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only make things more difficult. “We need to talk to him, Shantal. It’s important.”
    “Yeah, well then I guess you gotta come back later, ’cause he ain’t here now.” She shook her head and looked like she was going to cry. “Why don’t you just leave him alone, Darius?” she said after a moment, her voice pleading. “You ain’t taken enough of his life?”
    Train considered their position. They had no warrant, and couldn’t force their way in to check the place out without facing charges later. Besides, looking at Shantal he could tell she wasn’t lying; her son wasn’t there. “All right, Shantal, we’ll come back later. You tell him we’re lookin’ for him, though, okay?”
    “Yeah, I will,” Shantal said. She glared at the two officers as they turned and walked away. “He’s a good boy!” she called after them. “You leave him alone now, you hear?”
    Train heard, but he was already down off the porch and headed back toward the car.
    z
    “What now, boss?” Cassian asked as they climbed back into the car.
    Train flipped open his notebook. “I’ve got the address of the place where Jerome’s parole officer got him a job. We could head over there, but I’ve got a feeling that’ll be a dead end. Shantal’s got no reason to lie about him getting fired.”
    “Might be worth a shot anyway,” Cassian said. “Sure beats the hell out of sitting here waiting for him to come home, sweating our balls off in this goddamned car.” He looked over at Train. “Too bad we don’t have a neighborhood watch pro gram set up out here,” he joked. “Somebody might have seen the man recently.”
    Train thought for a moment, and then suddenly opened the door to the car again. “We do,” he said as he got out. He walked up the lawn toward Thelma Thornton’s house, right toward the old woman, who was still sitting on her porch.
    She saw him coming and started shaking her head. “Don’t you do this to me, Darius Train,” she said as he neared the porch.
    “Do what to you, Miss Thelma?” He tried to force a smile.
    “You can gimme that fool’s grin all you like, but I can see the look in your eyes. You want me to say something that’s gonna get somebody in trouble.” She shook her head again. “Good Lord, son, don’t you know I still gotta live here?”
    Train held up his hands. “Okay, okay,” he said. “I won’t ask you to say anything that’ll get anybody into trouble. We’re just looking for Jerome, next door, and his mother doesn’t know where he is. I just thought, maybe, y’know, because you always seem to know everything going on in the neighborhood, you might have an idea where we might find him.”
    Thelma Thornton shook her head once more, though less forcefully this time. “Just like the police to use an old lady for information.” She looked at him. “I’d have hoped you’d be better,” she said.
    Train returned her look, his own eyes deadly serious. “It’s important, Miss Thelma,” he said. “A young mother was murdered yesterday. I’m not lookin’ to jam Jerome up for something he didn’t do, but we gotta talk to him. And the longer it takes for us to find him, the worse it’s gonna be for him.”
    She sighed and let her needlepoint fall onto her lap. She leaned in and spoke quietly. “Now I don’t know for sure, you understan’,” she said reluctantly. “A lot of what I hear is nothin’ more than rumor.”
    “We’ll take anything we can get, Miss Thelma. Even rumors.” Train knew that Thelma’s rumors were generally more accurate than anything printed in the daily papers.
    “I heard he’s running a shack down on G Street—you know, the one near Eighth? My guess is that you’d find him there,” she said. Then she added quickly, “You know him, though, Darius. He was a good boy once. It’s just the damned drugs that changed him.” She looked him in the eyes again. “And prison.”
    Train felt as though he’d been slapped, but it was worth