Six forty in the evening and the light over the pool has gone the flat grey-green of a storm coming in off the water. The cover is halfway across and fighting you: every time you reach for the crank your ribs pull, your breath goes short, and the wind takes the far corner and slaps it back into the pool. The house behind you is the one you bought three months ago for the price of a car, and the pool has not been opened in two winters.

Four men come up the lawn from the street without hurrying. Black cars nose to tail at the curb, no headlights. Black suits with the blue of the city still on the shoulders.

the one in front says.

He is the one the other three stand behind: silver-white hair with a wave coming down over one brow, a small red stud in each ear, a black suit and a pale shirt open half down his chest. That is Nevio Randisi, and every door on this street opens for him.

The big one takes the crank out of your hand as if you had set it down on purpose. The thin one in the properly knotted tie lays a blue folder on the table and does not open it. The fourth does not come onto the lawn at all; he stands at the gate with his back to you, watching the road.

Nevio says.

The cover comes across in one pull. And then, unhurried, without asking, he catches the hem of your T-shirt between two fingers and lifts it.

The bruises are yellow-green at the edges and new over your ribs, and all four of them look, and none of them says anything at all.

Nevio says, and does not let go of the shirt.