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Moving quickly now, I bounded back out to the street and went into the alleyway the basement window led out to. I scoured the concrete under my feet. Nothing. Investigated the metal grate around the Darrow house. Nothing. The brick wall of the building opposite. Nothing. The only thing left to check was the big, metal garbage can sitting in the alley. I plucked off the lid and peered inside. Paydirt, in the form of a single feather. It wasn't any pigeon's feather. It couldn't have fallen in, anyway; the lid had been on firmly. It was almost completely black, with a white, tapering tip. I didn't recognize it, but still, I had what I needed.

I didn't even need to haggle over the cost of my services. I usually did, but I guess I don't usually deal with people with as much money as Douglas Darrow. He immediately offered me fifty dollars a day, plus expenses -- my usual rate is thirty-five -- and, on top of that, a hundred thousand dollars if I managed to recover the diamond. I had to have him repeat that last part a couple of times before I was sure I'd heard him right. After I'd left the premises and got back to my home turf in Hell's Kitchen, it was almost noon.

I decided to have lunch and think about my options. Darrow was meeting with Rossini at eleven at night on the twenty-fourth. It was the twenty-second now, which meant I had nearly sixty hours to work with. As long as the gem was still in the city, I knew I had a shot. The question is, how to find the perp? The quickest way was to get in touch with my man in uniform. But in the situation my client was in, maybe involving the police wasn't the best idea. After going through an egg salad sandwich, an order of fries, a slice of pie, and three cups of coffee, I finally had a plan.

It was a page out of Sherlock Holmes's book. I'm not nearly as smart as Holmes, by any means, but that doesn't mean I can't copy his methods. The next morning, a classified ad was going to run in the Times: "Found: 1 gold ring in alley, engraved For my blackbird at West 71st and Central Park West. Contact M. Manderly, KL 5-9125." Of course, I didn't find a gold ring in the alley. But so far, our mystery thief had been a bit of a show-off, and I couldn't help but think that, with that blackbird reference, she wouldn't be able to help herself. I found a payphone and called Tilly at the office, bringing her up to speed. She wasn't thrilled about me using her name, but the fifty thou she'd be getting if we find the diamond was enough to placate her.

Another walk around town, and I found myself at the precinct where my N.Y.P.D. liaison works. Joe Necchi, an old friend of mine, who's on the organized crime task force. I dropped the feather I found on his desk. "Recognize it?" I asked.

He looked up at me, then at the feather. I could see the gears working behind his face. "A calling card?" he asked.

"Yeah. Left behind at a burglary, somewhere it definitely couldn't have been by accident."

"A burglary?" Something seems to click. "Oh, yeah, I know who we're dealing with, now." He got up and went back to the wall of filing cabinets behind the desk. He pulled one open here, then there. It took him a minute to find the file he was looking for. He plunked it down on the table once he did. I grabbed a seat and flipped it open.

"La Gazza?" I asked. That was the alias printed at the top of the page. Attached to the front cover was a mugshot: a bird of some kind, mostly black, but with lighter streaks on her face -- couldn't tell the color. With a feathered hand, she clutched a plate with her name on it.

"Real name Velia Marchetti," Joe said. "Female, twenty-nine, five-foot-eight, hundred and ten pounds. Magpie, which explains the alias. La gazza means 'the magpie' in Italian," he explained. I'd given him a curious look.

I shot another glance at the mugshot. "This was taken thirteen years ago." The date had been scrawled onto the bottom of the photo: 9-14-38.

Joe nodded. "The only picture of her we have. Just a serial shoplifter back then. She'd taken the five-finger discount on about five hundred dollars' worth of merchandise."

"Jesus," I exclaimed. That much put her deep into grand larceny territory. "How did they catch her?"

"They didn't," he replied. "She turned herself in, confessed."

"And she went to jail?" I asked. "At sixteen?"

"No, that's the thing. She was acquitted."

"Acquitted? With a confession?"

"One of the officers that interrogated her when she turned herself in had a record of rough treatment with suspects. I have no idea what she said to him to get him to hit her, but . . ."

I nodded. This woman seemed to have a natual talent for deception and manipulation. "So she came in, confessed, only with the intent to get herself an acquittal?" It sounded like she enjoyed getting one over on the police, liked showing off. That whole trial might have even been her résumé. It all seemed to tally with what I'd figured out. I stood up.

"Okay, thanks for the intel, Joe."

"No sweat," he said. "Next time I'm at McCarran's, buy me a drink."

As I walked out the door, I flipped open my notepad, where I'd written the ad I was going to place. I crossed out the word blackbird and replaced it with Velia. That should get her attention.

The call came almost as soon as I came into the office the next morning. I'd hardly sat down and started reading the paper when I heard the telephone ring. I heard Tilly's answer, then, doing the most I could not to make a sound on the line, I picked up the receiver. Putting a hand over the mouthpiece, I put the phone to my ear.

". . . found my ring?" finished a woman's voice. Velia's? Can't be sure.

"Yes, I sure did," replied Tilly. "Tell you what, darling. I'll buy you lunch and give you the ring back."

They settled on a little Italian place in Queens, at one o' clock. It was almost nine, now. After the call was done, I went out into the front room.

"So, boss, what's the plan?" Tilly asked. "Wait here, then go? Or are you gonna go now and stake the place out?"

I was thinking about the second. The important thing about that restaurant is that there's a diner across from it. It wouldn't be easy to catch someone spying on the entrance to the Italian place from there. Not impossible, but not easy. I told her this.

"So what are you going to do if she shows up? Gonna confront her? Make her give up the goods?"

I shook my head. "No, she won't bring the diamond with her, we can be sure of that. And she's not the type to 'give up' anything. I'm gonna have to follow her. When I don't turn up, she'll go back to her safe house. I follow her in, get the diamond, get out."

It was a good plan. Shame that wasn't how it went down. I got to the diner at twelve-thirty, sat in a booth next to the window. I had a perfect line of sight to the door of the place across the road. I waited. One o' clock came and went. So did two o' clock. It was almost three when I finally decided that she wasn't going to turn up. I was kicking myself for wasting a whole day in a time-sensitive case. Still, didn't matter. I had almost thirty-six hours left. I left the diner and took the subway back to the office. Tilly greeted me at the door as I took off my coat and hung it up.

"You were gone awhile," she said. "Get the diamond?"

I shook my head. "She was a no-show. She must have known it was a trap."

"Maybe she reads the Post," Tilly suggested. She was trying to cheer me up, but I wasn't in the mood for it yet. At my suggestion, Tilly threw on her coat and went home. Meanwhile, went into my office to come up with a new plan.

She was waiting for me.

There she was: Velia Marchetti. The thirteen years between her mugshot and now might as well not have happened. She looked almost exactly like she had in the picture, only now I could see the color, as well. She wasn't all black and white. A gold beak and a streak of yellow under her eyes. Blue covered her forearms and tail. A low-cut dress, blue, perfectly matching her feathers, went down to her knees, but her talon-like feet were bare, and more importantly, up on my desk. A small paper bag sat on her open palm. She extended it out to me.

"Peppermint?" she asked.

It took me a while to get my bearings. The audacity of the scene seemed to freeze me in my tracks. Here was the woman I'd been after for twenty-four hours, in the last place I expected to find her. Not only that, she had her feet on my desk and was offering me candy. I got the feeling I was up against an opponent much more cunning than I was. I wasn't used to it, and didn't like it one bit. After about ten seconds of my standing there silently, she shrugged her shoulders. "No? Maybe later." She picked one out herself, unwrapped it, taking her sweet time, making as much noise as she could with the cellophane. She popped it into her mouth and sucked on it ostentatiously. Finally, I came to my senses. I reached into my jacket, to the holster I kept strapped to my suspenders, and pulled out my .44. It was aimed right at her head.

She didn't seem fazed at all. Maybe a little amused. "Oh, so we're doing that?" She laughed. "Come on, Cain, we both know you're not going to shoot."

She was right. I could do it. But then, I'd get arrested. Darrow wouldn't get his diamond back and would probably get whacked. I put the safety back on and slipped the gun back into its holster. Velia didn't seem surprised. "I was hoping," she said, "that maybe we could talk like civilized people. Have a seat." She was pointing at the worn leather couch that was pushed up against the wall of my office. It was pretty galling, being offered a seat in my own office. But it was the right move. If I appeased her, maybe I'd be able to connive my way into getting what I want.

She rolled the desk chair over closer to me. Too close, really. Her face was about six inches from mine. "So," she said. I noticed there was a change in her tone of voice; it had gone from breezy and casual to seductive. "Cain Coney."

Her eyes bored into mine like tiny, dark brown drills. "I've been looking you up these last couple days," she said. "Cain Edwin Coney, born October seventh, 1920, in New Bowdoin, Maine. Volunteered for the Army on December ninth, 1941. Left college for it, which was a shame, considering you were in the top ten of your class. You were a sergeant in the 81st. Injured during Operation Forager. Took shrapnel, didn't you?"

I had no idea how she could possibly know these things. It was all true, though. A grenade had exploded about fifteen feet to my left when we were taking Peleliu. The memories afterward were foggy, but I vaguely recalled the doctors saying I nearly lost my leg. Even now, it hurt, especially when it rained. Velia took my silence for confirmation.

"They shipped you home after that," she pressed on. "You moved to New York and got a job on the beat. A real star on the force, too. Probably could have been commissioner one day. And yet, here you are, six years later, barely managing to keep afloat as a private dick." She lingered on that last word and leaned in even closer. I had no idea if she was trying to turn me on or piss me off. Or both. "Why is that, Cain?"

That threw me for a loop. Did she really not know, or was she just trying to get me to say it? I can't see how she couldn't, since she seemed to know everything else. But why get me to say it? It's not a big, ruinous secret. She could ask just about any cop in the N.Y.P.D. and find out. I still didn't say anything. The smell of peppermint was very distracting.

"You know, Cain, you're going to have to say something at some point," she said. "That, or we could do something about this palpable sexual tension between us." She stroked my face, but a second later broke out in laughter, as if she couldn't hold it in anymore.

Finally, I spoke up, trying to cut to the chase. "Where's the diamond, Velia?"

"Ooh, direct," she said. "I like a man that knows what he wants. But you shouldn't worry, sweetie. The diamond's safe."

"It may be, but Darrow isn't. Do you really want his blood on your hands?"

"No, I really don't," she said. "I might be a thief, a liar, and a slut, but I'm not a killer."

"So give it back," I said.

"Oh, come now," she laughed. "You really think I'm going to make it that easy for you? No, sweetie, if you want that gem, you're going to have to work for it." She leaned even further in. There was maybe half an inch between my mouth and hers. I stared at her beak anxiously, not sure if kissing her at this point was a good idea. But that's just what she wanted, apparently. In the blink of an eye, she had a cloth over my face. I could smell, taste the ether it was saturated with. I was almost immediately woozy. Before I knew what was happening, she was at the window.

"Sorry, sweetie," she said. "But I don't want you following me. Best you stay here and sleep a while." The last thing I saw before I blacked out was the hem of her blue dress whip out of sight.