The Porkchoppers

29

On October 26, a Saturday, the gray-haired man who sometimes called himself Just Bill came out of his apartment building on West Fifty-seventh and turned left. In his right hand he held a leash that was attached to an aged English pit bull that waddled as it walked and wheezed as it breathed. In his left hand, Just Bill carried a brown, oblong, stamped and addressed manila envelope.

“Come on, Dum-Dum,” Just Bill said to the dog and strolled slowly down the block toward the mailbox. Half way there he stopped and bought a New York Daily News because its screamer headline had caught his eye:

Just Bill raised his eyebrows as he read the story while waiting at a lamppost for Dum-Dum to relieve himself. As he walked on toward the mailbox, Just Bill ran the facts of the story through his mind to determine whether any of them might implicate him. When he was satisfied that there was no possible way that they could, he smiled slightly, and checked the envelope again to make sure its address was correct:

Just Bill read the address twice to make sure it was right, nodded to himself in a satisfied way, and dropped the envelope into the mailbox.