mind on mescaline half the time, but he was still a genius."
  "I want to hear," said D'Amour. "Do you want to tell me?"
  Howie stared at him for a long moment. Then he sighed, and with a tone very like 
surprise said:
  "Yes. I think I do."
  Grillo was sitting in the 50's Cafe on Van Nuys Boulevard in Sherman Oaks, trying to 
remember what it was like to enjoy food, when somebody came and sat opposite him in the 
booth. It was the middle of the afternoon, and the cafe wasn't full. He raised his head 
to request some privacy but instead said:
  "Tesla?"
  She was dressed in quintessential Bombecksquerie: a flock of ceramic swans pinned to a 
midnight-blue blouse, a red bandanna, dark glasses. Her face was pale, but her lipstick, 
which clashed with the bandanna, was glitzy. Her eyeshadow, when she slipped her glasses 
down her nose, was the same shade of riot.
  "Yes," she said.
  "Yes what?"
  "Yes Tesla."
  "I thought you were dead."
  "I've made that mistake. It's easily done."
  "This isn't some illusion?" he said.
  "Well the whole damn thing's that, isn't it? All a show. But us, are we any more 
illusory than you? No."
  "Us?"
  "I'll come to that in a minute. First you. How are things?"
  "There's not much to tell. I went back to the Grove a couple of times, just to see who 
survived."
  "Ellen Nguyen?"
  "She wasn't found. Nor was Philip. I went through the rubble personally. God knows 
where she went."
  "Want us to look for her? We've got contacts now. It hasn't been much fun, as far as 
homecomings go. I had a body to deal with, back at the apartment. And a lot of people 
asking difficult questions. But we've got some influence now, and I'm using it."
  "What is this we business?"
  "Are you going to eat that cheeseburger?"
  "No."
  "Good." She pulled the plate over to her side of the table. "You remember Raul?" she 
said.
  "I never met the mind, only the body."
  "Well you're meeting him now."
  "I beg your pardon?"
  "I found him, in the Loop. At least I found his spirit." She smiled, ketchup round her 
mouth. "It's difficult to make this sound wholesome...but he's inside me. Him, and the 
ape he used to be, and me, all in one body."
  "Your dream come true," Grillo said. "All things to all men."
  "Yes, I suppose so. I mean, we suppose so. I keep forgetting to include us all. Maybe 
it's best I don't try."
  "You've got cheese on your chin."
  "That's it, bring us down."
  "Don't get me wrong. I'm glad to see you. But...I was just beginning to get used to the 
fact that you weren't around. Should I still call you Tesla?"
  "Why not?"
  "Well you're not, are you? You're more than that."
  "Tesla's fine. A body's called by what it seems to be, right?"
  "I suppose so," Grillo said. "Do I look like I'm freaked out by all this?"
  "No. Are you?"
  He shook his head. "Weird, but no. I'm cool."
  "That's my Grillo."
  "You mean our Grillo."
  "No. I mean mine. You can fuck all the great beauties in Los Angeles and I've still got 
you. I'm the great imponderable in your life."
  "It's a plot."
  "You don't like it?"
  Grillo smiled. "It's not bad," he said.
  "Don't be coy," she said. She took hold of his hand. "We've got some times ahead, and I 
need to know you're with me."
  "You know I am."
  "Good. Like I said, the ride's not over."
  "Good. Where'd you get that from? That was my headline."
  "Synchronicity," Tesla said. "Where was I? D'Amour thinks they'll try New York next. 
They've got footholds there. Had them for years. So I'm gathering half the team together, 
he's gathering the other half."
  "What can I do?" Grillo said.
  "How do you fancy Omaha, Nebraska?"
  "Not much."
  "That's where this last phase began, believe it or not. In the Omaha Post Office."
  "You're kidding me."
  "That's where the Jaff got his half-witted idea of the Art."
  "What do you mean: half-witted?"
  "He only got a piece of the thing, not the whole solution."
  "I don't follow."
  "Even Kissoon didn't know what the Art was. He had clues, but only clues. It's vast. It 
collapses time and place. It makes everything one again. The past, the future and the 
dreaming moment between...one immortal day..."
  "Beautiful," Grillo said.
  "Would Swift approve?"
  "Fuck Swift."
  "Somebody should have."
  "So...Omaha?"
  "That's where we start. That's where all the lost mail of America ends up, and it may 
have some clues for us. People know stuff, Grillo. Even without realizing it, they know. 
That's what makes us wonderful."
  "And they write it down?"
  "Yes. Then they send the letters out."
  "And they end up in Omaha."
  "Some of them. Pay for the cheeseburger. I'll be waiting outside."
  He did, and she was.
  "I should have eaten," he said. "I'm suddenly hungry."
  D'Amour didn't leave until late in the evening, and when he did he left two exhausted 
storytellers behind him. He took copious notes, flipping the pages of his pad back and 
forth as he tried to make sense of the way fragments of information related to one