The place is narrow but long, little more than a row of stools at a bar and booths with single seats against the windows. A teenage couple sit in one, the boy holding the girl's hand across the table. Anton sits in another booth, empty sugar packets and a half cup of coffee on his table. The clear glass ashtray has cigarette butts in a nest of ash.

Anton's eyes are rimmed with red. His hair is brown and short, parted in the middle. The small mustache and tuft of beard are starting to gray. Only black night roads could lead here. Gas station with sharp blue lights and semis rumbling on tarmac. A beacon. This is Aliento.

A man walks in wearing red checkered flannel and thick boots. He's looking at the waitress, who fills a square silver coffee maker with water. "Balthazar," Anton calls. Balthazar looks away, then back at the door. He takes a step towards the door. "No," says Anton. "Come here and sit down." Always pressed suits before. Emerging straight and tall from a car and fixing his collar. Never a look like he wants to run.

Balthazar stops and walks to Anton's booth. "It's funny, I want to tell you that," he says, sitting down in the seat opposite. "Because I thought about you this morning. Something made me remember our first job together."

Anton takes a packet of cigarettes from the jacket crumpled between his hip and the wall. He pulls out a cigarette and offers another to Balthazar, who declines. "You mean that guy on 14th street." Hard kicks at a door. The jamb starting to splinter. Balthazar standing back, calm, gun in hand.

"No. A lot earlier than that. Remember we delivered some stuff for that high school kid?"

Anton is lighting his cigarette. He puffs the new smoke and smiles. "Oh yeah. We were even younger than he was." Black-hair, big, greasy-looking teeth. "I got a few bucks for you guys if you'll do something for me. His hands unrolling a paper sack. White powder in taped plastic inside.

The waitress comes by in her creamy green skirt. "Hi, how are you tonight?"

"I'm fine, Janie," says Balthazar. "Just coffee."

She smiles and nods. When she's gone he folds his hands on the table. "How did you find me, Anton?"

Anton shrugs. "It took a while. I started at the motel, showed your picture around. Finally ended up here and found a waitress who told me you showed up pretty often."

Balthazar jerks his thumb. "Her?"

Anton shakes his head. "No, I've come here on a few nights."

The waitress returns with cup, saucer and coffee pot. She offers to fill Anton's but he tells her no.

"So, what are you supposed to do?" says Balthazar.

"Kill you and bring back the money, what else would it be?" A man pulling him aside by the tall lamp in the corner. "He's angry now, I mean steaming out of every orifice." "Why?" The light slick and glowing on the wood-paneled wall. "Balthazar Krebs is gone."

"Well, you can't have the money."

"Spent it already?"

"No, none of it. I was careful about that." Balthazar sips his coffee. "No, I think of it as sort of an offering."

"Offering?"

"You know. Leaving a candle burning in a church, or flowers at someone's grave."

"You're not religious, Balthazar. I know you."

"I was once, back when I was really young. When we were just punk thieves in the street." He and Balthazar and the other kids in a circle around the boy. "You can't leave until you give us something." Looking from one to the other, eyes tearing over, a shove. "Piss your pants, baby."

Balthazar leans forward and pushes the cup aside. "I've been doing some reading lately. There's one story I really like. I want to tell it to you."

"Sure, go on." He taps the cigarette on the ashtray's lip.

"Okay, it's about a saint whose name was John Gualbert. He started his own abbey, but before that he was just a typical man, living like anybody else. Then one day his brother was killed by another man, a man John knew. So John strapped his sword on his hip and went looking. He happened to run into the man in an alley, backed him against a dead-end wall."

Balthazar picks up the cup and swirls the coffee around, lets it lap against the sides. "Now, imagine what he's thinking. He has his sword out, ready to push it in up to his wrist in blood. He has every reason to do it. Revenge. Family honor. Just plain anger. But the other man drops to his knees, probably shaking, maybe putting his hands out. And John doesn't do it. He slips the sword back in the sheath and walks away." Long blood groove gleaming in polished silver. Sighting along that to a man's open wide eyes. Stale rain in cobblestones. A wall hard and dark.

"I think about that. Somehow, the easiest thing in the world got too hard for old John Gualbert." The resignation. Sword point dropped to the ground. A long walk away and someone sobbing behind. The echoes of his sobs in the alley.

"You'll tell me why you ran, won't you?" says Anton.

Balthazar takes a long swallow of his coffee. "It wasn't the money. Like I said, I never even touched it."

"I didn't think so, but I wanted to ask you myself."

"That's why you haven't shot me yet?"

Anton squeezes the cigarette butt into the ash. "We heard about your last job. Things didn't happen the way they were supposed to." Newspaper headline. "DUAL MURDER AT ROADSIDE MOTEL." An ambulance. A woman caught weeping into her hands.

"I didn't think it could be as easy anymore. Not after that." Balthazar holds his hand up, thumb extended, three fingers clenched, index finger making a pulling motion. "That action there, squeezing the trigger, it can be so simple you don't feel like your finger's touching something, or it can be so hard that that little piece of metal seems to be welded in place. You have to wonder what makes that difference. I didn't know for all these years, but I know now." Flash of smoke. Burning carbon smell. Somebody swimming in his own blood, drowning, then silent.

"You have your gun on you, Balthazar?"

"No."

"That's no way for a man on the run to hide out."

"Where's yours?"

Anton pats the piled coat beside him.

"What kind of a hitman are you? You never talk. Everyone knows you never talk."

Anton looks out the window. Streetlights fogged a little through the glass. The two men's reflections, ghost colors floating against black night. "I'm not the only one looking for you, Balthazar. We've all been offered a lot."

"Lots of money."

"Not just that. You were the top hunter for a long time and you left a big empty space. They say whoever gets you takes your place, and there's a lot of hungry men back home."

"You're looking for a promotion."

"I remember that first job, and before that. Do you remember that you were just a little punk who had no friends. None of the other boys liked you, I'm the one who talked them into letting you in. If it wasn't for me, you would've been like those other fucks we kicked the shit out of." Balthazar in the circle's center. Sweater with stretched dirty cuffs. Pants too short. "Are you scared, huh?" "No, he's okay, leave him alone."

"But somehow when we started playing with the big boys they picked you for the important jobs and kept me around to back you up. I noticed that. Maybe you didn't think so, but I did." Three around a table. Whiskey in short glasses. "I know the guy, I'll talk to him," says Anton. Gesture with a fat cigar. "No, Krebs goes. You stay back, he'll call if he needs you, right Krebs?"

Balthazar pulls his cuff back and checks his watch. "Around this time, I finish up my coffee." He swallows the last of his cup, pulls a dollar bill from his wallet and slips it under the saucer. "And I go for a long walk. It helps me settle my mind before going to sleep. So goodbye, Anton." He gets up and waves to the waitress before pushing out of the front doors.

Anton watches him turning and walking down the sidewalk. Then he adds another dollar to the table and gathers his coat. Outside, he runs to catch up, finding his automatic in the coat. "Balthazar!" he calls, pulling back the gun's action. Balthazar stops and turns. He looks at the gun.

"Just tell me where the money is," says Anton. "You don't want it. I'll take the money with me and you can disappear. Then I'll tell them I got you. If I have the money I can fake it."

Balthazar shakes his head. "Nobody gets the money. The money rots."

Anton moves a little closer. "Then I bring you back in the trunk with a hole in your head."

"You're not getting the money."

"It has to be one or the other. I've waited too long, I don't think you realize that."

Balthazar puts his hands in his pockets, looks down at the sidewalk. "If it's that easy for you, I think you should go ahead and do it."

Anton extends his arm and steps to put the gun's muzzle a few inches from Balthazar's forehead. Two sights, three green dots in alignment, along smooth barrel to small folds in skin. Gray hair gleaming in streetlight glow.

"Never talk," says Anton "You never talk." He steps back, holds the gun at his hip. "Like I said, there's others. I ran into Schlegel and his young murderer friend two towns back. It's only a matter of time. Take whatever you have and make for the border." He pulls the slide back and empties the bullet from the barrel. Balthazar shakes his head. "No, I've got a job to do here."

Anton puts his coat on and slips the gun into the pocket. "You don't care if you get dropped, so why do I care if I'm the one who drops you."

"I don't know, Anton."

"Well, Balthazar, I have a long fucking drive home, so good night." The lights on the long stream of reflectors, flashing on highway signs. Cigarettes tapped out on window's edge. Sting of cold air.

Balthazar nods, then turns and continues down the sidewalk. Anton watches him and crosses the street to his car.

Anton's thirteen and Balthazar's twelve, standing together at the foot of somebody's steps. Paper bag in Anton's grubby hand. "I don't know," he says. "It's okay, just knock," says Balthazar. "Why don't you knock." Balthazar kicks the first step. "Come on, we'll get some money for this. We'll split it even. You knock and I'll talk, okay?" He pushes Anton by the shoulder. Anton clutches the bag tighter and walks up the steps. Balthazar follows. Anton knocks three quick times on the door and jumps behind Balthazar. The man who opens the door is in his thirties, dressed in a loose blue robe. His hair is sticking up and his chin is black with unshaved growth. "What the fuck do you want?" he says. "Jimmy sent us," says Balthazar. "Jimmy, well where is he?" "He's busy. We work for him. We have what you wanted." He reaches back and pulls on Anton's sleeve. Anton holds up the bag. The man smiles. "Oh really? Well let's have it." "Wait," says Balthazar. "First the money." The man looks at him, starts laughing and shakes his head. He steps away from the doorway. Balthazar looks at Anton and nods. When the man returns he's holding bills in his hand. "All right, but it better be good stuff or your ass is mine." Balthazar takes and counts the money, then gestures to Anton who hands over the bag. After the door shuts, the two of them walk slowly down the steps and start to run, down the street and around the corner.