The pedestrian rush-hour traffic of lower Manhattan was what he missed most. Back then one of his neighbors called him "The big-city warrior" because the commute from Ridgewood, New Jersey, to Wall Street was, he said, like going off to war. "They should give you the Purple Heart, Pal," he'd say, everytime he'd see Nick. Yeah, Nick thought now, the Purple Heart.

Though it was five in the evening, he had the Santa Fe sidewalk all to himself. The others, nowhere near him, walked leisurely as if getting home after a day's work wasn't worth the hurry. Two years already and Nick was sure he would never get used to this laid-back life. No wonder visions of New York City popped into his head! The melting-pot babble of crowd voices, the fiery bursts of profanities doused with giggles and cackles and roars of laughter. God, he missed that!

At San Felipe Avenue he crossed the street when the giant red hand turned green, then made his usual left at Graham's Liquor Loft.

Another uneventful day of menial labor made getting home to Omar, his sociopathic Persian cat, the highpoint in his day.

He knew the wisdom of heeding the voice of good counsel that kept his eyes forward, his feet moving towards home. If he had learned any lessons these past two years, they were these: live one day at a time; walk the straight and narrow; mind your own business." Sure he missed the old life, but the old life had betrayed him. If he had stayed there in the Big City, God knows he'd be lying in a dark box by now, envying the tall grass growing above him.

Nick turned to look inside the store window of Graham's Liquor Loft. Out of the corner of his eye he thought it was the Chianti wine bottles displayed like spokes in a wheel that caught his attention, but then he saw the tall man leaning against the inside of Graham's front door.

He was so damned ugly we all called him "Handsome." Funny how Nick remembered that after all these years. That and the frozen tic at the high corner of the tall man's mouth. It was almost as if one day as a kid he had made too many funny faces, and at one point God punished him by making him stay that way. The look gave big Gus Heidler a kind of perpetual smile, even when there was nothing much to smile about. Nick remembered him in his angriest moments when he'd stand there, hands on hips, teeth clenched and bared, and under the blazing coals of his dark eyes--one squinting nearly shut--that idiotic half smile that made it hard to take big

Gus seriously at all. Maybe it wasn't him. Maybe daydreaming about New York City was enough to conjure this familiar, unforgettable face, superimpose it in all its ugliness onto the nondescript face of a stranger. "Keep walking," said the voice in his head. "Go home. Feed your kitty. Keep your nose clean."

Nick shrugged off the voice, cast one hard last look through the store window. This time the tall man locked eyes with him, and Nick was certain this was no trick of the imagination. Damnit, it really was "Handsome"! Quickly he spun around towards the front door; Gus let him in.

"That you, Corelli?" Gus asked, extending a huge gloved hand that swallowed Nick's in a pumping handshake that hurt.

"Gus, it's you!"

"Yeah. Is this a small world or what?"

From behind the counter, past the displays of vodka and gin, a woman called to Gus, "Will this be all, Sir?" Gus ignored her. "Santa Fe. Well, I'll be damned," he said to Nick. "Might as well be the moon. I couldn't be any more surprised, Man!" He shook his head in disbelief.

"Rule number one: Don't talk to strangers.

"Rule number two: Don't talk to people you used to know. Keep walking. Pretend you're somebody else. Survival depends on it. You want to live? Go by the rules."

Nick Corelli could still hear Donovan drumming lessons into his head. He could remember how good the miracle felt: they were going to let him live! It was simply a matter of playing it smart, doing whatever it took to stay alive.

"When you move out here, City Boy?" asked Gus.

Nick blinked the memory of Donovan and the other FBI agents out of his mind. "Handsome" was all right. No reason to distrust him. We come from Brooklyn, for crying out loud! On the same block. My mother used to say how she wished Gus would wake up one morning without that smile and be healed once and for all. Gus was like family!

"About two years ago," Nick finally said. "I got tired of the old neighborhood. But you, Gus; you were smart. Right out of high school and you were thumbing a ride far from Brooklyn."

Finally Gus turned as though the woman at the counter had only just spoken to him. "Yeah, that's it," he called to her.

Then he walked to where she was folding the brown shopping bag and peeled away a twenty from a thick wad of bills.

"A six pack of Miller's and a bottle of--" she stopped to unravel the bag. Gus put his hand up. It was enough for her to close the bag again. Nick could tell that Gus's smile made the woman uncomfortable. As quickly as she could, she took his twenty dollar bill, made change, counted it out and gently dropped the change and bills into his gloved hand.

She smiled, then thought better of it. "Thank you," she said

to Nick as though he, not Gus, had bought from her. Nick smiled and both men headed towards the door, into what had already become a cool Santa Fe night.

"You live where?" asked Gus.

All those rules danced in Nick's head like sugar plums in a diabetic's dream. Once Donovan had held his service revolver against Nick's temple, explaining how damn easy it would be if he pulled the trigger and closed the chapter on one more wiseguy.

"I don't much care for you, Corelli. But I do my job. They say you're important. A star witness. You ain't no star, Boy. You're the night watchman, keeping an eye on the bigger boys breaking laws in the dark. You got a good singing voice, enough to sweet-song a few of those birdies into the big cage. Only thing is I say you don't smell much better than they do. Know what would please me, Corelli? To say how sorry I am for letting this trigger finger slip. Know what I mean?" Nick could feel the salt trickle down to his trembling lips. He nodded. When Donovan eased the hammer back to safety, he nodded again. "You're gonna do what we tell you, Mr. Canary. You'll sing your heart out and then you're outa here. You kiss your old lady goodbye, your kids, your mother. Then you kiss the ground when you get there, understand? You learn all about the new you. Say goodbye to Nick Corelli; leave all your sins behind and look straight ahead. Understand?"

"...understand," Gus was saying.

"Huh?"

"You live around here, Nick?"

"Down San Felipe three blocks," Nick said, then laughed.

Gus knitted his eyebrows; the taut half moon of his smile twitched noticeably under his right eye. "No, I'm laughing because this is a helluva night, Gus. I mean out of nowhere I run into an old high school pal I haven't seen in twenty years. I hear my old name again.

It's like walking in a dream. You called me 'Nick.'!"

"Yeah, so? What do you want me to call you: Mr. Corelli maybe? You gonna surprise me now and say you're a big shot?"

The air was crisp; it reminded him of Brooklyn Septembers. But one look at the streets lined with green trees and so many flowers, and there was no chance of mistaking this pueblo mission town for the Big City Nick knew a lifetime ago. Gus had left New York City for a new life; Nick stayed, loved the old life too much, wanted too much from it till that life started burying him alive. What did it earn him, all that ambition and power, all that money? A new start here in Santa Fe, that's what. A new life that made him feel more dead than maybe he was meant to feel.

"You in trouble, Corelli?" asked the big man with the big smile. "If you are, I got lots of friends. I just have to pick up the phone and--"

Nick waved Gus's words away. A friend! God, when was the

last time he had one? His wife? Even his two sons--all of them said to go away and never come back.

Donovan was right: he should have pulled that trigger.

"You and me, we go back a long way, Gus. We stood, like they say, at the crossroads of life except you took the right turn, I took the left. You happy, Gus?"

"Sure. As happy as an ugly-faced guy can be, I suppose."

"Hey, you got that face and it ain't easy to hide, but 'Handsome,'--I mean, Gus--you got a heart a gold. You just saved my life!"

When they reached the apartment building, Nick pointed up the steps. "Home sweet home. Come on up."

The 40-watt lightbulb in the hall had burned out. Like blind men the two of them negotiated the three flights one cautious step at a time until Nick reached his door, inserted the key, and the two of them entered the small apartment. Nick put the light on in the kitchen. Omar hissed.

It was not his entire life that flashed before Nick's eyes in that final moment, brightened by the fire of an almost silent gun.

It was the half smile on Gus's face or it was Donovan holding a cocked pistol against his temple or maybe it was thinking how safe he had always felt in New York traffic.

Gus leaned sideways so he could cradle the phone against his shoulder while he punched in the New York number. Someone on the other end picked up but did not speak. "Santa Fe," Gus said. "The night is cool. Our boy is fast asleep."

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