I rested my arms on the window and glanced out at a late afternoon sky that resembled rusted steel. Threatening clouds had been hanging low for three days now and so far the weatherman had not earned his keep.

The Saturday crowd moving along 125th Street probably had as little faith in the forecast as I and went about business as usual, ignoring the heat and the haze.

I sneaked another glance at my watch and wondered how long Elizabeth was going to wait. It was nearly 6:30.

"Claudine should've been here by now," I said, trying but failing to hide my impatience. "As long as we've known her, she's always been late, but this is something special."

I was annoyed because we three had arranged a week ago to go out to dinner to celebrate her impending liberation. I knew James Thomas, her soon-to-be ex, and I had detested him from the day we confronted each other three years ago at their wedding reception.

Now I pictured his smooth face and silky soft voice and felt a fleeting panic, imagining that he might have talked Claudine into changing her mind about the divorce, that he would get a job again, stop drinking, stop blaming and beating her for what he imagined the world was doing to him.

I turned from the window and faced into the office to watch Elizabeth lean back in her chair, an old swivel model of glossy dark walnut and vintage leather upholstery. The chair had belonged to her father when he'd had his own law practice uptown over the old Smalls Paradise next door to the Poro School of Beauty Culture. That was years ago. Elizabeth's office was smaller, and probably a lot more expensive. Space on 125th Street near the Apollo didn't come cheap.

The coil ...