. . . Then the unmistakable sound of a shotgun blast out on the street jerked Blackburn back to the real world. So he resolved to kill whoever had done it. If he had the chance.

     But when he went outside, he saw it was too late. The moon had emerged from the clouds, and its weird ochre light mingled with the glow from the shop to reveal what had happened. The driver's door of the Chevy van was open, and the thin, dark-haired man who had bought the shotgun was slumped on the seat inside. He couldn't really be identified as "dark-haired" anymore, though, because the top of his head was gone, along with half of his face. Blackburn only knew who it was because of the Army jacket. And the shotgun. He recognized that too. The polished walnut stock was clamped between the man's knees, and his thumb was still on the trigger. The shotgun's muzzle was inside what was left of his mouth.

     Blackburn was perturbed. This guy had not been considerate. If he was going to blow off his own head, he could have at least gone home first. By doing it here, he had interfered with other people's lives.

     The bell on the pawnshop door clanged, and then Uncle Bill was standing next to Blackburn, cradling another shotgun.

     "Oh," Uncle Bill said. His cigar dropped from his mouth, and he stared at the mess in the van. "Oh. I thought . . . I thought maybe there was some trouble out here."

     "Not exactly," Blackburn said. He glanced down at the shotgun Uncle Bill was holding. "So you might want to take that back inside before the cops come. Just so they don't get nervous before they understand the situation."

     Uncle Bill looked pale, but he nodded. "Yeah. Good idea. Good thinking."

     Blackburn could see that Uncle Bill was rattled. "Don't worry," he said. "This didn't have anything to do with you. He killed himself."

     Uncle Bill couldn't seem to stop staring at the man in the van. "Yeah, but they'll still question me. Because I traded him for that shotgun. He got it from me."

     "It's his thumb on the trigger. That's what counts."

     "But why go to all that trouble?"

     "All sorts of reasons," Blackburn said. "Life is too hard for some folks."

     Uncle Bill scratched his jaw. "That's not what I mean. I mean, why come to my shop and dicker for a shotgun? Why not just park the van in his garage and gas himself?"

     Blackburn looked at the corpse and shrugged. "Maybe he doesn't have a garage. Or maybe he just wanted to make sure. A shotgun in the mouth is pretty definite." He gave Uncle Bill a sidelong glance. "What'd he trade for it, anyway?"

     "Stack of silver dollars," Uncle Bill said, shifting his gun to the crook of his left arm. "1911 to 1932. Plus an old straight razor with a carved ivory handle. That was the clincher. Beautiful thing. He coulda used that, too, come to think of it. It's probably a hundred years old, but it still has an edge. Coulda slit his wrists in his bathtub, passed out in the water, and died peaceful."

     "But if he'd done that," Blackburn said, "you wouldn't have your silver dollars."

     Now, finally, Uncle Bill looked away from the van. "Yeah, well. Suppose I'd better call the police."

     "I expect they're already on their way. Sound carries on a cold night."

     "But I have to call 'em anyway." Uncle Bill nodded toward the Falcon, as if he knew without asking that it was Blackburn's vehicle. "And you might want to clear out. This wasn't none of your affair, so you shouldn't have to answer any questions or have the law poking around your car. We'll have to take a rain check on that .357."

     Blackburn saw the wisdom of getting the hell away. There were a number of items in the Falcon that he wouldn't want a cop to discover. "You make a good point," he said. "I'm sorry we couldn't do business."

     "It's just temporary. Come back in twelve hours."

     Blackburn looked past Uncle Bill and saw all three teenagers staring out through the shop windows. And now they all seemed younger than they had before. Especially Amy. With her eyes wide in horror, she looked about thirteen.

     "Crap," Blackburn said.

     Now Uncle Bill noticed them too. "Aw, Jesus H.," he said. "I hate for my niece to see this."

     Blackburn was surprised. "So you really are their Uncle Bill?"

     "Just Amy's. Them boys live next door to her, out near the fairgrounds. But they call me Uncle Bill, too. Everybody does." Uncle Bill closed his eyes. "Hell. She went through enough shit three and a half weeks ago."

     "What happened three and a half weeks ago?" Blackburn asked.

     Uncle Bill opened his eyes and frowned. "Never mind. It was bad, and this'll just remind her. But I'm her ride home, so there ain't nothin' to do about it." He spat on the sidewalk. "Goddamn Christmas break. They wouldn't even be here if they had school tomorrow."

     Blackburn looked at the girl again. He didn't know what she had already been through, but she didn't look as if she deserved to go through anything at all. "I could give her a ride."

     Uncle Bill's frown became a glare. "Yeah, you bet. One stranger trades me for a shotgun, and he eats it right outside my store. Then another stranger, who claims he has a .357 handy, offers to give my niece a ride home. Do I look dumb enough to let Amy get in a car with a guy might be a rapist or a psycho killer?"

     "I give you my word that I'm not a rapist."

     "Maybe not," Uncle Bill said. "But that don't mean you're a fine human being. For one thing, you don't seem at all perturbed by this dead man here."

     "He's not the first one I've seen. And if you don't mind my saying so, Uncle Bill, you don't seem too perturbed, either. Here we are having a conversation while he's dripping."

     Uncle Bill squatted down, picked up his cigar from the cracked sidewalk, and replaced it in his mouth. It had gone out, but he didn't seem to notice. "He ain't my first, either. Although he's for sure the most fucked-up."

     "He's a mess, all right," Blackburn said. "Which means the cops, the coroner, and whoever they get to pick up the pieces will all be here for several hours. So I'm offering to help you out. If you don't want Amy here for the circus, I can take her home right now."

     Uncle Bill's expression softened. "Look, I appreciate the offer. But my sister-in-law Nadine, that's Amy's mother, gets off her shift at the waffle house on I-80 at 1:00 AM. So she'll be home pretty soon. And if she knew I'd let a stranger give Amy a ride, I'd never see the child again. See, ever since my dumbass brother drove into an overpass support and got killed, Nadine's let me be a sort of part-time daddy -- but she could pull the plug on that anytime she likes. You understand."

     "I do," Blackburn said. "But I also understand that you don't want Amy here for this, and you can't take her home yourself until after it's over. So here's my suggestion. I give you my Colt as collateral for her safety, with the understanding that you'll make me a deal for it tomorrow. And I can take the boys home, too. I'll even let the big one drive, if he's old enough. You said they live right next door to her?"

     "Yeah, but Nadine . . . "

     Blackburn didn't let him finish. "If we leave now, we can have them home before Nadine gets there. It's an easy shot out to the fairgrounds this time of night. But if you wait to take them home yourself, there's no telling how late you'll be. Probably after sunup."

     "I could call her," Uncle Bill said. He was almost muttering, talking to himself. "But if I tell her why we're gonna be late . . . Jesus H., she'd have a stroke." He glanced at the dead man, grimaced, and then looked at Blackburn again. "Amy sits up front with Jason," he said. "He's seventeen, got a license and everything. You sit in the back with Gerald."

     Blackburn couldn't help giving a slight smile. "I guess that means you trust me with Gerald."

     "I don't give a damn about Gerald. Now let's see the Colt. I think I hear a siren."

     Blackburn didn't hear a siren yet, but he sympathized with Uncle Bill's nervousness. If the police weren't on their way, they would be soon. So he went to the Falcon, opened the driver's door, and pulled the Colt from under the seat.

     "Any other weapons in there?" Uncle Bill asked. "Just out of curiosity."

     "No." Blackburn handed the gun over. "But feel free to look."

     "Nah, that's okay." Uncle Bill held the pistol in his right hand and peered at the cylinder. "I see it's loaded."

     "Empty chamber under the hammer," Blackburn said.

     Uncle Bill nodded. "Speaking of which. If Amy and her little friends don't get home safe, I'll empty another chamber into your balls. Got me?"

     "Yes," Blackburn said. "And don't worry. My balls have had enough trauma recently." If he had been in Uncle Bill's place, he thought, he would have insisted that the kids take the car without him. But if Uncle Bill didn't bring it up, he wasn't going to offer. The Quad City Motor Court was too far away to walk to.

     Uncle Bill tucked the pistol into his waistband, went to the shop door, and opened it. The cowbell clanged. "Amy? This gentleman's gonna give you and the boys a lift." Then he looked back at Blackburn. "By the way, what's your name, son?"

     "Jimmy," Blackburn said. "Jimmy Doyle."

     "Huh. Name like that you must be Irish. Where you staying in town, Irish?"

     "Quad City Motor Court, up on 61. Room 12." Blackburn took his room key from his pocket and held it up. The blue plastic oval dangling from the key caught the moonlight, and the flaking gold number 12 flashed.

     Uncle Bill squinted, then gave a nod. "Yeah, okay." He stuck his head inside the shop. "Go on, all three of you, get in Mr. Doyle's car. And don't look at the van. Jason, you're driving. Amy, you're shotgun." He coughed as he said the word.

     Amy came outside. "We already looked," she said. Her voice was toneless.

     That bothered Blackburn. It seemed to him that a teenage girl ought to be a little upset at the sight of a man with most of his head blown off. He knew his sister Jasmine would be, anyway. It didn't bother him, of course. But he was a lost cause.

     Amy went around the Falcon and got in on the passenger side without another word. Jason got in on the driver's side, and Blackburn climbed into the back seat and slid across so Gerald could get in on the curb side. Gerald got in, closed the door, and started to roll down the window, but the crank came off in his Band-Aided fingers after four turns. He looked horrified.

     "Don't worry about it," Blackburn said. He reached into his pocket, fished out the Falcon's ignition key, and handed it up to Jason, who sneered at him in the rearview mirror.

     On the sidewalk, Uncle Bill leaned down and spoke into the eight-inch window gap that Gerald had made before the crank had broken. "Jason, if you can drive this heap to Amy's house without wrecking it, I'll let you play that red guitar plugged into an amp tomorrow. Amy, you call me as soon as you get into the house."

     "What should I do?" Gerald asked.

     "Sit on your hands and keep your mouth shut," Uncle Bill said.

     It was clear to Blackburn that Uncle Bill didn't care for Gerald, although it seemed to him that Jason was the less likable of the two. But as long as neither of them did anything to him, he didn't guess it was any of his business.

     Jason put the key into the ignition, cranked it, and pumped the gas pedal. The Falcon coughed to life in less than ten seconds, and Blackburn's opinion of Jason went up a bit. So the kid was surly. Blackburn had been surly in his teens, too. It was even possible that he was still surly on occasion, although twelve of the possible witnesses to that fact were no longer available to confirm it.

     Uncle Bill slapped the Falcon's roof, and Jason pulled around the van and hit the gas. The Falcon roared, but its acceleration didn't match the noise. Streetlights began sending slow pulses of white through the car, and Blackburn found himself staring at the translucent fuzz on the back of Amy's neck. The fuzz was much lighter than the black fringe of her haircut. It looked like frost.

     As Jason turned north onto Gaines, Blackburn saw two police cars, lights flashing but sirens silent, turn from Gaines onto 4th. They were heading to Uncle Bill's via the same route he had taken.

     "See those cops?" Jason asked, giving Blackburn a sharp glance in the rearview.

     "Hard to miss," Blackburn said.

     "You do anything to us, they'll know."

     "I won't do anything," Blackburn said.

     Jason's eyes were hateful. "You say."

     Blackburn couldn't take offense. Jason had the usual teenage chip on his shoulder, but he also seemed to be paranoid enough to see the world for what it was. It wasn't personal. It was just good sense.

     "You'll see," Blackburn said. "Even if I wanted to do something, I wouldn't have time."

     Now Amy turned to look back at him. Her cheek had a little frost, too.

     "Why not?" she asked.

     "I have to get to my motel so I can let my dog out to pee."

     Amy gave him a pout. "Too bad," she said, and faced forward again.

     Now Blackburn was confused. Staring out the pawnshop window, Amy had seemed about thirteen. But just now, she had sounded like a twenty-two-year-old who knew how to be coquettish and contemptuous in the same breath. And she had looked it, too.

     As Jason turned west onto Locust, Blackburn glanced at Gerald. Gerald was staring out at the night, shivering in the frigid air that was slapping his face through the half-open window. His breath had made a foggy half-moon at the top edge of the glass. He had to be freezing, but he kept his face in the wind. He was sitting on his hands, and his mouth was shut. He hadn't been this withdrawn in the pawn shop. So maybe he had gotten too close a look at the guy in the van. Or maybe he was afraid to disobey Uncle Bill.

     Blackburn watched as Gerald's unblinking right eye began to water. A clear droplet crawled up into his stringy hair. And although Blackburn couldn't see it after that, he was pretty sure it turned to ice.

     The kids lived on a narrow street in a neighborhood that had once been suburban and middle-class, but was now city-swallowed and rundown. Blackburn had seen streets just like it in Kansas City and Wichita, streets with pocked and patched asphalt and decaying two-bedroom houses with crooked porches and rust-stained siding. Throw in some malnourished, winter-stripped trees and a couple of dull, flickering streetlights, and Blackburn's single room at the Motor Court didn't look too bad in comparison.

     Jason stopped the Falcon in front of a snow-crusted gravel driveway that led to one of the little houses. The house's porch light was on, but there was no car in the driveway or any other sign of life. "Looks like your mom ain't home yet," Jason said. "I guess that's good. Now she won't freak out."

     Amy pushed her hair back. Blackburn couldn't see her face, but he saw her hand come over the top of her head and knot into a fist, bunching the black hair into a stiff brush above the frost.

     "She'll find some reason to freak out anyway," Amy said. "She comes home, freaks out, and wakes me up. That's what she does."

     "Want to come over to our house instead?" Jason asked.

     Amy shook her head while still clutching her hair. "We might wake up your dad. 'Sides, it'll be worse if I'm not here when Mom decides to show up." She released her hair, pulled the door handle, and pushed with her shoulder. But the door didn't budge.

     "You have to unlock it first," Blackburn said.

     Amy didn't seem to have heard him. She just kept straining against the door. So Blackburn reached around the edge of the front seat to unlock it himself. But Amy reached for the button at the same time, and their cold fingers met. Blackburn tried to do the polite thing and pull away, but Amy's hand closed around his middle finger and squeezed. And when Blackburn was able to pull away, his finger was warm.

     He glanced at Jason, who was glaring at him. But the glare wasn't any more vicious than it had been earlier, so Blackburn didn't think Jason had noticed the finger-squeezing. That was probably a good thing.

     Amy pulled the lock button, opened the door, and stepped out. "Thanks for the ride, Jason," she said, leaning down and looking back into the car. She turned toward Blackburn then, and her dark eyes locked on his. "You too, Mister Doyle."

     For a moment, Blackburn forgot that his name was supposed to be Doyle. Then he remembered, and he gave a nod. He didn't think it would be a good idea to say anything. His finger was throbbing, and he was afraid he would ask her why she had squeezed it.

     Amy shifted her gaze to Gerald. "See you tomorrow, Gerald."

     Gerald was staring off across the street, but his shoulders moved a little. It might have been a shrug.

     "See you, Amy," Jason said. "I'll stay here 'till you're inside."

     Amy's eyes seemed to go black, but Blackburn looked up and saw that a cloud was passing over the moon again. He looked back down at Amy then and wondered what she would look like in the light of day. Her skin was so pale and her hair so dark that he had trouble imagining her under anything brighter than moonlight and streetlamps. She looked as if sunlight would make her dissolve like a snowy image on TV.

     "That's okay," Amy said. "I'm fine." She closed the door a little harder than necessary and walked up the driveway to the house. Her sneakers crunched on the icy gravel.

     Jason sat watching her. But Blackburn noticed that Amy didn't look back at him. Not even when she was on the porch, unlocking the door, and going inside.

     When a light came on in a window at the corner of the house, Jason drove the Falcon another twenty yards to the next driveway and pulled in. This house here was a mirror image of Amy's. The only difference was that the driveway had once been paved. Now it was potholed and broken. It made cracking sounds as the Falcon bounced to a stop behind a brown Rambler station wagon parked under an aluminum carport.

     "Looks like Dad's home," Jason said. Gerald didn't respond.

     Jason put the Falcon in Park, then got out and started walking toward the house. He didn't thank Blackburn, and he didn't seem to notice that Gerald was still sitting in the back seat with his face against the half-open window.

     Blackburn couldn't make up his mind about Jason. Cut him a break, or break his neck? It was a tossup.

     He opened his door and stepped out, expecting that Gerald would do the same. But Gerald remained in the same position he'd been in since downtown. His breath was still maintaining a foggy circle on the glass. But otherwise, he was as still as a cadaver.

     Blackburn gave a sharp whistle to stop Jason, and Jason came running back with an expression of mingled anger and fear on his face. The Falcon's headlights made the puffs of his breath look like glowing smoke.

     "What the hell?" Jason said. "My dad's trying to sleep."

     Blackburn nodded at the car. "Your brother's not moving."

     "So? Wake him up."

     "I don't think he's asleep." Blackburn came around the back end of the Falcon and met Jason at the left rear door. Gerald's cheekbone was resting against the top edge of the glass, and now Blackburn could see that both of the boy's eyes were open and unblinking. "Looks more like catatonic."

     "You some kinda expert on that?"

     Blackburn raised an eyebrow. "No. But I've seen awake, asleep, and dead, and this doesn't look like any of those. Process of elimination."

     Jason reached in through the open window, grasped Gerald's hair, and bounced his face against the glass. The circle of fog smeared. "Hey, dumbass," Jason said. "Wake up. We're home."

     Gerald blinked, then turned to stare up at Blackburn.

     "God?" Gerald asked.

     "I hope not," Blackburn said.

     This seemed to interest Gerald. "You're not sure?" he asked.

     Jason made a noise in his throat. "Not again," he grumbled, then yanked open the door.

     Gerald began to fall out, but Blackburn caught him and pulled him up, then steadied him from behind with a hand on each shoulder. He could feel that if he took his hands away, the boy would topple like a piece of wood.

     "We may have to carry him," Blackburn said. He was annoyed at the prospect, but didn't want to let the kid collapse. Word might get back to Uncle Bill, and their business arrangement might suffer.

     Jason slammed the car door, and the window fell down the rest of the way.

     "Hey," Blackburn said. He had never killed anyone under voting age, but there was a first time for everything.

     For a moment, Jason looked a little startled. "Sorry," he said.

     Blackburn was satisfied. "No problem. I'm getting rid of this thing in a few days anyway." He lifted his hands from Gerald's shoulders for a second, and the boy began to fall to the left. Blackburn caught him. "Is this typical?" he asked. "Or should he go to a hospital?"

     Jason grasped Gerald's left arm. "No, he's okay. I mean, he will be. He comes out of it."

     Blackburn took his hands away so Jason could support Gerald. "If you say so."

     "Thanks for the ride," Jason said. He pulled Gerald forward a few steps, and then they both almost fell when they hit an icy spot. They stopped and wobbled while Jason tried to get a better grip.

     Blackburn sighed. If they had just gotten past the Falcon's driver's door, he could have gotten in and been gone. He hoped Uncle Bill was going to give him a heck of a lot of money for the Python.

     He stepped up and took Gerald's right elbow. "I'll help you get him to the house."

     Jason gave a grunt. "We gotta go to the back door. My dad has the only key to the front."

     Blackburn and Jason began shuffling up the icy driveway, half-dragging Gerald between them. Blackburn slipped on a patch of ice as they went under the carport, but he caught himself by putting a hand on the Rambler's hood. The cold metal made a whumpa sound as Blackburn lifted his hand again.

     "Watch it," Jason whispered. "You'll wake up my dad."

     Blackburn didn't say anything. Tough if their dad did wake up. If he was anything like Blackburn's old man, he didn't deserve any sleep anyway.

     They made it through the carport and went around the corner of the house. The light from the street was blocked now. But the moon had come out again, so Blackburn was able to avoid the old toys and auto parts that cluttered the tiny back yard. Everything seemed to be the color of rust. But then Blackburn glanced up and saw that the moon looked rusty, too. The reddish hue had deepened. It was almost the color of a fresh bloodstain on white cloth.

     "Look at that," he murmured.

     "At what?" Jason said.

     "The moon. It's red."

     Now Gerald looked up at Blackburn with his big, unblinking eyes. "You are God," he said.

     They had reached the back door. Blackburn held Gerald upright while Jason dug a key from his pocket and struggled to get it into a deadbolt lock.

     Gerald swayed in Blackburn's grasp and tried to reach up to touch his face, but Blackburn leaned away from the quivering fingers. Jason continued to struggle with the lock.

     "Please don't hurt me, God," Gerald said. "I'll be good." He kept reaching for Blackburn's face.

     Blackburn was just about to drop Gerald and head back to the Falcon when a yellow bulb under the eaves came on, and the door was pulled open from the inside. A small, stoop-shouldered man wearing thermal underwear stood there blinking. His thinning, stringy hair flopped down to his eyes, and Blackburn could tell that it was usually combed back over his bald spot.

     "I wonder if you boys could make a little more noise," the man said. His voice was thick and sleepy. "I was havin' a dream where this winged dragon was carryin' me up to the stratosphere. And if you let me go back to sleep, who knows, he might drop me, which could result in sweet death."

     "Only in the dream," Blackburn said.

     The man gave him a bleary stare. "You die in a dream, you die in real life too. Didn't you know that? And who the hell are you, anyway?"

     "This is Mr. Doyle, Dad," Jason said before Blackburn could answer. "He gave us a ride from Uncle Bill's."

     "I thought Uncle Bill was gonna do that."

     "He was," Jason said. "But there was a guy shot himself outside the store, so he had to wait for the cops. And now Gerald's having another episode."

     "Shit. This fuckin' town." The boys' father stepped back and pulled the door open wide. "Well, bring him in. What're you doin' standin' out there in the cold?"

     Jason went inside without another word or glance to Blackburn. And now Blackburn was stuck with Gerald, because the boys' father was shuffling away from the door and turning on a kitchen light. So Blackburn propelled Gerald inside, then closed the door with his foot before continuing into the small gray kitchen. The room was illuminated by a bare ring-shaped fluorescent bulb in the ceiling, and it smelled like cold potatoes. Jason had already disappeared into another part of the house, but the boys' father was sniffing at the filter basket of a grimy coffeemaker. He gestured toward the Formica table in the center of the room.

     "Sit him down there," he said. "If I put him to bed when he's like this, he'll start screaming. But if I can get some coffee into him, sometimes he comes around without the screaming."

     Blackburn steered Gerald to the table and managed to get the boy into one of three red-vinyl chairs.

     "Thank you, God," Gerald murmured. Blackburn could barely hear him. "Thank you for not cutting me up."

     "Don't mention it," Blackburn said. He looked over at the boys' father, who had snapped the filter basket in place and was now pouring water into the machine. "Guess I'll be going now."

     The man gave Blackburn a scraggly smile. "Stay for a cup of coffee if you like, Mr. Doyle. By the way, I'm Don Leymer. Guess you've already met my boys."

     "Yes. And the girl next door."

     "That'd be Amy." Leymer flipped the switch on the coffeemaker and shuffled over to the table, scratching his chest through the thermal undershirt. "Sweet girl. Gerry here's got a crush on her. Hell, they both do. Now that Annie's gone, I mean. That was the one Jason really liked." He ruffled Gerald's hair. "Fuckin' shame."

     "What's that?"

     Leymer peered at Blackburn. "You must be from out of town."

     "Been here a couple weeks."

     "Haven't seen a newspaper? The Quad-City Times?"

     "I've been pretty busy."

     "Oh. Well, then." Leymer sat down in one of the red chairs as the coffeemaker began to make gurgling sounds. "Amy's sister Annie got killed, I guess it musta been four weeks ago. December 3rd, after some kinda dance at the high school. The boy she was out with got killed too. David something-or-other. Football player. Both of them seventeen. And whoever done it cut them up real bad. Took Annie's head clean off, and almost did the same to the boy. The medical examiner says the murder weapon had an edge like a razor. And after the guy killed them, he stripped 'em naked and left 'em in the back seat of the boy's car. The cops found 'em at Devil's Glen Park over in Bettendorf, posed like they was . . . well, you can imagine."

     Blackburn glanced down at Gerald, who was swaying in his chair.

     "Don't worry," Leymer said. "When he's like this, he don't seem to be aware of anything anybody else says."

     Blackburn looked toward the back door. None of this was any of his business. But just as he was about to thank Leymer for the coffee offer and leave, Gerald grabbed his hand.

     "Forgive me," Gerald said, staring up at Blackburn again. "I didn't mean to be bad. Forgive me. Please."

     Leymer looked surprised. "This is a new one. He's been having these spells for a month, but this is the first time I've heard him say anything like that. What's he want you to forgive him for?"

     "I don't know," Blackburn said, pulling his hand from Gerald's and taking a step back. "But he's called me God a few times already."

     Leymer stiffened. "That so." He stood up and went back to the coffeemaker. The machine was dripping brown liquid into its carafe, and steam was rising from the vent at the top. There was only an inch of coffee in the carafe, but Leymer reached for its handle anyway.

     Blackburn could see what he was about to do. "If you throw that," he said, "I'll have to do something about it."

     Leymer stopped with his fingers touching the handle. "I wasn't going to."

     "Yes, you were." Blackburn considered leaving. But now he was curious. "How come?"

     Leymer ran his hand through his sparse hair, glanced at Gerald, and then took a chipped green mug from a draining rack by the sink. He set the mug beside the coffeemaker and watched the brown liquid rise in the carafe.

     "The cops don't know who cut up Annie and her boyfriend," Leymer said. "But they think Gerald might've seen the guy. What happened was, Nadine, that's Annie and Amy's mother, came home about 3:00 AM that morning and found Gerald sittin' in her driveway. Gerald and Jason had been hangin' around with Amy and some other kids outside the dance, but Jason says they got bored and came home about midnight. Anyway, Nadine finds Gerald in her driveway havin' one of these spells. The first one, in fact. But I don't really know just what happened, because I wasn't here. I was workin' the night janitorial shift at the osteopathic hospital." Leymer's voice turned bitter. "When I got home, the cops gave me shit for not lookin' after my boys every minute. Like it's my fault their mother ran off to fuckin' California, or that I got a job that makes me work some nights. But they're fourteen and seventeen, so how much motherin' or daddyin' should they need at this point?"

     Blackburn thought of his own daddy again, and wished he had been more like Mr. Leymer. Gone a lot. Or like Amy's daddy. Dead.

     "Did they give Nadine shit too?" Blackburn asked. "After all, you said she wasn't home until 3:00."

     "Hell, no." Leymer lowered his voice. "But that's 'cause she throws the cops a free one now and then. In between all the truckers. If you know what I mean."

     "Seems clear enough."

     Leymer's expression softened. "Look, I won't pretend that I think much of Nadine. But even she don't deserve the news she got that night. Way I understand it, she's in the driveway tryin' to get Gerald to move, when the cops pull up and tell her they found Annie out at Devil's Glen. And then Gerald starts jabberin' that God cut Annie to pieces. Thing is, at that point the cops hadn't said she'd been cut, or even that she was dead. All they said was they found her. So they figure he saw somebody outside the school. Somebody maybe waiting to follow some kids to Devil's Glen."

     "And now," Blackburn said, "you figure I might be that somebody. Because he's calling me God."

     Leymer didn't answer. But he glanced at the coffeemaker.

     "I don't blame you," Blackburn said. "You don't know me. But I wasn't in town on the 3rd. And I don't cut up teenagers."

     Leymer held up his hands. "All right. All right. Nobody said otherwise."

     "Just making sure." Blackburn took a step toward the door, then paused. "And if I were you, I'd talk to Uncle Bill. See, the man who shot himself outside Uncle Bill's store tonight did some business with him first. He traded an old straight razor for a shotgun. Then he went out and ate the gun."

     Leymer's eyes widened. "Like a man with a guilty conscience might do." He looked over at Gerald, who was now staring down at the tabletop and rocking back and forth. "Hear that, Gerry? The man who cut Annie is dead. So you don't have to act like this no more."

     Gerald just kept staring and rocking.

     "I'll be going now," Blackburn said. "Best of luck to you."

     "You won't stay for coffee?" Leymer asked.

     "No thanks." Blackburn started to leave, then paused again and looked over at the dark doorway that led to the rest of the house. "Best of luck to you too, Jason."

     Jason took a step into the wavering kitchen light. He was holding a rust-spotted butcher knife.

     "What the fuck you doing with that?" Leymer snapped.

     Jason glared across the kitchen at Blackburn. "Just being safe."

     "It's okay," Blackburn said to Leymer. "Under the circumstances, I'd've done the same." Then he turned away and went to the back door.

     As he opened it, he heard Gerald's voice behind him.

     "Thank you, God," Gerald said. "Thank you for not cutting us."

     "No problem," Blackburn said, and stepped out into the rusty moonlight.

                                         #

     By the time he stopped the Falcon in the Motor Court parking lot in front of Room 12, Blackburn had no hope that Dog could have held it this long. But he jumped from the car and hurried to the door anyway. He could hear Dog scratching and whining on the other side as he jiggled the key, and then she burst out in a small black-and-white blur as he shouldered the door open. She ran past him into the gravel lot and began dashing back and forth like a berserk rabbit, spraying gravel and dirty snow with each turn.

     Blackburn leaned against the doorjamb and watched her run. Room 12 was at the end of the building, and the only other occupied room was Room 1, down by the office. So he didn't think anyone would be bothered by the scrabbling sounds Dog was making as she ran and spun. Poor Dog. He had left her alone far too long. But then, he couldn't have predicted the turn his evening would take after his raid on Rock Island.

     Dog ran off the edge of the parking lot into a frozen field and squatted. Blackburn strained to see whether she was peeing or pooping, but she was too far away. The only reason he could see her at all was because of her white patches. He began to worry that she might run off into the darkness, and that the odd light from the moon wouldn't be enough for him to find her. So he stepped away from Room 12 and began to stroll toward Dog at what he hoped was a casual pace. He wanted to be able to get close enough to grab her if necessary.

     But Blackburn stopped as he came alongside the left rear door of the Falcon, the one with the fallen window. Amy was sitting inside, looking out at him.

     Blackburn was startled, but he tried not to let it show. "Thought I dropped you off," he said.

     Amy tilted her head. "I got back in when you went into Jason and Gerald's house. And I laid down so you wouldn't see me and make me get out."

     "I can see you now," Blackburn pointed out.

     "I don't care if you make me get out now."

     Blackburn looked across at Dog, who was now sniffing a clump of dead weeds a little further out in the field. He could just make her out.

     "Do what you like," Blackburn said. "I have to get my dog."

     "It's a cute dog," Amy said.

     "Thanks." Blackburn went around the car to the edge of the gravel, clucking his tongue and making kissing noises. Sometimes Dog responded to that.

     But this wasn't one of those times. As Blackburn stepped into the field, Dog scampered away another twenty feet, staying just at the edge of visibility. And as Blackburn tried to get closer, she kept doing the same thing -- waiting and scampering, waiting and scampering, staying just within vision and just out of reach. She led him into the depths of a stubbled field that had once grown crops, but was now cold and defunct. She was punishing him for leaving her alone so long. He just hoped she would forgive him in time for him to get Amy back home before her mother called the cops.

     Out in the middle of the field, Blackburn had a better view of the sky than he'd had all night. And damned if the almost-full moon wasn't still a dusky pink color even though it was high in the sky. The clouds had all slipped away, but there was the moon looking as if it were shining through a red candy wrapper. Or as if the spray from a man hit by a shotgun blast had risen up to cloak it in a crimson mist.

     He liked it. It was different.

     He didn't realize how long he had been standing still, staring up at the moon, until Dog rubbed her face on his jeans. Then he held out his arms, and when she jumped up into them he knew he was forgiven. He carried her back to the motel while she licked his cheeks and nipped his chin. She had grown a lot in the weeks since he had acquired her in Kansas City, but she was still less than thirty pounds. He hoped she wouldn't get much over thirty-five, because he liked being able to hold and protect her like this. Of course he knew that nobody could ever really protect anything, but he liked having the feeling anyway.

     When Blackburn and Dog got back to the parking lot, Blackburn saw that Amy was no longer in the Falcon. He also saw that the door to Room 12 was closed. But the key was still in the knob, so he opened the door with one hand while Dog wriggled in the crook of his other arm. He let her down once they were inside, and she immediately ran to Amy, who was sitting on the edge of the bed in an oval of light cast by the nightstand lamp. Amy had taken off her sweatshirt, and now she was in a black tank top that showed more of her than Blackburn felt comfortable seeing.

     Amy rubbed Dog's ears, which excited Dog enough to jump onto Amy's lap. "He's adorable," Amy said, leaning back as Dog tried to lick her on the mouth.

     "She," Blackburn said. He took the room key from the knob and put it in his jeans pocket. But he didn't close the door.

     "What's her name?" Amy asked.

     "Dog."

     Amy frowned. "She needs a better name than that."

     "It wouldn't change who she is," Blackburn said.

     "Why would you want to change that?"

     "I wouldn't. That's my point."

     Dog turned in a circle on Amy's lap, then flopped down as if settling for the night. Amy caressed Dog's head and looked at Blackburn with an expression that was almost a smile.

     "I think she peed on the carpet over there by the bathroom," Amy said. "I put a towel over it so you wouldn't step in it like I did."

     "Sorry about that."

     "It's okay. It's not like I was barefoot. And I hope you don't mind me using your bathroom."

     "What I mind," Blackburn said, "is you sneaking into my car. See, what I want to do now is go to bed, but instead I have to take you home. Which I already did once."

     "You sound mad."

     "Just annoyed."

     "Are you sure?" Amy was giving him the same big-eyed look that Dog often gave him.

     "If I was mad," Blackburn said, "you'd know it. Now come on. I'm freezing my ass off here."

     "So close the door."

     "This isn't funny," Blackburn said. "Your mom'll be home soon if she's not already, and I'd rather not be accused of anything."

     Amy's expression went blank as she continued to stroke Dog's head. "You know about my sister," she said. It wasn't a question.

     "Mr. Leymer told me."

     "Her name was Ann," Amy said. "She liked dogs, too. She used to volunteer at the animal shelter twice a month. You know, feeding the dogs and stuff like that. She said she paid extra attention to the ones they were gonna put to sleep."

     Blackburn found himself starting to like someone who was dead. "That was good of her."

     Amy nodded. "She wasn't very nice to me, but it was only because she wanted a dog. Mom wouldn't let us have one, 'cause she said it was hard enough feeding the two of us. So Ann blamed me. She said if I hadn't come along, she could've had a puppy."

     "My sister didn't like me, either," Blackburn said.

     "Is she dead too?"

     "I don't think so. I haven't checked in a while, though."

     "Oh. You said she 'didn't' like you, as if she was gone or something."

     "No. I'm the one who's gone."

     "Well, you should check on her," Amy said. "Because, you know, even though Ann was mean to me, I still wish what happened to her never happened. You don't want to feel like that. Trust me."

     "That's why I need to get you home," Blackburn said. "So nobody thinks something's happened to you, too."

     "Just close the door," Amy said. Her voice was flat.

     Blackburn was getting fed up. "How about this. Go get in the car, or I'll carry you there."

     "If you do, I'll scream."

     Blackburn looked into her dark eyes and knew she would. "Why are you doing this to me?"

     Amy's face began to show signs of life again. "Because I like you," she said.

     Blackburn closed the door, but he didn't move any closer to the bed. "How old are you?" he asked.

     "Seventeen," Amy said. "Why? How old are you?"

     "Old enough to know you're not seventeen."

     "But you can say that's what I told you."

     "Yeah, that always works," Blackburn said. "Except I know Ann was older than you, and she was seventeen."

     Amy stopped petting Dog, and she scooted back on the bed so her feet came up off the floor. Dog looked up, surprised, but didn't move from Amy's lap.

     "My mom won't worry about me," Amy said, "because she won't be home until 8:00 or 9:00."

     "That's not what I hear. I hear she's home by 3:00 --" He glanced at his cheap plastic watch. " -- which is coming up."

     "Well, you heard wrong," Amy said. "She gets off work at 1:00, but she's been going on dates after that. They usually buy her breakfast."

     Amy's tone was so matter-of-fact that for a moment Blackburn thought she might be legal after all. But then he made himself study her pale, unlined face, and he knew better.

     "You're fifteen," he said.

     Amy flinched, and Dog sprang off her lap to the floor. Then Dog ran to Blackburn, rubbed against his shin, and turned around to give Amy a single, sharp bark.

     "Dog knows it too," Blackburn said.

     "So what?" Amy said. "I'm sixteen in three weeks. And even if I wasn't, I'd still get to decide what I do."

     Blackburn leaned down and stroked Dog's back. "After what happened to Annie," he said, "I'd think you'd be more careful."

     Amy's eyes widened. For a second, Blackburn thought she was going to make good on her threat to scream. But then she just turned away and lay down on her side, curled up in a fetal position.

     Blackburn considered sneaking up on her, clamping a hand over her mouth, and carrying her out to the Falcon. But then he realized he would have to take his hand away to open the car door, and that would be it.

     "You wouldn't hurt me," Amy said with her back to him. "Besides, the police say whoever killed Ann probably left town right after he did it."

     "I don't think so," Blackburn said. "In fact, I think he killed himself outside Uncle Bill's store tonight. And maybe because seeing that happen didn't bother me, you think that hanging around me will keep it from bothering you too. But it should bother you. And so should I."

     Now Amy rolled over to face him. But she stayed on her side with her cheek on her shoulder and her black hair fanned out around her pale upper arm.

     "You're wrong about everything," she said. "That guy in the van was gross, and it about made me throw up. But he wasn't the one who killed Ann. And neither were you."

     "How do you know?

     Amy licked her lips, and Blackburn suppressed a pang of desire.

     "Because," Amy said, "neither one of you is God."

     Blackburn hadn't been expecting that. But he had a response anyway.

     "Your friend Gerald disagrees," he said. Amy sat up again. "Gerald didn't see God. I did." She reached back and clutched her hair the way she had on the ride to her house. "What happened was, there was this Homecoming thing at school three Fridays ago, and I was hanging around outside with Gerald and Jason and some other guys. Ann had a date, and I wanted to mess it up because she'd been awful to me all week. So I sent Jason and Gerald home without me and said I'd get a ride from David. That was the guy Ann was with. He was on the second-string football team. Jason hated him."

     Blackburn thought of Jason standing in his kitchen with a butcher knife. "But it wasn't Jason who decided to mess up their date?"

     "No," Amy said. "That was me. I hid in the back seat of David's car like I did in yours. Then when they came out from the dance, David drove to Devil's Glen so they could, you know, do stuff. And I was gonna jump up and scream when they started. Then they'd have to take me home."

     "Sounds like a plan," Blackburn said.

     Amy was pulling on her hair so hard that her face was stretched tight. "Except that when David parked the car, they got out. That made me think they were gonna move to the back seat, so I decided I'd sit up and scream when they opened the back door. But then I heard David talking to someone else. It was like it was someone they came there to meet. So I sat up and looked. And there in this little clearing in the trees, I saw God."

     Blackburn was skeptical. "How? It was dark, wasn't it?"

     "There was lots of moonlight," Amy said. "The moon was full on the 1st. Like it'll be again tomorrow. There are two this month."

     "Okay, then," Blackburn said. "Tell me what God looks like."

     "He's taller than you. He wears a hat."

     "Lots of people are taller than me. And it's winter, so lots of people wear hats."

     Amy shook her head. "Not like this one. This was like one of those tall black hats in old Fred Astaire movies. The ones where they dance in tuxedos."

     This girl wasn't like any other fifteen-year-old Blackburn had ever encountered. "Where'd you see a Fred Astaire movie?" he asked. "I've never even seen one of those."

     "You should watch more TV," Amy said.

     "I'll do that. Maybe I'll watch one of those Sunday morning church shows so I can see whether God wears a Fred Astaire hat."

     Amy released her hair and gave Blackburn an I-can't-believe-you're-this-stupid look that only teenage girls can give. "Those shows are talking about a different God," she said. "They're talking about the God of peace and love and all that crap. They're talking about the Jesus God."

     "Oh," Blackburn said. "Well, then, what God did you see?"

     "The one who makes sacrifices to himself. The one who cuts people. The one who killed my sister."

     "You saw him do that?"

     "No," Amy said. "But I know he did." Her face went smooth again, and she began speaking in the same tone of voice that Gerald had used in his trance. "Ann and David walked toward him, and I screamed at them to stop, but I guess they couldn't hear me because I was in the car. They just kept walking. They were between God and me, and I couldn't see him except for his forehead and his hat. And for a second or two I think a cloud went over the moon, because the clearing got dark and I couldn't see him at all anymore. I could still see Ann and David, but it was like God had gotten smaller or something. Then the moon came back, and so did God. That's when he took off his hat, and fire and smoke came out of his head."

     "Or maybe," Blackburn said, "he lit a cigarette."

     She didn't seem to hear him. "And then I saw God's arm come up, and he was holding something bright. It was a pinkish silver color, like the moon is now. It was like this long blade made of light that was shining through glass smeared with blood. And I could see what God was going to do with it. But Ann and David just kept walking toward him anyway. So I got out of the car and screamed at them again, but they still didn't hear me."

     Amy fell silent then, and she stared at Blackburn as if daring him to finish the story himself.

     So he did. "And then," he said, "you ran away."

     She nodded. "I ran out to Devil's Glen Road," she said. "And then I kept running and yelling, and my feet were numb, but nobody stopped. Finally I got down to State Street, and a Bettendorf cop pulled over. I told him what God was doing, but he wouldn't go try to stop it. Instead he called for other cops, and he made me sit in his car and wait. After a while he got a call that said to take me home, and when we got there my mom and Gerald and two other cops were in the driveway. Those cops asked me a lot of questions, and they wouldn't say why. But I knew."

     Blackburn nudged Dog to one side and headed for the bathroom. "I've heard the rest already," he said. "And all I can tell you is that being with me won't change anything. I'm making a pit stop, and then I'm taking you home."

     "But you want me to stay," Amy said. "I see how you look at me. Besides, I called Uncle Bill when you dropped me off at home the first time. So he won't worry about me. And I swear, my mom won't be home for hours. So we can do whatever you want."

     Blackburn didn't reply to that, because replying to it would make him think about it. He went into the bathroom and closed the door. Amy had left the light on, and he noticed that Dog had eaten all of the food he'd left in the plastic margarine tub on the floor. He turned on the cold water tap at the sink because he didn't want Amy to hear him piss, and then felt dumb. There wasn't any point in being embarrassed around this girl.

     When he was finished, he turned off the tap and came out to find that Amy had taken off her shoes and jeans. Now she lay on the bed wearing only the tank top and a pair of blue cotton panties. She looked good. Dog was on the bed again, licking Amy's toes.

     Amy giggled. "That tickles."

     Blackburn was about to jump out of his own skin. "What'd I ever do to you?" he asked.

     Amy went serious again. "You haven't done anything yet. But you will, because God's coming back. Gerald says his blade gets hungry for a few days around the full moon."

     "Well, since Gerald also says that I'm God," Blackburn said, "I think we've established that he's full of shit. See, if I thought I needed to do something to someone, I wouldn't wait around for the moon to hit the right phase. I'm not a werewolf, and I'm not God, either."

     "But it was an understandable mistake for Gerald to make," Amy said. "The thing is, you're not God. You're the Devil."

     She kept on surprising him. "Beg pardon?"

     "You're like God's flip side. I could tell from the way you looked at the guy in the van like he was an empty paper bag or something. That's when I knew you weren't a regular person. But I knew you weren't God, either. Not the one I saw, and not the peace and love one. So you must be the Devil. And that's why I want to be with you."

     Now Blackburn understood. "You're think God's coming back. And the only thing with a chance of stopping God is the Devil."

     It was as if Amy's whole face had lit up from within. "Yes. But don't just stop him, okay? Kill him."

     "We'll see." Blackburn went to the foot of the bed, where Dog was still licking Amy's toes. He made a kissing noise, and Dog leaped into his arms. "Dog and I are going to spend the rest of the night parked on the street in front of your house. If anyone besides your mom tries to get in, I'll know." He started for the door.

     "Wait," Amy said. "I have to put on my pants."

     "Make it quick. Car's leaving in one minute." Blackburn opened the door and stepped outside.

     He got the Falcon started with only a little trouble, and he reached over and opened the passenger door when Amy came out of Room 12 wearing her jeans and sweatshirt. Dog wriggled happily as Amy got in, then turned around a few times and curled up on the seat between her and Blackburn.

     "I thought you might be less cold up here," Blackburn said. "I don't think that window back there'll go up now."

     Amy nodded, but didn't speak.

     "What's wrong?" Blackburn asked.

     "You think I'm a slut," she said.

     Blackburn put the Falcon in reverse. It made a chunk  sound and lurched backward.

     "If I thought that," Blackburn said, glancing over his shoulder and turning the wheel, "I wouldn't be taking you home."

     Amy gazed out the window. "The moon sure is ugly," she said.

     Blackburn put the Falcon in Drive and took it out to Highway 61. "Yeah, I don't know why it's that color. It's not right."

     Amy looked at him. "You don't know why?"

     "I just said I didn't." He had to raise his voice over the growing whistle of wind from the back window. "What, are you going to tell me God did it?"

     "No," Amy said. "God probably prefers its natural color. It's like this now because of the volcano."

     "I didn't know there were volcanos in Iowa."

     "There aren't, dip. But there's one in Mexico called El Chichon, and it erupted in March. Now all that ash is spread out through the atmosphere, and it changes the color of the moon and stars."

     "Mercy," Blackburn said. "The things they teach in school these days."

     Amy made a spitting noise. "They don't teach anything in school. I heard about the volcanic ash on TV. It was in the newspaper, too. Seriously, don't you watch TV? Or read the newspaper?"

     "I've been pretty busy."

     "Well, you might want to take a look at them sometime. You might learn something."

     "Thanks for the tip. But since I'm the Devil, I already know what counts. Everybody's going to hell. Whether they watch TV or not."

     Neither of them spoke again until Blackburn turned onto Amy's street. He stopped the Falcon just short of her driveway, then switched off the lights and engine. The driveway was still empty. And except for the porch light, the house was dark.

     "Looks like your mom's still not home," Blackburn said.

     "Told you." Amy was gently stroking Dog's fur from head to tail. Dog was curled up asleep.

     "I'll watch you go in," Blackburn said.

     "You aren't going to walk me? To make sure it's safe?"

     "It's safe," Blackburn said. He had seen some movement at the side of the house, but he had also seen who it was. It wasn't a problem.

     "I don't know," Amy said. "God could be in there waiting for me."

     "He's not. I should know. Go on in. You can look out your window if you want to see I'm still here."

     Amy stopped petting Dog and opened her door. Her shoes made a crunching sound as she stepped out. Then she looked back at Blackburn. "You're making fun of me. You really don't believe in God, do you? Not in the one I saw, or any other one. Or the Devil either, even though it's you."

     Blackburn shrugged. "What people believe never seems to have much to do with what they actually have to deal with. And that's all I'm interested in."

     "But if you don't believe in God," Amy said, "then nothing that happens makes sense."

     "I'm used to that."

     "And just because you don't have to deal with something doesn't mean it isn't real. You probably haven't seen any bald eagles around here. But they're out there on islands in the river right this minute."

     "That's fine," Blackburn said. "They don't bother me, I won't bother them."

     Amy made a face. "Good night, Mr. Doyle."

     "Jimmy," Blackburn said. "You can call me Jimmy."

     Amy shook her head, and that gorgeous black hair brushed her cheeks again.

     "I already have a Jason and a Gerald next door," she said. "So I'd rather not." Then she shut the door and went up the driveway to the house.

     Dog lifted her head as the car door closed and gave Blackburn a sleepy look. Blackburn scratched her ears and watched as Amy went into the house, and then as the light in the corner window came on. He saw Amy open the curtains and wave. He waved too, and then the curtains fell over the window again. A few minutes later, the light went out.

     Soon after that, Gerald emerged from the shadows at the side of the house and crept back to his own home. He cast nervous glances at the Falcon as he crept, but Blackburn remained still so as not to scare him. He was glad that Gerald had snapped out of his trance, or whatever it had been . . . and he wondered how long the boy had been waiting for Amy to come home so he could catch a glimpse of her.

     It was a cold night, and what Gerald had done required a fair amount of dedication. So Blackburn hoped that the kid had gotten a good look before Amy had shut off her light.

                                           #

     Blackburn dozed off as the sky began to turn from black to gray, but that didn't last long. Dog jumped onto his lap, put her paws on the steering wheel, and yapped as a faded yellow Chevy Nova pulled into the driveway. The Nova had to make its turn right in front of the Falcon's grille, so Blackburn snapped awake just in time to see the its driver glaring at him. She was a hard-jawed woman with blonde-streaked brown hair. She didn't much resemble Amy, but Blackburn knew she had to be the girl's mother. Nadine. She looked pissed off, and Blackburn wished he'd had a chance to leave before she pulled in. Now he would have to stick around long enough to explain himself. Otherwise she might call the police.

     He looked at his watch as the woman got out of the Nova and strode back up the driveway. It was 7:28. Nadine was home a little earlier than Amy had predicted. She was wearing a pink waitress's uniform that looked as if it had gone through three or four shifts since being washed. But Nadine herself, apart from her tangled hair and the set of her jaw, was an attractive woman. Nice knees, Blackburn thought. And she was over the age of consent, too.

     She opened her purse as she came up to Blackburn's window, pulled out a snubnose .22, and tapped on the glass. Blackburn began to think that maybe his chances with her weren't so good.

     Dog yapped once more, then got off Blackburn's lap and lay down again. Apparently, now that Dog had sounded the alert, she figured that the woman with the gun was Blackburn's problem.

     Blackburn rolled down his window and waited for Nadine to speak. People brandishing weapons usually wanted the first word. And the last. And most of the ones in between.

     "Mind telling me what you're doin' parked in front of my house?" Nadine asked. Her voice had the rasp of a two-pack-a-day habit, and her damp-ashtray breath confirmed it.

     Blackburn glanced at her face, thought she looked pretty but worn, and then focused on the .22. The barrel was resting on the top edge of the glass, pointing at his neck.

     "My name's Jimmy Doyle," he said. "I met your daughter Amy and her friends at Uncle Bill's pawn shop, and I gave them a ride home. Then Amy asked if I could wait out here until her mother came home. I assume that's you." He decided to leave out the part where Amy had gone to his motel room.

     The .22 remained on the glass. "Why would my daughter ask you to do that?"

     Blackburn watched Nadine's trigger finger. If it started to flex, he might have time to open the door and knock her on her butt before the gun fired. Nadine hadn't thought to tell him to put his hands on the wheel, so she couldn't see his left hand. He curled it around the cold chrome of the door handle.

     "She knew you wouldn't be home until daylight," Blackburn said. He didn't see any reason to sugarcoat it. "And she was afraid to be alone all night. I didn't know how to say no."

     "I'll just bet you didn't," Nadine said.

     Blackburn was becoming irritated. He looked up from the gun and stared into Nadine's hard eyes. "I didn't touch her," he said. "I didn't even go in the house. But after she told me what happened to her sister the last time there was a full moon, I understood why she might not want to be alone all night."

     Nadine's face changed. It was as if she had been slapped. She took a step back, and the pistol dropped to her side.

     "That didn't happen here," she said. "It was over in Bettendorf. It's safe here. The boys next door would call the police if anyone tried to break in."

     "Maybe," Blackburn said. "Unless they were asleep."

     Nadine's expression began to harden again. "Well, what am I supposed to do? I could go on welfare, but that wouldn't pay enough to keep the house."

     Blackburn nodded. "I see your point. But it's none of my business."

     "You're damn right it's not," Nadine said. She gestured up the street with the .22. "So why don't you get out of here?"

     At least she wasn't going to shoot him. Blackburn grasped the ignition key and gave it a turn, but the Falcon only whined and shuddered. Too much had been asked of it in the past twelve hours.

     "Get going," Nadine snapped. "And don't think I'll be giving you a jump."

     Blackburn gave her a sidelong look. "I didn't think you would."

     He cranked the ignition again, and this time the Falcon sputtered to life. Good. Now he could get away from all these people. He'd had enough of Jason and Gerald and their daddy Don. He'd even had enough of Amy, who was nice but too young to do him any good. And he'd especially had enough of Nadine. He didn't care for people who tried to intimidate him, which was one reason he'd never cared for cops. In fact, he thought he might have made an exception to his never-kill-a-woman rule just for Nadine -- except that it would upset Amy. And even if she was too young to do him any good, he still liked her. She was smart. Smarter than most, anyway. She reminded him of Jasmine, although he didn't want to think about that too much.

     Dog snuggled up against Blackburn's hip as he drove, and he was glad. The air blowing into the Falcon was frigid. It seemed even colder than it had in the night. But Blackburn thought that might be a trick his mind was playing on him because he was driving toward the newly risen sun. The morning was cloudless and bright, and the sky was as blue as a baby's eyes. It promised warmth, but delivered none. So that made the cold air feel even colder.

     At least the earth didn't lie. The ground was brown and white, and the trees were bare sticks. Except for the evergreens. And even those looked frozen into sharp points. Like God's green daggers.

     Blackburn was ready to get out of the Quad Cities right now. But he had to wait until Uncle Bill opened his pawn shop and paid him for the Python. Then, maybe, he would be able to snag the Thunderbird, and he and Dog could be on their way to the Windy City. Sure, it would be cold there too. But Chicago wouldn't lie to them. A place like that could only show you what it really was. Besides, they would be in a Thunderbird. That would make a world of difference.

     He took Dog back to the Motor Court, figuring they could get a little more sleep since they had a few hours to kill. Dog was all for the plan, and she curled up on the bed against Blackburn's ribs. But Blackburn lay awake staring at the speckled texture of Room 12's ceiling, which was illuminated by a thin, bright knife of sunlight slicing between the dusty curtains. He was exhausted, but his brain was jumping as if from jolts of caffeine or electricity. It wouldn't let him rest.

     The problem, he realized after several attempts to keep his eyes closed, was all those damn people and their connections to each other . . . those fathers, uncles, mothers, sisters, brothers, and friends. They reminded him of when he'd had some of those things too. And he wished he could punish someone for that.

     It was too bad that the man who had murdered Amy's sister had eaten his new shotgun. If he hadn't, then Blackburn would have had a deserving target.

     Except that if the guy hadn't killed himself, Blackburn would never have heard about what had happened to Ann and her boyfriend. He wouldn't have had to deal with Amy and her mother, or with Gerald, Jason, and their father. He wouldn't be lying here awake and agitated. He would have been able to sell his Colt Python to Uncle Bill without any delays or distractions.

     And he wouldn't have had to think about every single word Amy had said to him, and the look on her face when she'd said it. He realized now that she reminded him not only of his sister Jasmine, but of Leslie Bonner, the anti-abortion activist he had fallen in love with in Kansas City. There was a darkness in their eyes that was similar and that Blackburn found appealing.

     But his desire for Leslie Bonner hadn't ended well. In fact, it had ended with her death due to a pipe bomb. Blackburn thought there was a lesson in that. And the lesson was that getting too involved with people just wasn't a good idea.

     "Chicago," he said aloud. Dog lifted her head and gave a quizzical whimper. "In Chicago," Blackburn explained as he petted Dog to reassure her, "there are so many people that we won't have spend more than a minute dealing with any one person. With so much shit going on all the time, nobody'll even notice us. It'll be like we're invisible. Sound good?"

     Dog rested her chin on his belly and thumped her tail. Whatever Blackburn wanted to do was fine with her, and a tail-thump was the only communication required to acknowledge it. That was one of the reasons he loved her.

     Dog fell asleep, but Blackburn lay awake thinking about Amy. He was fully recovered from his vasectomy now, so he couldn't help getting an erection. And he didn't like it. So he slid out from under Dog's chin, sat on the end of the bed, and turned on the TV. Amy had said he should watch more TV. So okay, he would watch more TV. Maybe he would learn something.

     It was hard to learn anything at first, though, because the black-and-white unit had crackly sound and a picture that was mostly dancing specks of white. But finally, after turning the entire set first one way and then another, he managed to obtain a watchable picture. The morning news was on, and the weatherman was talking about the moon, the sky, the volcanic ash in the atmosphere, and a lunar eclipse that would occur early the next day. Blackburn was astonished. He actually had learned something.

     Then the weather was followed by a clot of commercials, including one for the film Grease 2. Blackburn perked up. He hadn't seen the movie and had no intention of doing so, but he liked the commercial. That Michelle Pfeiffer was something else. So he was able to get his mind off Amy for a while.

     At 9:00 AM, he took a shower and put on fresh clothes. He debated whether to pack his duffel, put it and Dog in the Falcon, and turn in his room key before leaving for Uncle Bill's. He had visions of getting his Thunderbird immediately after getting his cash, then hitting the road before lunch. But he realized that wasn't realistic. Today he would be doing things in a strictly legal manner, and doing things in a strictly legal manner always took too long. If he checked out of the Motor Court now, Dog would be stuck in a car in cold weather for hours. Better to leave her in Room 12 for now and collect her when he was sure they could cruise out of town in style and warmth.

     Dog had awakened while Blackburn dressed and was now dancing about at the prospect of going for a ride. Blackburn hated to disappoint her, but he promised to make it up to her soon. In the meantime, he gave her a quick walk in the field beside the parking lot, and he was glad to see how delighted she was to flush a covey of quail. There were six of them, and they fluttered up in a panic, shedding feathers as they weaved first one way and then another, finally bolting toward the municipal airport where a red-and-white Beechcraft was rising into the sky. Blackburn listened to the airplane's drone, the covey's flapping, and Dog's excited yips, and he was as close to happy as he had been since killing Officer Johnston seven years before.

     When Dog finally gave up on the long-gone quail, Blackburn took her back to Room 12 and gave her fresh water and kibble. She started munching away like it was going out of style. He left the TV on to keep her company, then went to the Falcon and got it started with minimal frustration. Then he headed south on Highway 61. Visions of Thunderbirds danced in his head.

     But as he approached downtown Davenport, he checked his watch and saw that he would reach the pawn shop at about a quarter to 10:00. And he had a feeling Uncle Bill wouldn't open up early for anyone. So to kill time, he drove down to River Drive and headed west along the bank of the Mississippi. He pulled off at an overlook at the mouth of Black Hawk Creek and was happy to see that he had the picnic area to himself. Not that this was too surprising on a frigid Wednesday morning.

     He left the Falcon running as he got out and sat on the hood, looking across the river at Credit Island. And there in a bare tree at the edge of the island, as clear and bright as the back of a quarter, was a bald eagle. Just as Amy had said. It was the first one Blackburn had ever seen.

     "I'll be damned," he said.

     Then he watched as the eagle launched itself from the tree, swooped down to the water, and came up with a struggling fish in its talons. And then it disappeared off toward the other side of the island.

     For a moment, Blackburn wished he could go with it. Then he glanced at his watch and decided to do the next best thing. It was five minutes to 10:00. He got back into the Falcon and drove to Uncle Bill's. The eagle had inspired him. When he got to Chicago, he would find a Long John Silver's and have fish for supper.

                                          #

     Blackburn knew Uncle Bill was at the shop because the taupe Cadillac was there again, parked in a slightly different place at the curb. The Chevy van was gone, of course. In its place was a gray Crown Victoria. Apparently, Blackburn wouldn't be Uncle Bill's first customer of the morning. It was only a few minutes after 10:00, but someone had beaten him here anyway.

     He switched off the Falcon's ignition, and the engine dieseled, rattling and spitting, perversely refusing to shut down. For weeks, it had been a struggle to get the thing to run at all. And now it was rubbing his nose in it. So Blackburn just got out of the car and left it that way, left it shuddering behind the Crown Vic. He didn't care if it shook itself to pieces. Once he had the money from the sale of the Python, he would walk to Hawkeye Bob's if he had to. It wasn't far. Even as cold as it was, he wouldn't mind a bit. His Thunderbird would be waiting for him at the end.

     The cowbell clanged when Blackburn pushed open the door, and both Uncle Bill and the man he was talking to looked at him. Uncle Bill was on the far side of the counter again, and the other man, a tall guy with a lot of dark blond hair slicked back with grease, was on the customer side. But as soon as the man looked back at him, Blackburn knew he wasn't a customer. He was wearing a wrinkled overcoat over a cheap brown suit, and he had kept his sunglasses on even though he was indoors. So Blackburn looked for a bulge under the guy's left armpit, spotted it, and then knew for sure that he was a Davenport plainclothes cop. Small-city plainclothes cops were the worst kind, in Blackburn's opinion, because they always thought they deserved to be big-city detectives. So they had a tendency to be nasty. The unmarked Crown Victoria should have been a tipoff, Blackburn realized. Crown Vics were the most common cop cars in the nation. But he had been so excited about getting his money that he hadn't stopped to think about it.

     And now it was too late to avoid the guy. If he turned around and walked out, the cop would come after him and ask why. So instead Blackburn had to take a few steps toward the counter, make a throat-clearing noise, and ask, "Do you have any electric sanders?"

     Uncle Bill caught his drift. "Yeah, check the aisle there to your right."

     Blackburn nodded and moved into the aisle of tools. He pretended to examine the power drills and circular saws with great interest while keeping tabs on the cop in his peripheral vision. To his relief, the cop didn't seem interested in him. Instead, the cop turned back to Uncle Bill, leaned on the counter, and spoke in a low voice. Blackburn couldn't make out the words, but the tone sounded threatening. Then again, a cop's tone of voice was almost always threatening. He just hoped it wouldn't put Uncle Bill into an ungenerous mood.

     The slick-haired cop left a minute later, and Blackburn made sure to glance up and nod at him as he went toward the door. Nothing made a cop notice you more than if you looked away from him, and Blackburn really didn't want to be noticed. His tactic worked. The cop gave him a dismissive glance, then shouldered his way out the door. The cowbell clanked, cold air blew in, and Blackburn was alone in the shop with Uncle Bill.

     Uncle Bill chuckled as Blackburn approached the counter. "Sorry about that, Mr. Doyle. Leftover business from that mess last night. Lieutenant Thurston of the Davenport P.D. decided he wanted to hassle me a little more. My theory is his old lady burned his toast this morning."

     "I hope it worked out okay for you," Blackburn said.

     Uncle Bill gave a shrug. "He warned me he's coming back, but if he does it'll just be jerkin' off on his part. See, the guy in the van left a suicide note, and the lieutenant says it mentioned the antique razor I told you about. So he thinks I have it, and he wants it. Claims he had a razor like that stolen a few months ago. I said that's a shame, but I don't know a thing about it."

     Blackburn was puzzled. "Why not just let him have it and avoid the hassle?"

     Uncle Bill frowned. "Can't do that. If I give it up I'm screwed on the whole transaction. They're keepin' the shotgun, of course, but they also took the silver dollars I got for it. That's what I wrote down as our trade on the guy's receipt, so that makes 'em evidence. They swear I'll get 'em back, but I seriously doubt it."

     "Didn't you write the razor on the receipt too?" Blackburn asked.

     "Nope. Wanna know why?"

     Blackburn wasn't sure he did. But he could tell that Uncle Bill wanted him to, so he said, "Sure."

     Uncle Bill put a heavy forearm on the counter and leaned toward Blackburn. "Because in this business you have to keep a certain number of items off the books. Otherwise, you get taxed out of business. And when I saw that razor -- well, I knew it was one of those things. It's a collector's item, and sooner or later I'll find somebody who wants it bad enough to pay a nice chunk of change for it."

     Blackburn nodded, pretending to be interested. He wanted Uncle Bill in a good mood. "I see," he said. "That makes sense."

     "Yes, it does," Uncle Bill said. "And the reason I mention it is because the transaction I'm about to have with you will be similar. You're selling me your Colt Python, and I'll be giving you cash for it. But we won't be doing any paperwork. Is that okay with you?"

     "That's extremely okay with me."

     Uncle Bill took his arm from the counter and stood up straight, his plaid-flannel belly-bulge pressing against the edge of the counter. "All right, then. What'd we say, two hundred?"

     Blackburn's upper lip twitched. "We didn't say anything specific. But if we had, two hundred would have made me walk away. I've seen used Colt Pythons for five hundred."

     Uncle Bill's eyebrows rose. "Well, son, yours isn't in the best of shape. So two hundred is what it's worth to me. And since it's currently in my possession -- "

     Blackburn put his hands on the counter, palms down, and braced himself to vault over. "Don't finish that sentence," he said.

     Uncle Bill seemed taken aback. "Now, son, I'm just trying to point out -- "

     "Don't finish that sentence either," Blackburn said. "Instead, let me point out something myself. Last night I trusted you to look after my Colt, and you trusted me to look after your niece. Correct?"

     Uncle Bill scowled. "You threatenin' Amy?"

     "No. I'm saying that you and I each agreed to look after something that was valuable to the other. So if you cheat me on my Colt, it's like you're devaluing Amy. And that would make you a piss-poor uncle."

     "I'm not sure I -- "

     "But I am," Blackburn said. "I'm very sure."

     He watched Uncle Bill's eyes. If they darted to the back wall or to the space under the counter, Blackburn would know Uncle Bill was about to reach for a weapon. And then Blackburn would have to go over the counter, slam Uncle Bill against the wall, and kill him with one of the guns hanging there. He doubted that any of them were loaded . . . but they didn't have to be.

     Uncle Bill took a breath, sighed, and shook his head. "Well, shit," he said. "Let's get your Colt up here, take a look, and see if we can reach an agreement."

     Blackburn let his hands relax on the counter. "That sounds fine," he said.

     Uncle Bill was looking at him with a wary expression. "It's in the safe, and the safe is under the counter here. You want to come around and watch me open it?"

     "That's okay. You go ahead."

     Uncle Bill squatted down so that only the top of his head was visible, and Blackburn heard him turning the dial of a combination lock. Then there was a click, a clunk, and a squeak as a small metal door opened. And then Uncle Bill stood up and placed two objects on the counter. One was Blackburn's Colt Python, and the other was a closed straight razor with a carved ivory handle.

     "Thought you might want to see this," Uncle Bill said. He sounded almost reverent.

     "Why?" Blackburn asked.

     Uncle Bill looked at him, again, as if he had farted in church. "Because it's an amazing piece of work, boy. Look at all those tiny carved lines. It's like it's a language so old that the people who spoke it shouldn't have had a tool fine enough to carve it. And the blade -- " He picked up the razor and flicked his wrist. The blade opened with a whick and gleamed in the fluorescent light. "Look at the edge on that. Look how bright and straight it is. You could split a hair on that."

     "It's impressive," Blackburn said.

     Uncle Bill closed the razor and set it back on the counter. "You don't sound impressed," he said. "Don't you think it's amazing that something could be this old and in this condition? Don't it seem like some kind of miracle?"

     "I don't know," Blackburn said. "I don't have much experience with miracles."

     Uncle Bill sighed again. "You ought to go to church. A man goes to God's house once in a while, he comes to realize there's marvelous things in this world."

     Blackburn didn't care for that. "I've been to God's house plenty," he said. "The son of a bitch just never seemed to be home."

     Instead of being offended, Uncle Bill laughed. "Yeah, well, he was probably out performing some miracles. Now, how about this Colt?"

     "Okay. How about it?"

     Uncle Bill pointed. "It's got a scratch here on the barrel, another here on the cylinder, and a little piece out of the grip."

     Blackburn squinted. "That's maybe an eighth of an inch square."

     "True," Uncle Bill said. "But it affects the value. Folks want a .357 Python as much for its aesthetic appeal as for its other qualities."

     "Last night, you said you wanted it for yourself."

     "I'm pretty sure I said I might want it for myself."

     Blackburn could respect Uncle Bill's desire to get a good deal, but he wished they could skip the haggling. He wanted to get his Thunderbird and get gone.

     "Either way," Blackburn said, "I need four-twenty-five, or I can't do it."

     Uncle Bill's eyes gleamed. He took a cigar from his shirt pocket and bit off the end. "Three-twenty-five."

     "Four-twenty-five firm," Blackburn said. "See, I need three-fifty just to make the two thousand I need to buy my Ford Thunderbird from Hawkeye Bob's Pre-Owned Vehicles. And if I don't have at least another seventy-five after that, I can't pay off my motel bill and buy gas."

     Uncle Bill produced a chrome Zippo and lit the cigar, blowing a puff of smoke toward the ceiling. "I know Hawkeye Bob," he said. "If he's marked a car at two thousand, that means he'll take sixteen hundred. Tax included. So you already have what you need, plus fifty bucks. I give you three-twenty-five, then you got money for your motel, gas, and some pussy besides."

     "I don't pay for that," Blackburn said. He tried not to think of Amy. But he did.

     "Fine, you can buy a savings bond," Uncle Bill said. "Tell you what, take three-fifty -- and if you can't get that Thunderbird for nineteen hundred or less, I'll make up the difference so you walk away with a hundred bucks in your pocket. Deal?"

     Blackburn considered. Uncle Bill might be lying, but if he was, Blackburn could always come back and kill him.

     "Deal," Blackburn said.

     Uncle Bill squatted down again and came up with a stack of bills in one hand and a short plastic cylinder, bristling with the exposed tips of six bullets, in the other. He slapped the bills onto the counter beside the razor. "There you go. Three-fifty."

     Blackburn picked up the stack and flipped through it. "You already had this counted out and set aside," he said.

     "That's because I know what things are worth," Uncle Bill said. "The trick is getting the customer to reach the same conclusion."

     "That could be a dangerous process," Blackburn said, tucking the cash into his jean jacket.

     "Less so now." Uncle Bill held the plastic cylinder in his left hand and picked up the Python with his right. "This is one of them speedloaders I was tellin' you about last night. Watch this."

     Uncle Bill snapped open the Python's cylinder, slapped the speedloader to the empty chambers, and twisted a small knob on the end of the speedloader. Then he dropped the empty speedloader on the counter, snapped the Python's cylinder back in place, and picked up the ivory-handled razor with his free hand. The blade flicked open, and Uncle Bill stood there grinning around his cigar with a weapon in each hand.

     "Anybody dicks with me," he said, "I'm ready."

     Blackburn patted the wad of cash in his jacket. "Me too." He turned and headed for the door, glancing into the guitar cubbyhole as he passed. Amy and her friends might be there again tonight, fooling with that red guitar. But he would be in another city, in another life.

     "You take care," Uncle Bill called after him. "Pleasure doin' business with you."

     Blackburn paused at the door and looked back at Uncle Bill. He was still grinning around his cigar and clutching his weapons. He looked silly.

     "You take care too," Blackburn said. "And if Lieutenant Thurston comes around to hassle you about the razor again, you might want to ask him exactly what that guy's suicide note said about it."

     Uncle Bill lowered the razor and stared at it. "Why should I do that?"

     "Because," Blackburn said, "I think that miracle in your hand might've been used to cut off your niece Annie's head."

     Uncle Bill's eyes went dark, and the end of his cigar glowed bright red. He jerked the barrel of the Python toward Blackburn. "You've got your money. So go buy your fuckin' Thunderbird."