The Totem

ONE

A solitary rider on a ridge. that was the beginning. he'd been out for half a day now, checking the borders of his ranch, and coming from the high ground, he stopped to look down past the pine trees toward the sweeping grassland.

It was something that he never failed to marvel at. Sitting up here at the farthest reach of what he owned, staring down at all that rich wide ground, the abundant grass, the dots of sagebrush, he remembered how his father had used to take him here and point to it and tell him how his father's father had to fight for it and how the land would one day soon be his. He hadn't known that his father was then dying. He wasn't sure that his father even knew. But six months later he had seen his father buried-death had been both quick and painful-and then all the land was his.

That had happened twenty years ago. Now at thirty-eight he still came out here on the anniversary of when his father had died, and looked down at the valley from where his father once had pointed to it, and was proud. Pride of ownership. And something else: of knowing who his father had been. No, not who but what. The kindest, gentlest, and yet strongest man he'd ever met. Still after all these years he loved the man. And loved the land because of him.

He sat there, his reins tight on his horse, and stared out at the pasture stretching off as far as he could see and rubbed his weathered face and shook his head. He knew that he should go. The sun was fierce upon his back, his head protected by his cowman's hat. The horse would need some water soon; he still had lots of range to check. All the same, he didn't want to leave. He waited, his boots pressed into the stirrups, leather creaking, admiring the land his father had shown to him, and then the moment passed. He loosened the reins, nudging with his heels, and he was leaving.

The ridge led to a gametrail that wound down through shade beneath the pine trees. There was water at the bottom, and he felt the horse increase its gait, the cool smell evidently reaching it. He held back on the reins, working past a sharp turn in the trail, then easing farther down, the angle so steep now that he was forced to lean back. In the shade, his sweat-soaked shirt was cool against his sticky back. He reached behind to tug at it. Then he was working past another sharp turn, angling farther down, and he could see the stream below him glinting in the sunlight. His horse's hoofs plodded on the fallen pine needles.

He looked and saw another carcass, this one wedged between two trees. Another deer. Or possibly an antelope. From this far away, he couldn't tell. He likely couldn't tell regardless. The winter had been so severe, the snow so deep, the storms so frequent and intense, that many animals who normally survived up in the mountains had come down here for food. But the winter had been just as bad down here, so they had wandered, becoming thin and weak and cold until they dropped and maybe tried to stand up once or twice and dropped again and died. Sometimes scavengers would find them and, when finished, would leave only bits of bone and skin. Other times, like this, the carcass hadn't been discovered; it had dried and shrunk till just the empty hulk remained. The positions they assumed were on occasion fascinating. Like this one that was wedged between the two trees. An outsider might think that it had tried to squeeze between the trees, had gotten stuck, and there had died. But then of course the ground had not been visible in the winter. The animal had walked upon a floor of ice-impacted snow. The snow had been quite deep, at least ten feet and likely more. The two trees veered apart at that height. The animal had lots of room. It walked between, and died, and with the thaw, it settled toward the ground and wedged.

He rode down near it, passing it, and he was right. Deer or antelope. He couldn't tell. It was the fifth such carcass he had seen today, and he was sure that if he looked around more intently, he'd find several others. He couldn't take the time. It didn't matter anyhow. He wasn't out here just to admire the land, to commemorate an anniversary; he was checking on his stock. He heard the low of cattle off to his right now, and he stopped beside the stream, sunlight angling through the trees and glinting off it, long enough to let the horse lean its head down and take a drink. Just enough to give it strength, but not enough to make it sick. Then he was pulling on the reins and angling off, emerging from the trees to the grassland, turning right.

The low of cattle was much louder now. He guessed that they were just below the coming rise. He reached the top and saw them spread out across from him, a gully between, and he was riding toward the gully, looking for an easy place to dip down, up, and then across to them. At first he thought the carcass in the gully was another deer. It had the same tawny color. But then he saw that it was one of his stock, and frowning, he was pulling up and getting off. He looked around to tie the horse but couldn't find a place, holding tightly to its reins as he walked slowly down among the open earth and rocks. The steer was lying on an angle with the slope, its back to him, and he was thinking that it had fallen and snapped its neck. But coming toward it, he saw nothing strange about the neck, and none of the legs looked broken, and he was thinking, afraid now, of disease. He shifted toward its head, peering at its mouth, but there wasn't any froth on its lips, and he was thinking of a dozen diseases that could kill a steer and leave no trace when suddenly he came around and saw its midriff and was nearly sick. He stumbled back and dropped the reins. The horse began to bolt.

TWO

The old man in the chair was tired. He'd been out and making rounds all day, from just after dawn till well past sup-pertime, checking on some newborn calves, giving shots, a dozen other things, once even coming on a case of founder. Odd how people who had worked with horses all their lives could still forget the basic rules and get their stock in trouble. He had needed just one look to know that the case was classic. Take a hot day and a tired, hungry, thirsty horse. Give it too much grain and water. Something happened to the horse's blood. The veins within the hoofs swelled. The horse went lame. He'd helped to get the horse to stand in water. That would cool the veins and possibly reduce the swelling. But not much. The horse would never be the same. The swelling would leave scars and, more, would change the horse's gait. He'd cut away part of the outside crusted nails, had given purgatives to get the horse's stomach and its bloodstream back to normal. But he didn't have much confidence. Most cases like this ended with the horse dead on its own or else destroyed. On rare occasions when the horse recovered, it almost never worked well after that and ended as a family pet. If the rancher had the tolerance. Livestock out here was a business after all, and anything that didn't earn its way was hardly welcome.

The old man sat in the rocking chair and glanced out at the setting sun. Its stark, red, swollen disc was very close now to the mountains. Shortly it would touch and disappear behind them. From the kitchen he heard cupboards being opened, dishes rattled, knives and forks selected. Supper had been heated and reheated, he'd been told. His wife had been mad about it. Not because she'd had to do more work. God knows, she never let that bother her. But she'd been mad that he had let himself go on so long. A man his age should be retired. At the very least he ought to cut back on his hours. But at a time when he should take things easy, he was working more than ever, more than any other vet in town, and she was angry, claiming that his system couldn't take it.

"I'm a doctor. I know what I'm doing."

"Sure. Of animals. Not people."

"What's the difference?"

"Don't be smart," she said. "A doctor doesn't treat himself."

"You've got me there. I'd best sit down and take it easy."

He'd smiled then as he left her in the kitchen, sitting, glancing out the window, hearing pot lids being lifted and replaced. No point in telling her that she had not slowed down much either, going out to see the sick, the orphaned, and the poor, cooking for them, mending clothes or making them. There was a phrase they used to have for that. What was it called? The corporal works of mercy. The truth was that he was more tired than she guessed, short of breath and feeling dizzy. There had been a time when he would come in after making rounds all day and smoke and make a drink and sip it, eat, and go out with her for a walk or maybe to a movie. Then he'd read till one or two o'clock. Now he couldn't stay awake. The cigarettes and whisky were long gone. The walk was too much, the movie something on the TV while he slept. It was more than feeling tired. He was feeling sick. His appetite was less each day, his stomach faintly queasy. He told himself it was the heat, but he knew better. It was something with his heart. No pains yet in his chest or down his arm. Just a vague discomfort that would shortly be much worse.

All the same, he didn't know what he could do. It was in his nature to deny himself, to make of weakness strength. Besides, he didn't know how he would fill the time. He'd been a vet now forty years. He couldn't just forget all that and sit around the house. He joked about that to his wife. "You wouldn't want me under foot all day. Be grateful." But the joke was very poor. A man whose occupation was his life, he didn't have much choice. He had to work.

And one thing more: the ranchers who depended on him. He had worked with many of them all their lives, all his own life. He had seen their fortunes rise and fall, or fall and rise, their families grow, their ranches go through all the good times and the bad. He had measured out the seasons with them. Now they were a part of him, the rhythm of his life. He couldn't any more restrain himself from going out to work with them than he could stop the racing in his blood each April when the warm winds first began the long slow thawing of the snow. Maybe he was wrong. Maybe they didn't depend on him so much as he depended on them. Or maybe it was both together. There were vets enough to go around. That was sure. But he was part of their lives too. They'd had him with them through so many times that maybe they felt incomplete without his presence in their common rituals. Maybe. It was hard to say. He'd never ask. But ranchers had their superstitions. They had patience only with what worked, and what worked best was often very old.

Like himself, he thought. But really, he knew what the truth was. He was getting older than he liked to think, and he was damned if he would sit around and let death come to him. What was the greatest disappointment in the world? That of feeling useless. If he didn't work, he didn't see that he was justified. Still, he guessed his wife was right. He didn't have a reason to put in this kind of day. Maybe he would cut back, work just mornings, spend some time around the house. His wife was aging too, and maybe they should find out more about each other. While they still had the opportunity.

He sat and thought, his breath now coming easier, glancing out the window while he listened to his wife reheating supper, and the phone rang.

"Don't get up," she told him, and he understood. This likely would be business. Most calls at this hour were, and she was bound to see he wasn't bothered. He sat, waiting while it rang. He heard her put a lid down on a pot, then saw her walk across the entrance to the kitchen, disappearing toward the phone that hung against the cupboard wall. She got there halfway through another ring.

"Hello… No, I'm sorry he's not in right now. I'll take a message… What? How are you, Sam? I didn't recognize your voice. How's the…? No, I don't know where he is… Well, is it serious? If you'll tell me what it is, I'll have him call… You're sure? All right, then, Sam, I'll have him call you first thing he comes in… No, I won't forget… Right, Sam. Yes, I will… Right. Goodbye."

And that was that. He heard her hang the phone up and then saw her walk across the doorway toward the stove. He knew three Sams, but he didn't dare ask which it was. If she wanted to, she'd tell him, but he knew that if he asked her he would only make her mad. So he waited. He sat, smelling supper as it cooked. Then she told him it was ready. He went in and ate. Slowly as she wanted him. Pork chops, string beans, and potatoes, boiled, then stirred with butter and crushed parsley, as he liked them. Then she had a pie for him, apple with brown sugar and no upper crust. Again, the way he liked it. Then there was some tea, Chinese black, light and smooth and mellow. And he waited. He sat back and looked at her and tapped his fingers on the table.

And she told him. "That was Sam Bodine."

He nodded.

"Best get over there."

He had to laugh. "I thought you didn't want me to."

"I've changed my mind."

"What is it?"

"That's the point. He wouldn't say."

The old man looked at her.

"You should have heard his voice. I think you'd better go."

He looked at her a moment longer and then stood to get his bag.

THREE

The old man's house was on the edge of town, the side that faced the western mountains. He got in the car and backed out of the driveway, aiming toward the setting sun. It was almost down behind the mountains now. Its topmost swollen rim was barely showing.

Rocky Mountains. Tall and jagged, capped with snow although June was oddly warm. In August, some would be rock bare, but most would be snow-covered all year round. That was one nice thing about this kind of country: the difference in the weather. In the valley, it might be one hundred, but five hours drive up there and you could dig snow caves and wear a jacket. Plus, the sun did strange things with its color. It might be white with heat from nine to five, but after that, as it came closer to the mountains, dipping down behind them, the sun changed first to red and then to orange, bathing everything in alpen-glow, a rich warm golden tone that made the countryside seem magical. It was like that now, everything the same calm soothing color. Even trees were tinted by it, the green of leaves now more like yellow, the range grass all around reminding him of grain and honey.

The old man drove down the road past fence posts stretching off as far as he could see, past ranch homes nestled in their hollows, cattle feeding, windmills turning in the evening breeze. The supper had been very good. He had eaten more than was his custom. Indeed he felt much better now, his breath more easy, his legs more steady. That was why he drove the kind of car he did: to help him with his legs. The effort of a clutch had lately been too much for him, and he had traded to an automatic, which was bad for hills and snow, but he was forced to pace himself. In little ways he had to compensate. He sat back in the seat, his foot relaxed on the pedal, his hand light on the steering wheel, and glanced at all the country as he passed, the isolated trees, the sweep of rangeland stretching off, the fences, and the cattle, and he thought of Sam Bodine. No, of Bodine's father. At one time, the old man had been just about his closest friend, although they hadn't been old back then, thirty, forty years ago, hunting, fishing, working. No, not just about his closest friend. His only friend. They had been like brothers. He had loved the man, and still he missed him dearly. After twenty years, he marveled at how constant was his grief. He had seen the son grow to a man and seen him marry and have children. He had helped him every bit as much as he was able. But the son was not the father. He had different interests and concerns, and things were never quite the same.

Now he drove out toward the ranch as he had done so many times before. He passed the tree that he had seen grow from a seedling to a giant and then start to crumble. He passed the ditches he had helped to dig, the fences he had helped to set. He came around the curve that led down toward the entrance, slowing, turning left to rattle across the grate that lay over a gully and that kept the cattle off the highway, its metal gaps so wide that cattle couldn't walk across them. Next he was on gravel, gaining speed again, spinning up a swirl of dust behind him as he drove on toward the house and barn, their structures now in dusk, the alpenglow abruptly gone, the sun behind the mountains.

Then he saw him standing by the gravel parking space beside the house, big and tall, dressed in denim shirt and jeans, cowman's hat and boots, hands gripped on his thighs. His face was strong and solid, leathered, at the same time almost chiseled. He was walking forward even as the old man pulled in on the gravel.

"Thanks for coming."

The old man nodded. "What's the trouble?"

"I don't want to say. I'd rather have you look."

The old man glanced at him a moment and then got out with his bag. In all his years he'd never heard a rancher talk that way. They almost always had a thought of what the problem was and told him right away. Whatever was the matter out here surely wasn't ordinary.

Bodine was already walking. "How you feeling?"

"Pretty good," the old man said.

"We're going to be a while." Bodine said that with his head turned as he walked, angling toward the big garage.

"It isn't in the barn?"

Bodine shook his head and pointed. "Out there on the edge of the foothills. My boy's there watching now. We'd best take the truck."

And that was that. Bodine was already climbing into the truck to start the engine.

The old man climbed in the other side and set his bag between his legs. "But what's the mystery?"

"I don't want to say. A thing like this, if I tell you, you'll get preconceptions. Have a look, then you tell me."

And they were driving out the open doorway, turning west beside the barn, and heading off across the range.

FOUR

They headed toward the spot of light. The darkness was all around them now, the truck's lights on, and they were jouncing across the open bumpy ground, the old man with his hands braced on the dashboard. Bodine glanced at him and then ahead. The spot of light was flickering. A fire, and Bodine had to smile. He hadn't thought to tell his boy to build one, but then he had talked to him when it was day, and clearly they would need a thing to aim for.

Bodine saw a patch of smooth ground up ahead and gathered speed, but then he hit a bump he hadn't seen that jounced the old man very hard, and had to slow. The headlights showed the rangeland stretching off beneath them. Up ahead, a rabbit was paralyzed by them. Bodine veered to miss it. Then he picked up speed again.

The light was now distinctly flames, growing as he neared. He saw his boy stand up and walk in front of the fire, his body silhouetted by it. He saw the motorcycle parked beside the fire. The fire was very close before him as he pulled up and he stopped.

He kept the lights on, then stepped down onto the ground. The old man was already out.

The boy walked toward them.

"Anything?" Bodine asked.

The boy just shook his head.

"No animals? No tearing at the carcass?"

"It's been pretty quiet."

"Well, that's something anyhow. You stayed up here the way I told you? You didn't go down, messing any tracks?"

The boy just shook his head again.

"Okay, then. Doc, it's down there in the gully. Careful of the slope."

The old man walked across the glare of the headlights, standing at the edge of the gully. "I can't see much without more light."

Bodine reached beneath the seat to get a high-powered flashlight. He held it, long and heavy, walking toward the old man as he flicked the switch. The light shot out across the range. He dipped it toward the gully, sweeping back and forth until he found the carcass.

"There."

Its back was toward them, just the way it had been when Bodine had come upon it. As much as he could tell, it looked the same.

The old man started down, and Bodine stopped him.

"I don't know. I think the way to do this is to walk up here a ways, then cut across and come down looking on the other side. I want to keep from messing any tracks."

The old man hesitated, looked at him, and nodded. They went where the gully was more narrow, climbing down, the old man needing help to get up on the other side. The ground was hard and rocky. The old man's breath was forced as he got up and straightened.

"You all right?"

"It's nothing. I'm not used to this."

"You sure?"

"I said I'll be all right."

"Okay then."

And they waited. Then the old man had his breath back, and they walked along the top until they stood across from where the headlights and the fire were. Bodine aimed the flashlight into the ditch. The old man didn't speak.

He didn't speak for quite a while.

"All right, now tell me what the hell it was that did that," Bodine said.

"I don't know." The old man cleared his throat. "Right now I couldn't say."

It wasn't that the sight was shocking. He'd seen worse too many times. But the thing just didn't make much sense. Whatever had disemboweled this steer had done so from below and ravaged at the guts. But nothing seemed to have been eaten. The guts were mashed together, chewed and mangled, but the point was they were here. Whatever did this hadn't eaten at the flesh, had only chewed at organs and then left them. He had never seen this-he had never heard about a thing like this before.

The old man saw the flies that crawled upon the guts, smelled the stench that was coming from the gully, shook his head, and turned away. "I just don't get it."

"You're the expert," Bodine said. "Take a guess."

"Well, process of elimination. What would prey upon a steer?"

"I already thought of that. Bobcats. But they don't come down here. Wolves, the same. Coyotes maybe. I even thought it was a cougar. They don't single out the guts, though. Not when they've got flesh to eat."

"And one thing more. It doesn't look like anything's been eaten," the old man said. "What about those tracks you mentioned? Were they any help?"

"I never found them. If they were around, I didn't want them messed before somebody good came out to have a look."

The old man turned, again toward the gully, and he pointed. "Well, I don't know if I'd mess the tracks, but I should go down and have a look."

"You're the expert."

So the old man slowly worked his way down into the gully, Bodine close behind. But there was nothing he could tell.

"The only thing I notice is the blood."

"Or lack of it."

"That's what I mean. A thing like this, there should be lots of blood." The old man thought a moment. "Could be something spooked whatever did this, and it didn't get a chance to eat. It just licked all the blood."

"Could be. I don't know."

The old man looked around. "Well, I can't tell out here. I'd like to get this into town where I can have it on a table and dissect it. If there's a way for us to move it. What about your herd? There's nothing strange about it?"

"You were out two weeks ago. You said that it was fine."

"Well, something might have happened in the meantime. What I'm getting at is if this steer was sick, whatever tried to eat it might have felt the taste was off and left it."

"Maybe. But I hardly think it's likely," Bodine said.

"I don't think so, either. What about the truck? Can we get this in there?" the old man asked.

"That's no problem. We'll rig a line."

So they climbed up from the ditch, the old man breathing hard, and Bodine got a rope and tied it around the head of the carcass and hitched the rope to the truck and used the truck to drag the steer up onto the level. Then he opened the back and pulled out a ramp and this time hitched the rope around the motorcycle. His boy was working with the bike while Bodine pulled and guided on the rope, and slowly, motorcycle revving hard, the steer was dragged up onto the ramp and then pulled into the back. They stood and frowned at the carcass.

"Well, the guts stayed pretty much the same," the old man said, and Bodine flashed the light around to see if any had been left behind.

The old man walked back toward the gully. "Nothing down there either. But the swath the steer made sure played hell on any tracks."

Bodine turned and studied the old man. "There's one other thing I'd like to show you." He walked toward the woods, the flashlight in his hand, its wide beam sweeping through the trees.

They came to where the stream flowed through the trees, and found a narrow spot to step across and walked up onto the gametrail. Bodine led the way about a hundred yards, then stopped to let the old man come up close to him. He shone the flashlight in among the trees.

The carcass of a deer.

"All right. So what's the point?" the old man asked.

"Well, I saw a lot of these when I came through here just before I saw the steer. I figured, what the hell, the winter was a bad one. Then I didn't know. I came back up and checked on this one." Bodine poked with a stick where he had pushed the carcass from between the trees. "There. See where all the stomach skin's been eaten. Otherwise it isn't touched."

"But it's been dead for several months. Hell, anything could have caused that. Maybe insects."

"Even so."

The old man looked at Bodine and wondered what he must be thinking.

FIVE

The old man drove while Bodine followed in the truck. The boy stayed back at home. They raided across the grate and then turned right and headed toward town. It was after midnight, the car and truck the only traffic on the road. All around, the countryside was dark, no lights on in ranches, the stars clear, a few clouds across the moon. Isolated trees were black against the murky gray of night. The old man heard a coyote howling in the hills.

He was tired. This was late for him, and he was worn out from climbing into the ditch, then walking through the woods. He was feeling sick again as well, the good meal he had eaten now gone bad on him and rising in his stomach. He could taste the undigested pork. What did he expect? He knew he shouldn't eat so large a meal and one that was so heavy. But then he had been hungrier than was common for him, and besides his wife had gone to so much trouble that he couldn't very well refuse.

Now he paid. He squirmed in his seat, wishing he would throw up and be done with it. His foot was heavy on the pedal, not because he wanted to get quickly into town, but he was so tired now that he could hardly move his feet. They were like a separate part of him. He felt that they were swollen. Water filling up, he thought. He'd have to take another pill for that.

He suffered, glancing at the darkened country as the car sped down the road. One curve, then another, and he almost missed the third. Better take things easy, better get control, he told himself, and gripped the wheel more tightly, tensing muscles in his leg to get life in his foot. He glanced at Bodine's headlights in his rearview mirror. He looked ahead and saw a car approach him, its headlights growing larger as it neared. He glanced away as it flashed past, the headlights hurting his eyes, and then the car was gone, and he was staring at his own lights and the dark. Up ahead the carcass of a badger had been flattened on the road. At least he thought it was a badger. He had only one quick look before he was upon it and had passed. He thought about it and then had to concentrate on going around another curve. He shook his head to clear it and then squinted down the headlight-flooded road.

Twenty miles. In terms of effort, they felt more like eighty. He was thinking he was getting closer, thinking of his bed. He blinked his eyes to clear them now, staring down the road. And then he saw the first light in a house, another one closeby, and he was at the outskirts, coming around another bend and starting down the hill, and there the town was spread out wide before him, its streetlights sending up a glow that in the cool of night was like a yellow mist. Traffic lights and lights on in some houses, lights on in the diner and the first bar that he passed and then the all-night service station. After staying up so late, climbing in that ditch, walking through those woods, after this long drive, tired as he was, the warmth of all these lights, he felt that he was home.

The town was Potter's Field, so-called not because of any graveyard that was near it, although there were a lot of those from the old days. Farmers passing through. Trappers, ranchers, sheepmen, range wars. And the miners. At one time the hills around had all been rich with gold. But that was ninety years ago, and the gold had soon been gone. There had been two towns back then, one high in the hills that they'd called Motherlode, the other down here where the miners came from work to get supplies and drink and rest and often die. Like the farmers, trappers, ranchers, and the sheepmen. All passed on and laid to rest in graveyards that were like a page from history.

The town up there had long since gone to ruin, but the one down here had grown and prospered, twenty thousand people in it now and growing bigger, better, all the time. There were rumors about oil, ski resorts, and breweries, but the main trade here was cattle, and a lot of people didn't want those other things. The town was in a rich wide valley, mountains all around it, and the first man who'd come through here, back in 1850, was named Potter. He had been a farmer, and he'd liked the country so much that he'd tried to work it. But the soil was wrong for farming, and at last he'd given up, staying on nonetheless, hunting, fishing, living out his days here just because he liked the place. His shack had been rebuilt several times since then, set apart beside the courthouse with a plaque explaining who Potter had been and telling all about his field.

The field was where he'd tried to farm, about the size of what was now the city limits. The town was built exactly where he'd lived. It was the property he'd still retained after all the farmers and the cattlemen had come through here and bought up any land he'd sell them. At first he didn't want to sell, but Potter had anticipated what was coming, and he didn't see much point in holding out. Either he would sell or else they'd take it, and so he'd sold and seen the farmers leave, the ranchers stay, had seen the cattle business grow around him. Then he had a store, and then a bar, a hotel and a restaurant, and soon the town was on its way.

Still Potter had tried a bit of farming, marking off a plot of ground beside his shack which he refused to leave and where he died, growing corn and lettuce and potatoes. The ranchers thought him funny, but he prospered, and he still was going out to plant his corn the day he died that spring in 1890. So the field was both the city limits and that plot of ground he tended, the latter set aside behind the shack, a little park and flower garden.

Potter's field. a place where you can grow. So the sign said as the old man passed it, heading down the hill and driving farther into town. Below him, he could see the main street cutting through from right to left, one long row of double-story buildings, feed stores, hardware stores, bars and shops and restaurants, a movie theater, the police station, and the courthouse. The last two were beside each other, surrounded by great elms, sent in from the east donated by a rancher. Indeed the other trees through town were all sent in from other places too, maple, ash and oak, a dozen others, the color of their leaves in autumn stark against the fir green of the mountains.

Down the hill now, farther into town, he reached the stoplight where the two main roads intersected, waiting until the red changed to green and angling right, driving down two blocks and turning left to pull in at the wide two-story building made of cinder blocks and painted white that was his office. Not just his, but everybody's. Every vet in town. There were eight of them, and they had long ago decided that instead of each one having a separate office it was better, at least cheaper, more efficient, if they all combined to build a place that would be better equipped than each could ever manage alone. In addition to the offices, there were operating rooms, a storehouse, and a kennel. It had been expensive, but the ranchers out here paid to keep their livestock healthy, and besides there hadn't been much choice. To operate on bulls and stallions, you just had to have the space.

Headlights arcing, the old man went down the driveway toward the back, stopping by the double doors that led in to one operating room. The parking lot was walled with concrete, and he sat there, cut his motor and his lights, waiting in the dark, flexing his hands and kneading his legs to get more life back into them. He wondered how long it would be before he got to bed. He'd never felt so tired.

Then he heard the motor, saw the headlights flashing up the drive, and stepped from the car as Bodine's truck pulled into view. The old man lost his balance, put his hands against the car, then waited, took his keys, and opened the double doors. He went inside and switched on all the lights. The room was suddenly like day, brighter, like the starkest hottest day he'd ever seen, fierce overhead lights stabbing down at him. He had to turn away, barely glancing at the long wide metal table in the middle, at the white walls and the cabinets and rows of medical supplies. He sought out comfort in the darkness, waiting for Bodine to back the truck up to the entrance. Bodine came up almost into the room, then shut off his lights and motor, and stepped down onto the concrete parking lot.

The old man didn't move.

"What is it? Something wrong?" Bodine asked.

The old man shook his head. "You'll have to help me."

Bodine nodded, walking past him toward the glare that spilled from the entrance to the room. He'd helped with this before, heading toward the pulley that was on a bar up on the ceiling, grabbing at the straps that hung down from it, tugging at them so the pulley rolled along the bar up there and stopped above the back bin of the truck. He climbed up into the back and hitched the straps around the midriff of the carcass, just inside the legs. It was heavy work. Even though the steer was not full-sized, he still had lots of trouble heaving at its bulk so he could slip the straps beneath and slide them into position. Once the stench of all those open guts, left out in the sun all day, became too much for him, and he was forced to turn away. Then he had the straps in place, and he secured them, pulling downward on the chain to work the pulley until the steer was slowly rising, its hoofs dangling above the floor of the truck. A hunk of guts dropped out and plopped near Bodine. He didn't even look at them, just climbed down from the truck, tugging at the straps to slide the carcass from the truck, across the room and then above the table. Another hunk of guts dropped. He grabbed the chain and yanked down on it in the opposite direction, the pulley in reverse so the steer was slowly settling onto the table. Next Bodine slid the straps from beneath it, heaving at the carcass, and he moved the pulley toward the entrance to the room.

The old man was inside, his hand above his eyes to shield them from the light.

"You're sure that you're okay?" Bodine asked.

"I'm fine."

"All right then. Guess it's up to you now. What about those guts that fell?"

The old man looked around. "Take these forceps and that plastic bag. Put them in it."

Bodine did what he was told. He set the bag on the table. "How soon till I hear?"

"I don't know yet. I can't tell yet what I'm looking for. Tomorrow afternoon."

Bodine nodded, walking toward the truck. "I'll be waiting."

"Yes, I know you will."

SIX

Then, truck gone, it was quiet. No, the lights up in the ceiling made a buzz. Funny how he'd never noticed that before. But then he hadn't been here this late in some while. In the daytime, there were always sounds and people. He just wasn't used to being here alone.

The old man kept his hand near his eyes to shield them from the light, staring at the carcass on the table. What to do? What he'd said was true. He didn't know what he was looking for. He needed rest, a chance to think and sleep. He needed to sit. And then he realized. He hadn't even thought to ask Bodine to help him slide the carcass into the cooler. He didn't have the strength to do it on his own. He could put the bag of guts in there. But not the carcass. It would simply be too much for him. He wondered what to do.

The phone rang. He almost didn't answer. But he thought about it, and he guessed it would be his wife, and so he walked with effort toward the door that led down to his office, reaching for the phone beside the counter by the door.

"Doctor Markle here… Hi. How are you?… I'm just about to leave… I don't know yet. Something got a steer… We're not sure. We brought the carcass in to see. Listen, don't wait up. I might be half an hour or so. Go to bed. I'll tell you all about it in a while… No, I won't be long. I promise… Right. Goodbye."

And he hung up. She'd told him that she loved him, and he'd smiled. With his hand above his eyes again, he turned to face the carcass, and he realized that he had lied. He would not go home directly. He would stay and work a little on the steer. Either that or let it stay out all night decomposing more until he couldn't do the proper tests. A few slides for the microscope. Maybe take a portion of the brain and cool it for tomorrow. Test the feces. Take a sample of the blood, the little that there was and in such poor condition. He winced from the sickness in his stomach, and he almost changed his mind. Then he braced himself. Nothing for it but to go ahead. His legs heavy, he went over to the sink and washed his hands and put on rubber gloves, a gown and face mask, out of habit really, and to keep his clothes clean, and to bear the stench. He didn't think his samples would be clean. All the same he liked to do things right and not contaminate anything.

So he stumbled toward the carcass, and he wondered what he'd tripped on and then realized it was himself. His legs weren't working properly; he'd have to do this soon and rest. There were three facts that he needed to learn right away. Whether the steer had been dead before the animal had gotten at it. Whether the organs were all there. Whether the predator had left some sign of what it was. The first he thought he knew. If the steer had been dead, especially for some time, the blood would not have flowed. No matter that they hadn't found the blood, it clearly wasn't here. The predator had maybe drunk it, but that still meant that the steer was freshly killed. The only sure test was to open up the heart. A lot of blood would mean the steer was long dead when the animal had gotten at it. Little meant the steer had still been living when attacked. The point was that a dead steer meant a scavenger, and that would help identify the animal that had picked at it.

The fact about the organs, whether all of them were present, was related to the first. If some of them were missing, the assumption was that they'd been eaten, and that would help eliminate a good deal of the mystery. The steer had been attacked for food. On the other hand, if all the organs were still present, he'd have to figure why. The extensive damage meant that the animal had lots of time to eat. Even if it had been scared away, there had to be a reason why it didn't take advantage and eat something at the start. Could be that the steer was dead, and something, not a scavenger, instead an animal that preferred fresh kills, had tried to eat and given up. Could be too the steer was dead, and something, a disease perhaps, had made the meat taste bad. Could be, but the only way to tell that was by checking on the cause and time of death.

The other fact he needed, a sign to help identify what kind of animal had done this, he was hoping he would find as he examined the organs. Something like a piece of fur, a tooth-mark, anything. But that would come as he went through the process. First he'd get a sample of the heart, the brain, the feces. Since the carcass was already open, he would start in on the heart.

But as he went around the table, looking at the open guts, at first he couldn't find the heart. Then he did, mashed in with the lungs and upper stomach. It was more complete than he had hoped, and he was cutting carefully around it, reaching in to pull it out and slice it into quarters. He was taken up with interest now, breathing fast and hard, staring at the sectioned heart. It was almost empty. That was that. The steer had died from the attack. Of course it might have been diseased as well, and he would tell that as he checked the other organs. But at least he knew that what had done this was no scavenger. It had been a full-scale hunter, on the prowl for food.

His legs gave out, and he was forced to grip the table. This was wrong. He had to get away, get home, and get to bed. But he couldn't make his legs move. Then he had them working, and he straightened. He tried to go but couldn't take his mind off all those organs, sorting through them. Liver, bladder, kidneys, all those stomachs. He couldn't understand it. Even shredded as they were, it seemed that nothing was missing. But that shouldn't be. He cut deeply into the abdomen to where the bowels were still intact and took a sample of the feces. The stench, on top of what was in his stomach, made him almost retch. He had to find a reason. If the animal had been a hunter, then it should have eaten. But it hadn't, and he didn't understand.

His legs gave out again. His chest constricted. The pain shot through his left arm, and he was praying. He thought about his wife. He thought about how she had said she loved him, and he wished that he had said it back. He thought about so many things. Just before he fell, he singled in on one small portion of the guts, staring at them, disappearing into them, and noticed a detail so horrible that in his death at last he understood.

SEVEN

They found him in the morning where he lay on the floor by the table, one fist full of guts that he had taken with him as he fell. That was shortly after seven. The men who found him phoned a doctor, but it wasn't any use. The doctor came and knelt and checked him and just shook his head.

By then the old man's wife was there. She had waited up for him, but then, in spite of all her good intentions, she had gone to sleep. She had wakened early and had missed him, searching through the house. She'd seen that the car was gone and phoned the office, but there wasn't any answer. She had waited half an hour before going into town.

She came around the corner and started running when she saw the ambulance. The double doors were open, and she saw a crowd in there, and she was pushing through, stopping as she saw him, and she gasped. She ran across to him, kneeling down to cradle him, then yelling at him, pushing, shouting that he was a fool. No one understood. The doctor had been just about to leave. He tried to calm her, to lead her carefully away, but she kept screaming. Then she started hitting the body, and the doctor had somebody hold her while he opened his bag and swabbed her arm and filled a hypodermic, giving her a sedative. It didn't calm her right away. She kept screaming, began to sob, crouched beside her husband once again, and finally it seemed all right to try to make her go. They led her down the hallway to the office.

The medical examiner was there to see the last of it. He waited while they led her down the hallway. Then he checked the body, doing more or less the same as what the doctor had, but taking more time, making notes. He straightened, putting pad and pen together, turning toward the open double doors as behind the people there he saw the police car pulling up. He waited while the driver's door was opened and the big man got out, putting on his hat. The uniform was tan, the hat a Stetson. Even with the people there the policeman's face could be seen above the crowd, burly, craggy, strong-boned with high cheeks, just a little puffy near the eyes, the medical examiner assumed from too much beer. What the hell, if you worked the hours he did, you'd be puffy near the eyes as well, never mind the beer.

The policeman's name was Slaughter, and that had meant he almost didn't get the job. He had settled here five years ago, and when the old chief had died, Slaughter had asked the town council for the job. At first the council was reluctant, but Slaughter had showed them his credentials, and they couldn't pass him by. Twenty years a policeman and detective in Detroit, trained in every manner of investigation, tired of living in the city, wanting to come out and live in peace, he had tried his hand at raising horses but then realized he wasn't any good. The only thing he knew was being on the force; he did it well. The council needed him. He needed them. They finally worked it out. Some had feared, thinking of his name, that he would be too tough for them, that coming from the East he would treat them as if he were in the city, breaking heads as if this were Detroit. But they had phoned Detroit, and reports about him there were even better than he claimed. He had never had a complaint against him. He was never one to push. So they had tried him on condition, and they had kept him ever since. At least in terms of lack of crime, the town had never had things better.

As the medical examiner kept watching, Slaughter started, big and solid, through the crowd, talking to them, his hand pressed down around his gunbelt, bullets showing, that was shoved a little low around his waist. Then the crowd was in back of him, and he released the hand from his holstered gun. Instincts from the city. Among the few that Slaughter still retained. Standing there in cowboy boots and cowman's hat, a toothpick in his mouth, he looked about as local as a person could become. Not because he wore them, but because he wore them with a certain pride and made the townsfolk proud to see him and to speak with him. That faint inflection in his voice that he had picked up since he'd come. To see him grow to meet the town had made the town aware of what it was. He had added to it.

Now he paused and glanced around. Taking the toothpick from his mouth, he walked across and frowned down at the body. "Old Doc Markle?"

"Yes, I'm sorry. I know how you felt about him."

Slaughter didn't answer.

"Heart attack," the medical examiner said. "His wife was here to see him. She's just down the hall."

Slaughter looked at him.

"She had to be sedated."

Slaughter shook his head. "She'll have it rough from now on." His voice dropped with sorrow. He tried to distract himself by paying attention to details. "What time did he die?"

"I don't know yet. Rigor's set in. That means several hours."

"Some time in the night?"

"It had to be. Otherwise somebody from the office would have seen him."

"Maybe. Let's find out for certain." Slaughter glanced around. He saw the people by the open double doors and went across to talk to them. They listened, saying something back to him. He spoke again. They nodded, slowly breaking up to go away. He turned and saw the people in the green lab coats standing by the wall. He waved to them to follow him as he walked back toward the table.

"You all work here. Anybody see him just before you closed?"

They shook their heads. There were six men and two women. One, the youngest woman, twenty, maybe slightly more, began to cry. It was clear, the way her face and eyes were red, that she'd been crying earlier as well. They were looking at the body, then away, then in a moment back again.

"No," one man was saying. He was red-haired, freckled, maybe thirty-five, thin and going bald. "I came through to lock the place, and Markle wasn't here."

"You check all the rooms?"

"Yes. In case someone forgot to lock them."

"What time did you check?"

"Shortly after six."

"Were you the last to leave?"

The red-haired man nodded.

"Anybody else? You've got kennels. Anybody come in after that to check the animals?

"I did." The older woman, maybe thirty-five as well, short but solid, her hair cut to just below her ears. "A little after ten. The doctor wasn't here then, either."

Slaughter looked at her. "The doctor? He said Markle," pointing to the first man.

"He's a vet. I just work here."

"That means Markle came in after ten," the first man said, "and died a little after."

Slaughter glanced at him and shook his head. "I don't know. You're the one who found him?"

"That's right."

"Did you change anything?"

"I turned the lights off."

"What about the doors?"

"Well, they were open."

"Then it wasn't after ten," Slaughter said. "When I sent all those people home, I found a man who's got a room in a building that looks down on here. He was out till well past midnight. He came home and checked his window, and he's sure that everything was dark down here. If the doors were open and the lights were on, he surely would have seen it. No, the doctor came here after one. Now I know you people put in heavy hours the same as all the rest of us, but one o'clock, I can't believe that's normal."

No one answered.

"What about this steer? Tell me what's the story on it."

"I don't know." The vet came around the table, looking at it. 'You can see that it was dead before he brought it in."

"You're sure of that?"

"It had to be with all that damage. You can see that he was doing tests on it. There isn't any record why."

"You don't know whose it is?"

No answer.

Slaughter looked at him, then at the steer and at the body, and he turned to face the medical examiner. "Heart attack, well, maybe. All the same, I think we'd better run some tests."

"Again?"

But Slaughter only frowned at him. Then hearing someone coming through the hallway door, Slaughter turned and saw the doctor. He went over to him. "How is Mrs. Markle?"

The doctor shook his head.

"Can I speak to her?"

"She won't understand."

"How soon till she does?"

"Maybe after supper. She'll be at the hospital. I'll check on her and let you know."

"Thanks." Slaughter stared at the floor. "It's too bad. A woman that age. Now she's all alone." He sighed, then walked toward the double doors.

The medical examiner was waiting for him. "What about the body? Can I move it?"

"I'll have pictures taken. Then it's yours." Again he tried to distract himself. "Is everything all right for tomorrow?"

"As near as I can tell."

"Okay. I'll see you then."

Tomorrow was the weekend, and they always got together out at Slaughter's. That was Slaughter's way of keeping everybody friendly. Everyone he worked with had an open invitation to the ranch-although "ranch" wasn't quite the word, just five acres with a house and barn. But he had two horses, and the house was very nice, and he liked to have the people whom he worked with out, the only friends he had. He'd been married once. His wife, though, had divorced him, which was common with policemen who were married to their work. She had kept the children, one boy and a girl, and now he hardly ever heard from them except when he insisted that they come out for a visit. That had been a month ago, and since then he'd been distant. It was obvious that he was looking forward to have people with him for tomorrow.

Now he walked to the cruiser, glanced around, opened the driver's door and slid inside. He sat there for a moment, then reached to grab the microphone from the two-way radio on the dash.

He pressed the button. "Marge, it's Slaughter. Any news?" He released the button.

Hiss of static. "Nothing, Chief. What about Doc Markle at the vet's?"

Slaughter didn't answer.

"Chief?"

He swallowed. "It's too late. He's dead."

"Oh." Hiss of static. "Lord, I'm sorry."

"Yeah, well… Guess his time just came." The words were like stones in his throat. "Damn it," he murmured.

"Say that again, Chief. I didn't understand you."

"Nothing. I'll be back to the office shortly." Slaughter returned the microphone to the radio, grabbed the key and twisted it, starting the car.

He had tried his best to be objective in there. Really it was hard. The doctor and the medical examiner both knew the way he felt. So did Marge. That was what she'd meant when she had said that she was sorry. Not for Markle, but for him.

Markle was the man he'd known out here the longest. It was Markle who had come out showing him about the horses he had tried to raise, explaining his mistakes. Markle had told him that a vet should come out twice a year at least, checking, giving shots and worming. Just when Slaughter got so he had one thing right, though, he would screw up on another, and soon Markle had to come out nearly every day. In the end, the old man had asked him why he wanted in this business in the first place, and then Slaughter had told him of his ideal image, living in the country, raising horses, selling them, sitting on the porch and watching all the animals run free. Markle shook his head. The word he'd used was "business," and he meant it. If you wanted horses just to ride and look at, that was one thing. Raising them and selling them, that was something else. People out here bred their own. Anyway, you needed decent stock. Good brood mares, a winning stallion. It took years to build a proper herd. Not to mention all the care and work. Days and nights of making sure that they were healthy, taking pains that they stayed out of trouble. You needed to watch them all the time.

Slaughter had listened, nodding, but he'd persisted, and only when the herd-not one horse or a couple, but the whole damned herd-came down with colic, did he know enough to stop. It was Markle who had told him of the old chief's death and how the town council needed a replacement. Markle was a member of the council, and that had helped, of course. Plus, Markle felt close to Slaughter by that time, at first just full of pity and exasperation toward him but then growing to admire his determination and the way he liked the country and the people and the style of life. Indeed, they'd gotten to be good friends, sitting on the porch each time Markle had come out, discussing each new set of problems, Slaughter drinking beer, the old man drinking Coke. The old man sensed in him a gentleness that went beyond Slaughter's name and strong, tough manner. The old man had told him so, and while there were some members of the force who stood in line to get the job, the old man had felt that since Slaughter had singled out this place in which to live and since he had a sympathy for ranchers, since he had the best credentials, he ought to have a good chance for the job.

So the two of them had done their best, the old man working on the members of the council, especially those who felt that big-time tactics weren't exactly what the town required, Slaughter coming in to say that big-time tactics were exactly what he didn't want, that they had been the reason he had left Detroit. He made a good impression. The issue was-even those who didn't want him had to say-he knew so much about this kind of work. They couldn't help but be convinced. And Markle was the cause of it. That night Slaughter took the old man on a celebration. Markle even drank some beer.

And now Markle was dead. Slaughter pulled up at a stoplight, waited, thinking, shook his head, and when the light turned green, he angled left. He thought of how he'd never spent the time he planned to with him. There had always been a thing to do, some aspect of the job to keep him occupied. Oh, sure, he'd gone around to see him and his wife from time to time. But not enough and not for long, and now he'd never have the chance again.

EIGHT

The door was thick wood, rich and solid, and Slaughter swung it open, stepping into the shadowy coolness of the stairway. The cells were down the stairs to the right, connected to the courthouse by a tunnel. Above and straight ahead, a wide square vestibule led into the offices. The floor was wood. The vestibule was rimmed by treelike plants. The ceiling, two floors up, was domed with glass.

He climbed the stairs and stood in the middle of the vestibule, looking at the ceiling and the glass. The sun was not yet high enough to gleam in. Where he stood was in halflight. He felt the halflight match his mood, thinking of the old man, and then shaking off his mood, he turned abruptly left to enter his office.

"Morning, Marge."

"Morning, Chief. Your coffee's on the desk. The night sheet's right beside it."

"Thanks."

But he'd already known she would say that. It was what she told him every morning, reduced now almost to a ritual. In spite of what had happened, he was forced to smile, walking past her toward his glassed-in section of the office in the far right corner. Marge was forty-five, gray-haired, heavy-set. She had been here briefly with the old chief just before he died, and wanting to keep everything efficient, the change as smooth as he could manage, Slaughter had kept her on. It was the best move he could have made. Marge was widowed with two full-grown children, and she had gone to work to get some order in her life. She had helped Slaughter ease in to his job, telling him which man was good at what he did and which was faking. She organized things so he could find out quickly what was going on. It had been her notion that they move the two-way radio unit from the room across the hall and put it in here with him. That way Slaughter could overhear whatever messages were coming through and maybe save some time. Certainly that saved the town some money. Rather Marge did, taking on two jobs instead of one, freeing one man who had always worked the radio (now he could go out on the street), at the same time taking Slaughter's calls and acting as his secretary.

She had the unit on the desk beside the entrance to the office, typing at another desk and waiting for the cruisers to start checking in with her. Behind her, desks were set in rows where officers would come in for debriefing after finishing their shift. The desks were empty now. There wasn't any point in having men here waiting for some trouble; best to keep them on the street and have Marge call to tell them where to go if they were needed. Slaughter barely glanced around the quiet room as he entered the glass-partitioned section of the office, sitting at the desk. He reached to swing the door shut, peered out the window at the cars and trucks that went by past the trees out there. Then sipping at his coffee-cool; he hadn't drunk it soon enough-he took the night sheet, leaning back until his chair was braced against the metal filing cabinet.

There were ten notes on the sheet. Last night hadn't been busy. A break-in at the hardware store. He saw that two men from the day crew were already working on that. They would check the manner of the break-in, find out what was taken. Chances were by Monday they would catch whoever did it. Strangers didn't come to steal here very often. When they did, they surely didn't try the hardware store. Most likely these were locals. Even though the town had a population of twenty thousand, it was small enough that there would be no problem discovering who'd suddenly gotten his hands on lots of hardware store equipment.

Two drunk driving, one assault (that was at a truckers' bar-an argument during a pool game), one dog that kept barking all night, and one prowler. That was on the other side of town, and Slaughter would have a cruiser checking there tonight. He scanned the other items on the sheet. Two car accidents, no injuries. A broken window at the high school. A missing person. Well, not really missing. That was Clifford who had left his wife three times already. He kept going out and getting drunk and then not coming home. Clifford's wife would phone to say that he was missing, and they'd find him two days later at a friend's. Well, Slaughter would have a man check all the friends and this time tell the guy at least to phone his wife when he got sober. They had better things to do than run a marriage-counseling service.

That was that. Nothing pressing. Although he didn't want to, Slaughter would have to work some more on organizing traffic control for the Junior Ranchers meeting that was coming up next week. He would have to make a speech there too, and for sure he was going to have to work more on what he planned to say to them. He thought about the old man. Might as well get started. He was reaching into his desk for a pencil and some paper when the buzzer sounded on his desk.

Slaughter pressed the button on the intercom. "What is it, Marge?"

"A call for you. It's Doctor Reed."

Reed had helped calm Mrs. Markle. "Put him through." Slaughter straightened, reaching for the phone. "How are you, Doc?" And then he frowned and listened.

Mrs. Markle was still unconscious from the sedative. She kept talking anyhow. Babbling was more like it. Mixing things like Sam Bodine, the steer, the old man, several other things as jumbled. Mostly, though, she just kept saying Sam Bodine. The doctor thought that Slaughter ought to know.

"You think Bodine owns the steer Doc Markle had on the table?" Slaughter asked.

"I don't know. It's hard to tell. I thought I'd better call you, though."

"I'm glad you did." Slaughter set down the phone, scratched his chin, and peered out the window.

"Marge," he said and opened the door.

She looked at him.

"Sam Bodine and old Doc Markle. Weren't they friends?"

"The father and the doctor were. I don't know much about the son."

Slaughter didn't either. He had heard the old man talk vaguely about him, but he'd never understood the story.

"Guess it's time I took a drive. Anybody calls, I won't be back till after lunch."

NINE

It was a place he'd never been. Slaughter had made a point of getting close to nearly all the ranchers around town, but Bodine was a loner, and except for once or twice a year, at ranchers' meetings or in passing on the street, Slaughter almost never saw him. Strictly speaking, Slaughter had jurisdiction only in the town. The state police had power in the valley, so it wasn't strange that Slaughter barely knew him. All the same, the town and valley were related, and he liked to keep on top of what was going on out there.

He meant to tell Bodine what had happened, to find out if the steer the old man had been working on was his. Slaughter could have phoned to do that, but really it was better that he drive out and do it in person. This way, he had a chance to be alone and think, mulling through the times that he and Markle had shared together, facing up to what had happened so he could adjust to it and keep his feelings separate from his work. That was just about the only value that he had, the largest one at any rate. Of course, that value was a mix of several others, but they all combined to just one thing-the need to keep his life as straight and simple as he could. Since his work was really all that mattered to him (so he told himself at least; he wished he had his children with him), that meant keeping his work as straight and simple as he could as well. He couldn't be two people, feeling one way, acting some way else. He had to bring them both together, which was why he liked to have the crew he worked with out at his place on the weekends. Seeing all those people was a way of merging leisure with his work.

So the old man had passed on now. Never mind "passed on." The old man was plain dead. Three days later, Monday, he'd be underneath the dirt. There wasn't anything that Slaughter could do about it. Feeling bad was just a distraction. Anyway, he told himself, how come you're feeling bad to start with? For the old man, for his wife, or for yourself? Is that sorrow or regret? You owed him things. You didn't go around to see him. Now he's dead, and you start wishing that you'd gone. Some friend you turned out to be. All right, hey, get control. Get it straight that next time you've got dues to pay, you pay them. Next time you make friends, you understand the obligations.

Right, he told himself and then repeated. Right, he thought and shook his head. And then because he didn't like the way his mind was working, he did his best to switch it off, to concentrate on driving, to look at the fields around him, at the mountains. The sky was almost white now. He could feel the stark sun burning through the rear glass of the car. Today would be the hottest yet, and he was thinking of the ranchers who'd be working in the parched grass of the range. The cattle wouldn't breathe well. Some would die. Then, because the thought of death was going through him, he began to notice all the carcasses of animals that were here and there beside the road. Five of them in just one mile. A raccoon and a porcupine, a field squirrel, and a rabbit, then a skunk, stiff and bloating in the sun. He thought of old Doc Markle, shook his head, and didn't bother counting anymore.

He turned left, rattling across the grate, heading down the dusty road between the fields, seeing cattle, coming up a rise, then seeing where the house and barn were down there in a hollow. He saw trees and sheds, a wood pile, a big corrugated metal building that looked like it would serve as a garage. The house itself was newly painted, white with gray around the windows and the eaves, fresh and clean and bright against the summer sun. It was big and getting bigger as he neared, wider than he'd thought, a porch that faced off to the left, a gravel parking space on this side of the house. He pulled up, and he cut his motor, getting out, putting on his hat, walking toward the porch.

The thing was, no one seemed to be around. The windows all were open. Anyone inside could not have helped but hear him. All the same, there wasn't any sign of anyone. Slaughter knocked, but no one answered. Then he turned and looked out toward the barn, toward the corrugated metal structure which he saw now had one door open, nothing in there on this side except a motorcycle. Well, that helped explain it. They were on the range and seeing to the stock. Either that or gone to town. Even so, you'd think that someone would have stayed. The wife perhaps. He'd met her once in town. Nice hands. She didn't seem the type to go out working with the stock.

He put his hand down on his holster, stepping off the porch and walking toward the barn. He saw where posts and boards were rigged to form a horse pen, a nice looking appaloosa in there underneath the shelter of a cottonwood. He saw a water trough, a salt lick, and a feed pail. That reminded him to get another salt lick for his horses. He turned, facing toward the house again, the flowers on one side, the well-kept strip of lawn around the house and porch. He scanned the sheds, the barn, the open space between them, nothing out of place, nothing dirty or run-down, everything as freshly painted as the house, and thought that this must be among the best-kept ranches that he'd seen.

He stood between the house and barn and shouted. No one answered. The horse was looking at him. Slaughter went over, leaned on the fence, and snapped his fingers at it. "What's the matter? No one home?"

The sun glared down on him. The horse moved its hoofs as if to come across to him and then stopped, its head cocked toward the house. Slaughter sensed before he heard it. A constant, high, shrill whistle. It was coming from the back of the house. He walked along the side, looked through a kitchen window in the back, and saw it. There upon the stove. A kettle with a flame beneath it, steam escaping through the whistle on the spout. He found a door in back that led in to the kitchen, knocked but no one answered, went in and shut off the stove. He didn't understand. He searched through all the downstairs rooms and then the bedrooms up on top. He thought that someone might have turned the kettle on and then lain down to rest a moment and then gone to sleep. But there was no one anywhere. The well-kept grounds, the freshly painted house. It wasn't like the people here to go off with a kettle on the stove. Slaughter went out, checking through the barn, the sheds, and the garage, but there was no one, and he didn't understand. What would make them leave a kettle like that? Why had they forgotten? Where in hell had they gone anyhow? The kettle had started shrieking only a while ago. They must have turned it on just before he came, so where in God's name were they?

TEN

Dunlap was hungover. He was slumped across the back seat of the bus. He had made connections with the nearest airport and had thought that he would take a taxi to the town. He hadn't remembered to check his map, though, and was told that Potter's Field was fifty miles away. No one would agree to drive him. It wasn't just the distance. It was that the town was on the other side of all those mountains. Getting there was several hours. Better take a bus. "But I want to go there in a taxi." They just shook their heads. This was something new to Dunlap. In New York where he came from, taxi drivers would grab the chance to go that kind of distance, picking up another fare and coming back. That was just the trouble. No one would be coming back. People took the bus. "But I'll pay to have you go both ways," he told them. They just shook their heads again. "All that driving through the mountains. We'll stay here and save the cars."

So Dunlap took the bus. He'd stayed up drinking late the night before in Denver, waking almost too late for his morning flight to here. The plane had propellers. It hit some rough air just above the northern mountains, jolting up and down, and sick already, Dunlap had barely kept his stomach down. He'd tried some coffee. That didn't help. He tried some Alka-Seltzer, and it almost worked. Then he made a joke about a little of the dog that bit him, asking for a drink. At first the flight attendant was reluctant, early in the morning like that, but Dunlap made a point of it, and in the end he convinced her to sell him a Jim Beam on the rocks. That was just the trick. It went down sharp and made him gag, but it stayed down, and it seemed to settle his stomach. Two more sips, and he was fine. At least he thought he was, returning to his stupor of the night before. Another drink, and then his stomach let him have it. He was in the washroom, throwing up.

He washed his face, looked in the mirror at his gray wrinkled skin, walked back, and slumped, but he was glad to have it out of him at least, and he was sleeping, even through the turbulence, as the plane struggled through the clouds and jounced down for a landing. Waiting for the bus, Dunlap went in to the men's room, washed his face again, opened up his travel bag, took out a bottle, and had another drink. He knew that he was classic: drinking all night, sick and yet in need of still another drink. All the same, he needed it, and if he did his job right, who could tell the difference? Just as long as he could function. That's what you do? Function? Just about. He had another drink. He had another on the bus, his pint bottle hidden in his jacket pocket. He sprawled, feeling sick again, staring at the seat before him, and then sitting up, he glanced at all the grassland going past. It was flat at first, but then it started rising, sloping up to foothills and then mountains, fir trees angling off as far as he could see now, rocks among them, and at one point, looking out, he saw the guardrail and a straight drop down to boulders and a section of the road that curved around a ridge down there. An object came around the lower bend. He knew it was a car, but down that far it resembled a toy, and suddenly aware of just how high he was, Dunlap felt a spinning in his brain, a rising in his stomach, and he had to look away. Either that or throw up again.

He settled back in his seat, glancing at the people who were near him. Men in cowboy hats, women wearing gingham dresses (gingham-Lord, he thought that had gone out of style fifty years ago), old men in suspenders, all with sun-creased skin that looked a bit like leather. Two seats ahead of him, an Indian was looking at a magazine. The Indian's dark hair hung to his shoulders. He wore a pair of faded jeans, a red shirt and a beaded necklace, his boots stuck in the aisle, showing cracked seams, run-down heels, and something on one side that looked distinctly like a piece of horseshit. Dunlap watched him as he turned the page. There was something strange about the photograph. It showed a naked woman, braced, her crotch against a tree. Dunlap peered a little closer. She was dark-haired, ruddy-skinned, exactly like the man who read it. And the language, as he leaned a little closer, wasn't English. Christ, a pornographic magazine for Indians. He'd have to make a note about that. Clearly he could use it. Local color and all that. He squinted at the pear-shaped breasts upon the naked woman. Then the page was turned, and he was looking at a beaver shot. Dunlap thought of Indians and made a joke about a Little Beaver, shook his head, and took another drink.

What kind of place was this to build a commune anyhow? he thought. Why not east or maybe on the coast? At least he had some friends there. Well, there had been many communes in those places, but none had ever been like this. Besides, he didn't choose his assignments. His bosses told him what to do, and he went out and did it. Maybe that was how they got at him for all the drinking that he did. Maybe. Still, he did his job. Or so he told himself at least. He'd have to clean the act up. That was sure. After this job, he would dry out, and he'd show them. Sure. Just as soon as this was over. He slumped so no one could see and had another drink.

ELEVEN

The sign said potter's field gazette. Of course, Dunlap thought. That almost slipped my mind. Gazette, for God sake. What else could it be? At least the building had a little class. It was mostly windows on both stories, shiny metal strips connecting all the panes. And clean at that, he told himself, thinking of the bus depot he had left. There were like-new imitation marble steps that led up to the all-glass door, shiny metal all around it, a shiny handle on the door. Dunlap waited for a truck to pass, then stepped off the curb, and started across the street toward the entrance.

The door turned out to be electrically controlled, swinging open with a hiss. The reception area was spotless, bright lights in the decorator ceiling, all-white walls, shiny imitation marble on the floor. What was better, the building was air conditioned, sweat already cooling on Dunlap's forehead. He thought that this might work out, after all.

He glanced at polished metal counters on his right and left, desks and people typing at them.

"Yes, sir. May I help?"

Turning, he saw a woman on his left, early twenties, thin-faced, attractive, her hair combed straight back in a pony tail. He smiled and leaned against the counter.

"Yes, I'm looking for a-" Lord, he couldn't remember the name. Parsons. That was it. "I'm looking for Mr. Parsons."

She stared at his wrinkled sport coat, at the sweat marks underneath its arms. Something shut off in her eyes. 'Yes, and may I have your name?"

"Dunlap. Gordon Dunlap. I'm from New York on a story."

Then the eyes were bright again. "Of course. He's been expecting you. Take these stairs. The first door on the right."

She pointed toward a flight of stairs beyond the counter, and Dunlap smiled, nodding, walking toward them. She wore a silk blouse, her bra quite clear beneath it, the two top buttons of her blouse spread open. Dunlap thought about that all the time he climbed the stairs. After all the women he was used to seeing with no bra, their nipples almost poking through their tops, this was exotic. He stopped and took out a handkerchief and wiped his face. To the left he saw a corridor of offices, their doors open, people typing, talking on the phone. To the right, he noticed a wooden door, the first wood in here that he'd seen. mr. parsons. editor. Dunlap knocked and entered.

Another woman, older, sat at a desk and studied him. 'Yes, sir?" When Dunlap told her, she said, "Of course." She went out through another door, this one wooden like the first, although the desk and chair and cabinets were metal. He waited. Everything was just as clean and shiny as downstairs. Through the windows, he could see the stores across the street. The woman came back, smiling, saying he should go in. Dunlap nodded, walking through.

Everything was wood in there, bookshelves, desk and chairs and tables, even the walls. No, not everything. A thick rug occupied a large part of the floor, and two of the chairs were leather. The difference was the same. This was more a study than an office. More than that, a sanctum. People summoned here would be impressed. Whoever summoned them understood the principles of power.

Parsons. He was smiling, getting up from where he sat behind the desk, coming around to shake hands. "Hello there. We expected you the middle of the week."

"Yeah, well, something came up at the office. They wouldn't let me go till yesterday at noon." And then because he knew he'd sounded rude, "I hope I didn't inconvenience you."

"No, not at all." Smiling again, Parsons pointed toward one of the well-stuffed leather chairs before the desk. "Have a seat. Can I get you something?"

"Coffee would be nice."

Parsons pressed a button on the intercom and looked at him.

"Cream and sugar. Lots of it," Dunlap said.

And Parsons put the order through. Then still smiling, Parsons sat back, his hands upon his lap, and waited. He was maybe fifty-five, husky, almost fat, but not exactly. Mostly he was just big-boned: massive chest and shoulders, hands as big as a heavyweight boxer's. His head seemed extra large as well. Even with his bulging stomach, he seemed very much in shape, though, his skin as fresh and smooth as athletes in their twenties. When he'd come around to shake hands with Dunlap, he had moved as if he were a dancer or a man of half his size and weight. Dunlap was impressed. This man had a presence. More than that, he knew what he was doing. He had never once appeared to notice Dunlap's wrinkled coat and ravaged face and eyes. Clearly, though, he'd been aware of them from the start. He was not a man who did things without thinking. The way he'd fixed this office so it stood out from the others. The way he sat, his expensive suit conspicuous in a town where everyone wore cowboy clothes, his blue shirt crisp and clean, his striped tie meticulously knotted, his hands upon his lap, leaning back and smiling, as if he were at his leisure (but he wasn't). Dunlap knew he'd have to watch him.

"Yes, well, tell me," Parsons said, still leaning back and smiling. "I know you told me on the phone. But just to help me understand, why not tell me once again?"

Dunlap lit a cigarette. "Well, we're doing retrospectives."

Parsons leaned ahead abruptly, pointing. "No, not here."

Dunlap wondered what he meant. He looked around. He saw that there were no ashtrays and understood, standing up to crush the cigarette against the inside of a refuse can. "Sorry."

"Quite all right. You couldn't know."

"Sure." And now you're up on me, you bastard, Dunlap thought, sitting back and going on. "Like I said, we're doing retrospectives-"

"News-world magazine?"

"That's right."

And Parsons nodded. "Quite a thing. A man from News-world magazine to come here."

"Yes, well-"

"Must be quite a story."

Then the door opened, and the woman came in with the coffee.

"Thank you."

"Certainly." And she was gone.

Dunlap tried to continue his explanation. "We've been-"

"How's the coffee?" 'Just the way I like it." "Fine."

And Dunlap had lost count of how much Parsons was ahead of him. "The commune," he was saying.

Parsons looked at him. He evidently hadn't figured they would get so quickly to the point. His eyes narrowed. "That's right. I remember now. You're checking on the commune." "The commune twenty years after it was founded." "Twenty-three." "How's that?"

"Twenty-three years since it was founded." 'Yeah, we figured that might make a point." Parsons shook his head and frowned. "I don't quite understand."

"Well, the difference between then and now. Nineteen seventy. Dope and acid. Vietnam. Young people either going into politics or dropping out of society." "But what about the commune?" "Well, we figured we would check on how it went." "I still don't understand."

"It's a way to measure how the country changed. All those fine young good intentions."

Parsons made a face. "The new republic. That's the thing they called it. Free love, free food, and free spirit." Parsons made another face.

"Yes, but never mind the 'free love' business. That's the part that people always pick at. What we want to know is what came out of all that."

"You could have saved yourself a trip. I'll tell you what came out of all that. Nothing. That's what came of it." "Well, that's a statement in itself."

"Hey, wait a minute," Parsons said. "Do you have that tape recorder on?"

Dunlap nodded. "Turn if off." "But what's the matter?" "Turn the damned thing off, I said." Dunlap obeyed. "But what's the matter? Listen, radicals back then are running corporations now. Either that or writing books about how wrong they were. Entertainers who dropped out and went to China are out hoofing on the stage again. Everything has changed. It's a different world. What's so wrong to talk about that? All the communes are long gone as well. But then none of them was quite like this. None of them had so much money, so much talent and ambition, coming out here from the coast, buying all that land and setting up to start a brand new country: Brook Farm in our century."

"Yes, and Brook Farm went to bust, and so did this," Parsons said.

"But what's so wrong to talk about it?"

"Look, you didn't come here just to see the difference. You came here to start that trouble once again."

Dunlap didn't understand.

"It's common knowledge how the town put pressure on them," Parsons said. "How the freaks came through here in their long hair and their costumes, dressed as Superman and God knows what all, turning kids to dope, standing on the corner, howling, blowing kisses. How the town refused to tolerate them, wouldn't sell them food or clothing or supplies, wouldn't even let them in the city limits, tried to find a way to get them off that land. How one rancher had his boy run off and went up there to get him, went a little crazy, pulled a gun and shot a guy. There's a lot of memory yet in town about that. There's a lot of feeling. I don't want you going around and making people ugly once again. Either that or guilty. I don't want you writing so this town looks like the nation's asshole. We had lots of that before. Writers coming in and making trouble, sympathizing with those freaks. You tell me how things have changed. Well, one thing hasn't. Reporters like an underdog, and the way the town reacted to those freaks, there wasn't any question who the reporters sided with. My guess is you'll be doing just the same."

"But really I'm not here for that," Dunlap said. "I just want to see the difference."

"Will you mention what went on back then? How the town reacted?"

"Sure. I guess so. That's a part of how things changed as well."

Parsons shrugged. "All right, then, there you have it."

And they looked at one another, and they waited.

The buzzer sounded on the intercom. Parsons touched a button.

"Don't forget you chair a council meeting in an hour," a woman's voice said.

"Thank you."

Parsons took his hand off the intercom, leaning back.

Christ, Dunlap thought. He isn't just the newspaper's owner and the editor and maybe owner of a half a dozen other places too. He's the god-damned mayor. Dunlap tried to think of how to smooth things. "Look," he told him. "You know just as well as I, there are two sides to a story. Back in nineteen seventy, everything was polarized. The straights and the longhairs. The hawks and the doves. One group acted one way, and the other did the opposite. The thing to do is talk to people in the town and get their version of the story, then to talk to people in the commune and get their version too."

Parsons shrugged. "There's no one out there now."

"What?" Dunlap straightened in surprise. "Nobody told me."

"Maybe two or three are still there. If they are, it's news to me."

Dunlap stared at him.

"Of course, there are ways to track the others down," Parsons said. "The names are all on file. If you've got the time."

Dunlap went on staring at him.

"Look, I'll tell you what," Parsons said. "You may have gathered from that message that I don't just run this paper. I'm on the town council. If I wanted, I could make things tough for you, see that people didn't talk to you, deny you access to the paper's files, other things."

It was the "other things" that Dunlap didn't like the sound of.

"But I won't. For one thing, that would show up in your story too. For another, you'd just work a little harder, and you'd get your story anyhow. All the same, if I wanted, I could make things tough. Now the point is, I don't want you thinking I'm against you. The fact is that I'm not. In your place, I'd act the same as you. What I do want is a simple understanding. Anything you need is yours. Ask and I'll arrange it. You go out and do your story. Then you come back to this office, and we talk. I want the chance to make this town look good to you. These people here are fine. I'm anxious that they don't get hurt."

Dunlap squinted.

"No, I'm not afraid of business being hurt," Parsons said. "People out there don't stop buying cattle just because a story makes a town look bad. What I said was true. I just don't want these people hurt."

Dunlap took a breath. "Fair enough."

"What do you need?"

"Well, for starters, let me in your paper's morgue. Then I'd like to see the records the police kept."

"That's no problem. What else?"

"Courthouse records. Trials and transcripts."

"That's no problem either."

"Then I'd like to talk to people in the town. I'll go out to the commune, too, of course."

"Of course. I'll see that someone goes out with you."

Dunlap shrugged. "That's all I can think of for now."

"Well, you'd best get at it then. Just remember. Anything you need."

"Don't worry. I'll get back to you."

"I know you will." And Parsons stared at him as Dunlap stood to leave. One thing now was certain, Dunlap thought. This was going to be a whole lot harder than he'd expected.

TWELVE

Ken Kesey was the cause of it. The Merry Pranksters and that bus. That was back in 1964. Kesey had already finished One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and Sometimes a Great Notion. With his money, he had bought some land near Palo Alto, California, gathered freaks around him, and started on a trip. That was back when LSD was legal, and the trip of course was only in his mind. Then the trip was real. He had bought a bus, had sprayed it every color of the rainbow, and then dressing like a comic strip, he had shooed his freaks on board and started for New York. On the Road a decade later, Neal Cassidy as driver, that same Cassidy who'd been with Kerouac. They had ballyhooed across the country, music blaring out of speakers on the top, channeled in upon itself so that it echoed and then echoed yet again, police cars stopping them while Pranksters jumped down-Day-Glo-colored costumes, Captain Marvel, Mandrake the Magician-setting up their movie cameras. "Yes, sir! Yes, sir! What's the trouble? Speak right toward this microphone." Well, the policemen didn't stay long, and the Pranksters got few traffic tickets, roaring on across the country, popping acid, blaring music, acting out the movie of their lives. They reached New York and headed back, and by now they were noticed, not just by the strangers they were passing but the press as well. There were numerous stories about their odyssey, acid rock and Day-Glo paint, so that when they got back to the commune, others of their kind were waiting for them, and the movie went on, only larger, more extreme. From the commune, they went to the cities, starting what they called their acid tests, light shows, flashing pictures, music coming from each corner of a hall they rented, speakers blaring, all matched with the flashing in their minds from all those Kool-Aid pitchers spiked with acid. Then Kesey was arrested for possession, not of acid but of marijuana. That took place in 1965. In 1966 he was arrested yet again, same charge, but convicted by now on the first offense and out while sentence was appealed, he had fled his second trial, heading south toward Mexico. Unlawful flight. Rumors where he was. Then back in California where he was arrested once again. In 1967 he was serving time. That was how the acid culture got its start, from Kesey and his life style bigger than his books.

But there were other ways, those who said that Kesey had been wrong, that with a good thing going he'd been foolish to be so in sight. Better to do it on the sly, keep things quiet, keep them truly out of sight. Like the commune, some were saying. That had been a good idea. The trouble was that Kesey ventured out. He had been his own undoing. Better find a place where no one went, stay there, do your thing. Well, they did it, and where they chose to do it was near Potter's Field, Wyoming. All it took was one rich kid whose parents had both died. He'd been with Kesey. He had seen the trouble that was coming, and he'd split. Twenty-one, he had complete control of all the money he'd inherited. He'd found a spot where no one ever went, fifty acres of thick timber in the mountains far across the valley from the town. He had bought it, paid the taxes for ten years, set up buildings, and moved in. It wasn't just a place for freaking out. He had notions of a kind of ideal way of life. Those who marched against the Vietnam war but felt they weren't accomplishing anything, those who tried to change society from within the system but found that the politicians they worked for betrayed them, these and others like them he would welcome to his arms. The new republic. Free love, free food, and free spirit. Everything was on his tab. Not an orgy, not the kind of free love everyone was thinking of. But something else. Simple freedom that permitted love, love in any form, physical, emotional, as long as no one would be harmed, the kind of freedom those who were attracted to him hadn't seen before. First there were the freaks, imitation Pranksters, some who had indeed been Pranksters. Then there were the drop-outs, those who couldn't stand things anymore, who couldn't even bear to watch the television news. Queers and junkies, cowards, troublemakers, traitors and more, that was how the straight world saw them, but in Quiller's fifty acres, they were just themselves. Quiller, twenty-one and rich and leader of his version of a country. Photographs of him were not at all what a conservative would expect. No long hair and beard and ragged jeans. No beads, guru shirts, or Captain Marvel costume. Quiller looked just as straight as those who spoke against him. Short hair reminiscent of the fifties, sideburns even with the middle of his ears, fair-skinned to begin with so his clean face looked like it was always shaved. He wore custom-tailored shirts and designer slacks and hand-sewn patent-leather shoes. Tall and thin. No, that didn't quite describe him. Tall was far too relative. He stood six-foot-eight, a star in basketball in college, but that still did not convey his seeming height. Think of what he weighed. One hundred and sixty, sometimes less, just sinew, bone, and muscle, running ten miles in the morning and another ten at night. He looked as if someone had put him on a rack and stretched him, long legs, long arms, neck and body, stark thin hips and chest and waist. His face was in proportion, high and narrow, slight jaw, small lips, thin nose. Mostly what you noticed were his eyes, though. Even in the photographs. Bright and clear and gleaming, almost piercing. In color photos, they were blue.

Some who were against him said his eyes were bright like that because of all the speed and acid he was popping. Others, more inclined toward him, maintained that they were bright like that because he was so god-damned smart, his I.Q. close to genius, up there near one hundred and eighty.

All that Dunlap had already checked on, going through old Newsworld files back in New York at his office. There were photographs of Quiller talking to reporters, of the conference that he had called, using all the power of his wealth, to tell them what he planned. Reporters had been glad to come, promised champagne, pheasant under glass, and caviar, eager too to find another Kesey. They had written many stories based on Kesey. Now they hoped to write a lot more like them based on Quiller, disappointed when they saw how straight he seemed. Quiller had them writing soon enough, however. First he told them how disgusted he was that he couldn't get attention without bribing them to come, how he hoped the caviar would choke them and remind them of the sickness in the country. He explained his views about the nation, and he told them to go out and spread the word. They, of course, refused. Some were standing up to leave. But he had something yet in store for them. "The Exodus," he called it. Two months further on, July 4, Independence Day, he would free his people from their bondage. Starting out from San Francisco, he would lead a caravan of misfits, malcontents, and dispossessed from City Hall at nine a.m. and take them to the promised land. He told reporters of the fifty acres, told them what he planned to do there, told them of the kind of ideal life he hoped to lead. Because he couldn't change the nature of the world, he would turn his back on it and make his own. No hate, no wars, no repression. Only peace and mutual respect and harmony. He invited all the reporters in the room to join him. Mostly, though, he let them in on what amounted to a newsman's holiday. Two months from now, they'd have stories all right, more than they could handle, visions of those photogenic hippies, traffic jams and confrontations, Day-Glo buses, vans and motorcycles, God knows what all, heading down the road. Local color and events. That was it: events. This had the feel of something major. Quiller got what he had wanted. They went out and spread the word.

It was a media-created happening. Later, many would maintain that nothing would have taken place if reporters had been silent. But the media said that it would happen, and of course it did. Five thousand freaks of all descriptions, half as many vehicles. It wasn't just a traffic jam. It amounted almost to a riot, police attacking the freaks, claiming the assembly was unlawful, dragging hippies off. Quiller put a stop to that. He'd used his money there as well, buying various permits from officials.

And they started away, Quiller at the lead in a bright red classic 1959 Corvette, heading across the country. They went through Nevada and then Utah, others joining in along the way, a five-mile caravan of cars and trucks and bikes and buses, straight or twisted, some plain, others Day-Gloed, orange and green and purple, every color you could think of. It was something else, they said. It was also Quiller's last cooperation with reporters. He had broken his first rule-don't let people know what you're doing. He'd been forced to. Without newsmen, he had no publicity. But now he had no need for them, and he ignored them all along the way. He reached Wyoming, moving close to home. He crossed the rangeland, worked up through the mountains, crossed more rangeland, then more mountains. Then he reached the valley, coming through the western pass, never getting close to town, simply heading north within the valley until he reached the loggers' road and going up, and that was where the story ended. No reporter ever saw the compound. Lord knows, many tried. Quiller, though, was adamant. Echoing a famous Kesey slogan that a person's either on or off the bus, he said that newsmen too were free to join. The catch was, they would have to stay. 'You're either in or out of the compound. There's no in-between." Many newsmen tried to fake it, but he wouldn't have them. He wouldn't accept a lot of freaks who'd come with him as well. He wanted only those who sensed a mission. Those who wanted nothing but parties he ordered to leave. There were thugs he had hired who took care of forcing them to leave and many of the chosen who took care of forcing them as well. At last he had a thousand. Then he cut them down to half, and all the gates were closed.

From all accounts, there wasn't much to see, regardless: just an open space within the trees, wooden buildings set out into streets and sections, not like houses, more like barracks, just as if this were the Army. That had turned a lot of people off, helping to thin the ranks. The place itself was far off in the forest. Quiller hadn't bought land near the highway. He had bought it away up in the mountains, also buying a strip of land to get to it. That was why you couldn't see the compound. Walking up the loggers' road, you came to where a gate was closed and members of the commune watched it. You could work across and come in from the side. That took several hours, though. The woods were thick and slashed with ravines. But the borders there were guarded too, and anyway the woods were still so thick you couldn't see the commune. For a picture of it, you would have to walk right to the forest's edge, and someone surely would have spotted you. There were rumors that one man had gone there, been discovered, had his camera taken from him, and been chased. But no one ever found the man to talk to him, and no one ever knew.

And anyway, so what? The story by then wasn't at the compound. It was in the town. All the freaks who'd been rejected or had lost their interest showed up in Potter's Field. That was when the trouble started, when the town rejected all those crazy perverts, wouldn't sell them food or even gasoline, and called in the state police to have them sent away. There were fights and broken windows, shattered heads, Day-Gloed buildings, litter, obscene gestures, and a lot of dope. It was two weeks that the town wished hadn't been. In the end, the freaks were all evicted, but the town looked on the compound as the cause of all the trouble. Indeed the town drew no distinction between Quiller's people and those others, and it wouldn't sell the compound food.

Dunlap knew that from the files in New York too. He had seen the photos of the San Francisco riot, policemen dragging hippies off, kicking, swinging clubs and pushing, a great mass of pained and twisted faces, bodies trampled underfoot-photos that reminded him of others like them from the previous decade, especially the march on the Pentagon and the Chicago Democratic convention. He had read about the sudden permits that came through, suspecting that Quiller could have had them sooner but that Quiller held off until he made a point, binding all those people to him. Dunlap saw photos of the Corvette heading out of San Francisco, the long procession following; of locals by the road who even in still pictures seemed to shake their heads and turn and frown and ask each other what the hell was going on. State patrol cars waiting for a traffic violation. Restaurants that wouldn't serve them. By the time they got to Utah, the photos began to seem ordinary. Editors enlivened them, juxtaposing Brigham Young, the Mormon trek, and Quiller's ragged motorcade. The point was obvious, Day-Gloed buses against covered wagons, this new trek a parody of what had once been dignified and meaningful. Even layouts like that soon lost their effectiveness, however, so that by the time the column reached Wyoming, there was little new to show. Oh, sure, there were the mountains and the valley, the road up to the compound, and the gate. But all those pictures didn't have much drama to them. Editors rejected them in favor of what was happening in town.

As near as Dunlap could remember from the photos he had studied in New York, there didn't seem much difference between how the town had looked back then and what it looked like now. A few new buildings maybe, and of course the slogans had been erased from the walls, but really nothing much was changed. The same wide central street, the same two-story buildings that went straight down on both sides, their clapboard walls painted white. A pocket of tradition. Continuity. The place had likely looked the same back in the fifties too. Dunlap had seen pictures of the confrontation in the town, beaded hippies face-to-face with stern-eyed men in cowboy hats, state policemen standing by patrol cars waiting for trouble; fights and local people jeering; flying stones and bottles, broken windows, tents and garbage through the park-and more fights, further confrontations, each day worse than the one before until the roundup in the park, patrol cars all around it while the troopers went in from all sides and pushed the hippies toward the center, county buses waiting for them, those on foot at least, others forced to start their cars and trucks and vans and get the hell out from the town. The state police cars stayed with them right through the town and valley, up the pass, and only left them when they reached the other side. There were some who, stubborn, came back, but they didn't last long, forced to leave again, and then that part of everything was over. The story idled.

There was nothing doing. Newsmen and photographers soon left. Potter's Field was by itself again, except for Quiller and the compound.

So much for the files that Dunlap had gone through in New York. Parsons had been right, of course. The press had sided with the hippies. Civil rights and freedom of expression, not to mention that the hippies were the underdogs. All the same, Dunlap couldn't blame the town. It really hadn't been prepared for several thousand strung-out, West-coast freaks descending on them. There was just too little understanding. It didn't matter anyhow. That wasn't what he'd come for, although he'd have to note it for perspective in his story. What he wanted was the story of what happened next, the story no one else had covered, the subtle many-year changes that when isolated didn't have much drama but when put together and compressed might make a dramatic point.

Quiller and the compound, what went on up there behind those sentries and that gate? Dunlap was guessing that the new republic failed, all that wealth and innocence not good enough to make a difference. Lofty ideals compromised, gold turned into lead. Not that Quiller's ideals had been very deep or complicated. Regardless of the I.Q. they had come from, they were mostly well-phrased slogans. Sure, there was the paradox of using wealth to make a way of life that didn't need it. There was, too, the paradox of Quiller, straight and clean-cut, leading all those hippies, his classic Corvette at the head of all those music-blaring buses. Nonetheless, for all that Dunlap knew, Quiller had just made himself look straight so he could use the system to create his enterprise. The only way to know that was to talk to Quiller, and as much as Dunlap was aware, no one from the outside had heard news of Quiller since he'd closed the gates and gone back in the wood-enshrouded compound back in 1970. It was almost twenty-three years ago exactly. Parsons had been right. Next month, the middle of July, would be about the time the trouble had reached its worst within the town. Dunlap guessed that if the compound went to hell, its members simply drifted off, Quiller with them, so dejected no one wished to talk about it. Could be Quiller lost his wealth and disappeared, no longer powerful, only disillusioned and anonymous. Could be. All the same, you'd think that someone would have told.

Well, the only way to know was to do the research, get the facts, and get out of here. Dunlap sat before a microfilm machine. He was in the newspaper's basement, in a small room at the far end of a corridor. His coat was on a chair, the only light the one that glowed from the microfilm machine. It was pleasant down here in the half-dark, cool and faintly soothing, even with the sound of a fan that blew air past the film to keep the reading light in there from burning through it. He had asked the man in charge down here to give him all the reels for summer, 1970. Actually he'd been surprised that Parsons had the Gazette's morgue on microfilm. Most town papers like this just had issues put in storage, destroying many when they needed room. Parsons, though, was up on things. Dunlap hated reading microfilm. All the same, he was impressed.

He sat there, fooling with a reel, adjusting it. He turned the reel until he got an image on the screen before him, centered it, and started reading. What he wanted was some aspect of the story that the files he'd read had not included. Some small detail that would tell him what had happened in the compound while the troubles in the town upstaged it. For a time, the microfilm before him and the files he'd read in New York were the same. Different writers handled them. There were different slants, one in favor of the town and one against it, but the information was the same. Then he came across an item that he'd never seen before. The cars and trucks and vans that went up in the compound. Quiller had them sold. Some he sent down to the local dealers, trading at a loss for cash. Then the trouble in the town intensified so much that angry dealers wouldn't any longer trade with him, and emissaries from the compound had to leave the valley for the dealers in the nearest other towns. Emissaries. That was it. Quiller wasn't ever with them. What was more, the emissaries wouldn't ever mention what was going on up there. That was no surprise, of course, although Dunlap thought that it was subtle. Good religious precepts. Swear your followers to secrecy; have them give up all unnecessary worldly goods. The money they earned from the sale would have been nothing when compared to Quiller's wealth, but this way they were adding to the enterprise, giving, not just taking. The thing that puzzled Dunlap, however, was the sports car. In all the local items that described the way they traded all their vehicles for cash, there wasn't any mention of the classic red Corvette. Even back in 1970, a 1959 Corvette was special. Chevrolet had switched designs, and many buyers felt the earlier was better. Surely some reporter would have made a note if it were sold. Dunlap told himself that, when he had the time, he'd have to call the other papers in the area. In the meanwhile, though, and on a chance, he scanned the used-car advertisements on the microfilm. He knew that, if a dealer had his hands on that Corvette, he'd surely want to advertise. There wasn't any mention, though.

Dunlap looked ahead for several weeks, and still there wasn't any mention. He would have to check the other newspapers, of course. But could it be, was it possible that Quiller had ordered his members to sell their vehicles and, while they did it, had kept his own? What the hell was going on?

Dunlap turned the reel and read more of the microfilm. Once again, except for how events were slanted, this was much the same as what he'd read in files back in his New York office. The roundup, the expulsion, and the slowly settling peace. Then there was a difference, local items on how much it cost the town to clean the garbage from the park, to put in new windows, and to scrape the slogans off the walls. There were letters praising how authorities had handled things, attempts to understand a strange and changing world, confusion and bewilderment. Only one dissent, no name, saying that the town had been too hasty, that "instead of beating on those kids we should have tried to understand them." Maybe so, but if there had been others who agreed with that, there was no published sign of it. The overwhelming sense was of a town that still had not recovered from its shock. Weird beaded costumes, long hair, beards and what all, they were one thing, although Dunlap guessed that local people with their cowboy clothes and gingham dresses had seemed just as strange to all those West-coast hippies as the hippies seemed to them. Dope and shiftlessness and filth, though, they were something else, something that the town could neither understand nor tolerate. A woman wrote in, angered by two infants she had seen, dirty-faced and crying, diapers unchanged, while the mother stretched out on the grass and looked away. Another woman wrote that all she'd seen some children eat was half-cooked rice and moldy cheese and milk which with the specks of straw inside had clearly not been pasteurized, and where on earth they'd got that kind of milk she didn't know, but what was going on? The dope had really done the trick, though. They had evidently smoked it clear out in the open, almost flaunting it, and Dunlap, going through the items in the paper, was surprised that no one was arrested. Sure, he understood that too, he guessed. To pick up one, you'd have to take them all. Otherwise you punished one and let the others get away. The jail was likely far too small, the trouble just not worth the cost of feeding them. Better just to clear out the lot of them. Which is what they did.

Then Dunlap read some issues of the paper where there wasn't any mention of what happened. Things were getting back to normal. So the townsfolk were pretending. That was just about the time the newsmen and photographers decided that the story was played out and started leaving. They weren't present for what happened next, the murder, headlines straight across the page. At last.

THIRTEEN

The door creaked open. Dunlap swung. A man stepped into view, outlined by the hallway light that spilled in. He was tall and gangly, wearing suspenders, his shirt sleeves rolled up, his white hair haloed by the light behind him, the man in charge of microfilm whom Dunlap had talked to earlier. "I'm sorry, sir. We close at five." The words were hushed as if this truly were a morgue, the almost-empty room echoing.

Dunlap stared at him and breathed. Then he leaned back in his chair and rubbed his temples. He looked at his watch. Ten to five. He'd started shortly after two, so taken up by what he read that he hadn't realized how quickly the time was going.

Abruptly he felt tired.

"What time do you open in the morning?"

"Eight o'clock. We close at noon." The room echoed again.

Dunlap lit a cigarette and nodded. "Thanks." He'd been afraid that the newspaper's office wouldn't be open on Saturday. He stood and put his jacket on, glancing at the notes he'd made, surprised that there were so many of them, unaware he'd made them. He put the microfilm back into its box, stacked it on the other boxes, snapped the light off on the reader, picked the boxes up, and walked across the room to hand them over. 'Thanks," he repeated, and with his camera, tape recorder, and his notes, he went out past the man and down the hall.

On the street, Dunlap had to squint again. The sun was low, descending toward the mountains, but the glare was as bad as earlier. In contrast with the air-conditioned building he'd just left, the air out here was close and humid, and he started sweating almost immediately. There were people going past, walking home from work, lots more traffic on the street. He glanced at several women, young and tall with soft, loose-fitting dresses that nonetheless suggested hips and breasts, and shook his head. He turned and walked up toward the right. As much as he remembered, that was where the two big buildings with all the trees had been when he'd arrived on the bus at noon. He looked and saw the trees in the distance, and he kept walking. The trees seemed five blocks away at least, and he was wondering if the effort would be worth it. Mostly he was hot and tired, and his hands shook so bad that he knew he'd have to stop soon for a drink. But reading through that microfilm had perked his interest, and he didn't want to stay here any longer than he had to, so he'd take a chance, and if the office up there were still open, maybe he could save some time. Maybe, but the trees seemed just as far away, the more he walked, and several times he almost weakened, glancing at the bars.

Then he stood across from all those trees, the big, stone, pillared courthouse, and the brick, three-story building that he guessed would be the police station. He crossed the street toward them, reaching the shadow of the trees and feeling cool beneath them as the siren started wailing and a cruiser shot out from the corner of the building, racing down a side street, emergency lights flashing, barely stopping at the main street as the big man in there swerved the cruiser sharply to the left and, tires squealing, rushed down through the center of the town.

Dunlap watched him go. This was more like home. There were people all along the sidewalk stopped and watching. There were cars that pulled close to the sidewalk while the cruiser wailed quickly past. Then the cruiser was so far along that Dun-lap couldn't see it anymore. He heard the siren rising, falling, becoming fainter. Then he couldn't hear it, and after he noticed that the traffic and pedestrians were going on about their business, he started up the sidewalk toward the police station's entrance.

There was rich, well-tended lawn on each side of the walkway. From the shadow of the trees, he guessed. The sun could not get in and scorch it. He was thinking of the brown grass on the rangeland, thinking of the cruiser, what in this small town would merit such commotion. Probably an accident, he thought. A bad one, rush hour and all that. He reached the stairs that led up to the entrance, brick just like the portico and walls, old and dark and weathered. He went in. There were stairs that led down to the basement, stairs that led up to a vestibule, wide and tall and spacious, treelike plants in pots along the walls, doors that led off on each side. The place gave off the not-unpleasant must that comes with many years. He saw a door wide open, saw the sign on top, police chief, nathan slaughter, and he entered.

The room was bright: white walls, lights across the ceiling. To the left, he saw a heavy, gray-haired woman at a desk that supported a bulky, two-way radio. At first, she didn't notice him. All she did was sit there, staring at the radio. He moved, and then she turned to him.

"Yes, sir, may I help?"

Dunlap glanced across the empty room and doubted it. "I'm looking for the chief."

"Sorry. He's not in." The woman stared at the radio again.

"Well, my name's Dunlap. Mr. Parsons sent me over."

"You're the reporter from New York?"

He nodded.

"Mr. Slaughter had a call about you, but he couldn't wait. Something came up, and he had to get there."

Sure, the cop who raced out in that cruiser, Dunlap thought. As the woman stared at the radio yet again, he couldn't tell if she was being rude or was merely preoccupied. "I don't suppose you know when he'll be back."

The woman shook her head. "Tomorrow morning."

Swell, Dunlap thought. "Then maybe you can do something for me."

"That depends."

"I need to see some files."

The woman shook her head again. "You'll have to ask the chief about that."

Swell, Dunlap mentally repeated, and abruptly a call crackled from the radio.

"Christ, he's dead, all right," a man blurted, his frenzied voice distorted by static. "Lord, he hasn't got a-"

FOURTEEN

Slaughter skidded to a stop behind the other cruisers. He was getting out and putting on his hat even as he reached to turn the motor off. His siren faded. Over to his right, he saw them standing in a circle in the middle of the field, staring down toward what appeared to be a hollow: several members of his force, a few civilians, and the medical examiner. They looked at him as he hurried around the cruiser. Then they turned and went on staring. He was stepping onto the curb, rushing through the stiff brown grass, looking at the stockbarns over to his left, smelling cattle droppings, mounds and mounds of them, the one thing out here that he still wasn't used to, cattle milling in the pens, brought in to be force fed and then shipped. He was almost running as he came up to them and looked down in the hollow. No one spoke.

"Jesus," he said and turned away and then looked back again. "You're sure that this is him?"

Someone nodded to his right, the husky blond policeman who was Rettig.

Rettig handed him a wallet. Slaughter opened it and read the driver's license. Clifford, Robert B. It was him all right, unless somebody had made a substitution. All those times his wife had called and said that he was missing, afraid that something had happened to him, when in fact he'd just gone out to have some drinks and get away from her. And this time, damn it anyhow, her fear was justified.

What made Slaughter think about a substitution, what made him read the license, was the body splayed out stiffly in the hollow. The body had no face. Its eyes and lips and nose and cheeks and chin and forehead, everything was ripped and mangled, as if somebody had shoved the face into a wood shredder. There were bits of chin and cheekbone showing, sockets where the eyes had been, but mostly what was shocking were the teeth, bared, no flesh around them, white against the dark, dirty, scab-covered flesh. The ears were gone as well. No, not gone exactly. They were mixed in, bits and pieces, with the other mangled flesh, tufts of hair stuck where his eyes had been, the illusion that the hair had grown in the sockets. Slaughter was almost sick and had to turn away.

He took a breath. "Okay, what have you got so far?"

Rettig stepped a little closer. "Well, he was drinking last night at that bar down on the corner."

Slaughter squinted down the street. The Railhead. Where the stockyard workers went for lunch and after five. He nodded.

"He was drinking quite a bit. He stayed till closing, bitched a lot because they wouldn't serve him. Then he left."

"Was he alone?"

"That's what the bartender says."

"No one saw him after that?"

"Nobody I can find."

Slaughter glanced once more at the wallet in his hand, searching through it. "Two fives and a one. We know he wasn't robbed, at least." He brooded and turned to the medical examiner. "So tell me what your guess is."

"I won't know until I get him on the table."

"Hell, it's obvious," a man nearby them said.

Slaughter turned. He saw a young policeman. Red-haired, bothered by what he was staring at. His name was Hammel. Slaughter had hired him several months before, and now he guessed he'd have to start to teach him. "No, it isn't obvious. There are just three ways this could have happened. One: he was already dead when something came and ripped at him. Two: he fell unconscious, and it happened. Three: he got attacked while he was walking. Now if he'd been dead already, then we have to know what killed him. Someone might have slit his throat, and then an animal came by and smelled the blood." Slaughter kept staring at the young policeman who was red-faced, blinking, looking one way, then the other. Slaughter knew that he had shamed him, that he shouldn't press it anymore, but he was powerless to stop. "In case you haven't noticed, there's a difference between a dog attack and homicide. If that's what kind of animal to blame." He turned toward the medical examiner again. "Is that what you think did this?"

"I don't know. I'll have to measure all those lacerations. You can see there aren't any claw marks on the body. That rules out a cat or something like that."

"Cat? You mean a cougar?"

"That's right. Sometimes mountain lions come down here to the stockpens where the cattle are. But not too often. And certainly not lately. Not in twenty years. There aren't many cats around here anymore."

"You think it was a dog then?"

"That's my guess. I'll have to check to see, though, as I said. One thing that I want to look at are those pant cuffs. You can see where they've been torn. It could be something nipped at him and brought him down."

"Could be. On the other hand, they could be old pants that he didn't bother changing when he left the house. I'll send them to the state-police lab and in the meantime go around and see his wife about them." Slaughter was thinking that he'd have to go and see her anyhow, and then he didn't feel like talking anymore. He turned and saw the young policeman who continued to look flustered, his cheeks red, blinking.

"-never saw a thing to beat it."

"I did," Slaughter told him, trying to make up for how he'd spoken to him. "Back in Detroit, working homicide. Bodies one and two days old, bite marks all over their arms and legs, their faces and their necks. Rats in tenements. We got so we expected them. If we weren't out there fast enough, we sometimes didn't find too much. Just take it easy. A thing like this can throw you. Come to think of it, a thing like this can throw me too."

The young man nodded.

Slaughter nodded back. He turned to Rettig. "Go down to those houses on the corner. See what people know. Screams. A dog that's loose. Any thing they might have noticed."

"Right." Rettig hurried away.

Slaughter faced the medical examiner again. "We'd better call and have the ambulance brought out." He paused and watched as Rettig moved across the barren lot. "You know what I've been thinking?"

"I'm not sure."

"I'm thinking of that chewed-up steer we found by old Doc Markle."

"Some connection?"

"I don't know. But I can't shake the feeling something's wrong."