Sudden prey

FOURTEEN

LUCAS FOUND WEATHER AND ANOTHER WOMAN IN A thirteenth-floor laboratory, looking at skin grafts on a white rat. Weather was surprised when he poked his head in the door: ''We need to talk,'' he said gruffly.

The other woman looked at Weather as though Weather should be insulted. But

Weather nodded: ''Sure…'' And when they got out in the hall, she asked,

''How mad are you? You look kind of white around the eyes.''

''Don't joke about it,'' he said, his voice suddenly rasping. ''We have a tape of a phone call and they were talking about you.''

''About me?''

''Yeah. They want to get you, because you're with me. I'm out there busting my balls running these assholes down, and now I've got to spend a half hour looking for you because you've run off someplace…''

''Hey,'' she said sharply. ''I did not run off. I went to a hospital, where I work.''

''And told everybody you really didn't want to talk to me, so when we get this phone call, I wind up having to ditch the investigation to find you.''

''I didn't ask you to do that,'' she said.

He stopped talking for a second, then said, ''Listen, just what the fuck do you think is gonna happen if one of these people shows up here with a machine gun?

You think they're gonna ask for you, and take a number? Or you think maybe they'll shoot a couple of your friends to make the point, then ask where you're at. You're not just risking your life. You're risking theirs. There are already six people dead from this thing.''

''Eight,'' she said. ''Don't forget the two women at the credit union.''

MARTIN DROVE DOWN I-35W TO BURNSVILLE, THEN, BY memory, took them through a rat's-nest of suburban streets, and finally to a blue rambler, where a snow-packed driveway led to a double garage. Martin parked in the street. ''Hope he's home,'' Martin said, leaning across Sandy to look out the side window. ''He is, most days.''

''Want me to wait?'' she asked. She'd run, once Martin was out of sight.

''Better come along,'' Martin said.

''I was so scared in the store, that somebody would recognize me,'' Sandy said.

''I don't think Dave'll recognize you,'' Martin said. ''He doesn't watch much

TV. And he's a little shy.''

Martin rang the doorbell, waited, rang it again and the door opened. Dave-Martin hadn't mentioned his last name-was an older man with thick glasses, wearing a

Patagonia pullover. He pushed open the storm door, saw Sandy behind Martin and blushed.

''How y' doing, Dave?''

''Bill, come on in.'' Dave pushed the door wider. ''You on a trip?''

''Yeah, I am-heading out to the Dakotas.''

''You heard about the trouble we're having?'' Dave glanced sideways at Sandy and blushed again.

''On the radio,'' Martin said.

Dave said, ''And they want to take the guns away from the good people. I can't believe these guys in government.'' He shook his head.

Dave took them to the lower level, where a row of Remington gun safes lined one wall. He didn't have any ARs, AKs, ranch rifles or anything else that Martin was interested in, but he did have a rack of beautiful bolt-action hunting rifles-''Hunting's coming back in with the yuppies, I've been selling used

Weatherbys like hotcakes. You see any Weatherby Mark V's in three hundred Mag or less, in good shape, think about me.''

''I'll do that,'' Martin said. He was looking at another rack, short little rifles, and said, ''What're all the Rugers for?''

Dave shrugged. ''Just regular demand… jump-hunting deer. Can't hardly find them anymore.''

''How much you get?''

''Upwards of four-fifty, for a good one,'' Dave said.

''Jeez, they only cost half of that, new.''

''Well, they haven't made them for ten years. If Ruger doesn't come out with them again, I'll make a mint…''

They talked more guns for a while, Sandy standing silently behind them, and

Martin finally bought two used. 45s for seven hundred dollars.

''Wish I could help you more,'' Dave said, as they left.

To Sandy, Martin said, ''Two more stops.''

At the first stop, a sporting goods store, he bought four green-and-yellow boxes of. 45 ammo, a Browning Mantis bow, two dozen Easton aluminum arrows, two dozen

Thunderheadbroadheads, an arrow rest, a fiber-optic sight, a release and a foam target like the one they'd left in the Frogtown house. They waited while the guy at the store cut the arrows to thirty and one-quarter inches, and seated inserts in the tips, so Martin could screw in the Thunderheads.

Martin looked at a Beretta over-and-under twenty-gauge while they waited, then sighed, put it back, and said, ''Not today.''

At the second stop, he bought six more boxes of. 45 ammunition.

''Do you know where all the gun stores are?'' Sandy asked.

''Most of them,'' he said. ''Most of them from… well, from the Appalachians to the Rockies… and Salt Lake and Vegas and Reno. I don't know the coasts.

Well, some in Florida, if that's a coast.''

And a moment later, she asked, ''Have you thought about getting out of this?''

Martin looked at her. ''Have you?''

She shook her head: ''No. I'm stuck with Dick, I guess. I just think we oughta move on. Mexico. I really don't want to die.''

''Huh.'' Martin didn't relate well, but for the first time since she'd known him, he started to talk. ''I'm like Butters,'' he said. ''Running out of time.

All the people like us are: they're coming to get us, there's no way we can win.

We just make a stand, and go.''

''Who's they?''

He shrugged. ''The government-all of the government, the cops, the game wardens, the FBI, the ATF, all of them. And the media, the banks, liberals, whatever you want to call them. The Jews… They're all in it together. City people. They don't all want to do us harm-they just do.''

''The blacks?''

''Ah, the blacks are more like… poker chips,'' Martinsaid. ''The government's just playing a game with the blacks. I mean, they might use the blacks to get us, but the blacks themselves won't get anything out of it. Never have, never will.''

''That's pretty bleak,'' Sandy said.

''Yeah. Well, you know, the people who run things, they want power. And they get power by writing laws and making you depend on them. They can do anything they want to old people, because old people gotta have Social Security and Medicare and all that. And if you try to be independent, they get you with laws. Like

Dick. No way he was ever gonna be able to run that bike shop. He screwed up one time with his taxes, and they came after him forever. Never let him go. Makes a man crazy.''

''You think Dick is crazy?''

He grinned and said, ''We're all crazy. You can't help it. I was thinking about it the other day-you know how you used to burn leaves in the fall? In all the small towns? And how good it smelled, the burning leaves in the air. Can't burn leaves anymore, because they won't let you. No reason for it, in the small towns anyway. You ain't polluting nothing… They just make the law to train you. I mean, it starts with the small stuff, and it goes all the way up to the big stuff, like lettin' the Mexicans in, so people like us can't get good jobs no more…''

Sandy nodded. ''Okay.''

''I used to love the smell of burning leaves in the autumn,'' Martin said, looking out the window at the snow.