Winterkill

PART FOUR

Snow Ghosts Thirty-four Two months had passed, and except for an occasional morning dusting, it hadn't snowed. Even in March, normally the snowiest month of the year in Wyoming, it didn't snow. A combination of high-altitude sunshine and warm Chinook winds that swept down and roared across the face of the Rockies had melted the snow on the valley floor, although there were still six to ten feet of snow in the mountains.

At the Sovereign Citizen compound, the disabled Sno-Cats still sat as silent hulks. The empty trailers, campers, and vehicles of the Sovereigns hadn't been removed either, and probably wouldn't be until late spring, when the mountain roads were open and tractors and flat-bed trucks could get up there.

Except for investigators and a very few journalists, there had been almost no visitors to the compound since it had erupted. For all practical purposes, it looked the same as it had on that day in January. An internal Forest Service investigation had been launched immediately to determine whether or not policies had been breached and regulations followed. The FBI announced a similar investigation into the actions of Special Agent Dick Munker.

Robey Hersig had tentatively put out feelers to the attorney general in Cheyenne about an investigation on a statewide level. He was rebuffed on the basis that it was a federal matter.

Wade Brockius was among those found in the burned trailer. His body lay on top of Jeannie Keeley's as if he had been trying to shield her, and April's body was found beside her mother. Eunice Cobb's body was also found and identified. She had been the victim who had run burning from the trailer. The Reverend B. J. Cobb announced that he intended to file a wrongful-death suit against the U.S. Forest Service and the FBI, and that he would start a legal expense fund based at his church. Cobb had been told to expect that the suit would take as long as five years to culminate in a trial, if it ever went that far.

Cobb had noisily objected to the "internal" nature of the investigations carried out by the federal agencies. He called for an independent investigation instead and proposed that the U.S. Justice Department should form a task force. His proposal gained no traction.

In the meantime, Melinda Strickland had remained in Saddlestring. She had been named interim district supervisor, and had taken over Lamar Gardiner's office and desk. Two female employees had already filed a grievance, claiming that Strickland had hurled books at them in a rage. Joe and Marybeth Pickett paid for the funerals of April and Jeannie Keeley with money they didn't have. Although they still had legal bills from the lawyer they had hired to get April back, they went further into debt to pay for the plots and coffins in the Twelve Sleep County cemetery. The plots were located next to the grave of Ote Keeley, the murdered outfitter who had been buried in his pickup four years before. The fact that they paid for the funerals raised some eyebrows in Saddlestring, and it became a topic of conversation at the Burg-O-Pardner restaurant. The "Shoot-out at Battle Mountain," as it had been dubbed, faded quickly as a mainstream national news story, and didn't linger much longer than that within the state and region, except within pockets of the suspicious and dispossessed. Robey Hersig explained to Joe that the reasons for this had been the inaccessibility of the compound, the lack of media buildup, more pressing war news, and the absence of television coverage. Without visuals, Hersig said, there was no news. He gave the late Dick Munker credit for that.

Therefore, what happened at Battle Mountain didn't rank in the national conscience with Waco, Ruby Ridge, or the Montana Freeman standoff. Although the incident raged through Internet forums and simmered beneath the surface throughout the Mountain West, the lack of good information relegated the story to the back pages of newspapers. Robey told Joe that a few of the Sovereigns who had fled that day had contacted journalists in different parts of the country to offer their stories, but were generally deemed less than credible.

Melinda Strickland was hailed as a hero in a long-form feature in Rumour magazine written by Elle Broxton-Howard. Another feature in Us magazine-"Lady Ranger Bucks the System and Saves a Forest"-showed a photo of a shoeless Melinda Strickland on the couch in her home, with streaky blond hair, hugging her dog. A cable-television news crew came to Saddlestring and did a feel-good feature on Broxton-Howard and Melinda Strickland for a newsmagazine show.

As a result, Broxton-Howard's U.S.-based publicist parlayed the segment, which showcased his client's good looks, her on-screen presence, and an accent that seemed to have grown more refined and pronounced since she left Saddlestring, into a series of talk-show and twenty-four-hour cable-news bookings. Elle Broxton-Howard could now be seen on television several nights a week as a paid analyst specializing in gender and environmental issues.

Since January, Broxton-Howard had left three messages for Joe on his office answering machine. She still wanted to do his story, she said. She "smelled" a six-figure movie option. They could work out the details later, when they met, she said. Joe had yet to return her calls.

One night, while Marybeth was idly channel-surfing, Broxton-Howard's face appeared on their television screen. Marybeth scowled at Joe and quickly changed the channel. Bud Longbrake's wife, the woman who had been Nate Romanowski's secret lover and who had gone on a world cruise, sent divorce papers from somewhere in Nevada to her husband. He signed them. A week after that, Missy Vankueren moved to the Longbrake ranch. Nate Romanowski had vanished. Joe was surprised to find out that Nate had not been identified by the assault team as the man who had fired on them. His bulky snowmobile suit and helmet had disguised him. They mistakenly assumed that the shooter had been a Sovereign who had somehow flanked them. Ballistics reports couldn't positively identify the huge slugs that had disabled the Sno-Cats because the bullets were damaged beyond recognition. Joe realized that only two people could have positively identified Nate Romanowski as the shooter-Dick Munker and himself. Joe told state and federal investigators everything he knew about the incident that day and the buildup to it, with the exceptions of Nate Romanowski's identity and the conversation Joe had had with Romanowski as Dick Munker lay dying. He knew that his account was at odds with those of other witnesses, namely Melinda Strickland, Sheriff Barnum, Elle Broxton-Howard, and a half-dozen deputies. Joe was the only witness to claim that Munker's "warning shot" damaged the propane pipe, or that Munker had manufactured the hostage situation on the fly when told that Spud Cargill was in custody. According to the others, the warning shot had been exactly that, as far as they knew. No one else claimed to have seen a severed copper gas line or heard escaping propane gas. Joe didn't think the members of the assault team were lying-after all, they had been bundled up and wearing helmets that blocked sound, and none of them had been as close as Joe was on the road to the trailer and the severed pipe. The heat of the fire had damaged the pipe that Joe claimed was severed, literally melting it into the snow so Joe had no way to prove his allegations. Despite this, he hoped that his account would not be dismissed.

Several of the investigators asked Joe pointedly, and with obvious skepticism, if he wasn't too far away to see with certainty what had happened when Munker fired. They also speculated aloud that perhaps his personal interest in the entire event-and his obvious animosity toward Dick Munker and Melinda Strickland-had colored his interpretation. The working theory reached by DCI and the FBI was that the trailer burned from the accidental or intentional ignition of materials within the trailer itself.

One of the FBI investigators, a small man named Wendt, told Joe in confidence that he believed him. He also told Joe that his account would be difficult, if not impossible, to prove. Wendt said he was afraid that the internal investigation would be written from the point of view that Munker was a hero who had died in the line of duty. However it went, he said, Joe would also be commended for his attempt to save Munker's life.

Joe didn't hold out much hope, but part of him wanted to believe that further investigation would somehow corroborate his version and justice would be done. He hoped that a deputy or other member of the assault team would confirm his account, or at least parts of it. Someone, he thought, must have heard the hissing of gas. Maybe time, and guilt, would make someone step forward. But he knew how unlikely that was, and he knew from experience how law-enforcement personnel stuck together and told the same story. For Joe and Marybeth Pickett, the two months following the death of April went by in a kind of bitter, dreamy fog. Joe relived the two days leading up to the deaths over and over, picking apart his feverish moves and decisions. He deeply regretted not pressing Cobb further when he'd first gone to his house, and not questioning Cobb's reference to "sanctuary" that day. Cobb had misled him, but Joe had allowed himself to be misled. Because he hadn't understood what Cobb was hinting at, he had gone on an errant trail and wasted almost sixteen hours when he could have intercepted Spud coming down the mountain. It gnawed at him.

Many nights, he didn't sleep more than a few hours at a stretch. Several times, when he couldn't sleep, he would wander downstairs to his office and rewrite his letter of resignation. He had once sealed it and stamped it-only to retrieve it from his OUT basket the next morning. He had also written-but not submitted-a request to be reassigned to another district. The thought of sharing Twelve Sleep Valley with Melinda Strickland was loathsome.

Marybeth was mercurial, her moods swinging from pure anger to a resigned depression that was new, and disturbing, to Joe. On the nights when Marybeth locked herself in the bedroom, Joe cooked dinner for his girls and told them that their mother wasn't feeling well. Sheridan had stared him down on that one, and had known without asking that he was using illness as an excuse.

Once, late at night, as Joe printed out the latest version of his resignation letter, he heard sounds from down the hallway. Marybeth had led Sheridan and Lucy into Joe and Marybeth's bedroom to sleep, and was shuffling things in the children's bedroom with a vengeance. When Joe found her, she was in the process of removing every last sign of April. She had bagged all of April's clothes, school papers, and toys, and was now stripping the bed. He watched with sadness as she scrubbed down the walls near April's bed, as if to remove any physical evidence of April having been there.

"I haven't cleaned her sheets since she left," Marybeth told him, her eyes strangely alert. "I don't know why I haven't done that. But I need to wash them and put them away now."

Joe had watched her, not knowing what to do. When Marybeth finally paused long enough to cry, he held her.

"I've never hated a woman as much as I hate her," Marybeth said. Joe knew she meant Melinda Strickland.

Joe had never seen her so angry, or so bitter.

"She'll go to jail. The investigation will prove that," Joe assured Marybeth, stroking her hair and hoping that somehow he was right. "It won't bring April back, but at least Melinda Strickland will pay."

Marybeth leaned her head back and met his eyes. "She never even sent a note. Think about that, Joe. Think how cold her heart is."

Joe just nodded, knowing there was nothing to say. On the way home from the last basketball practice of the season, Sheridan sat quietly in the cab of the pickup, absently patting Maxine's head. Joe, driving, cast wary glances at the sky that filled the top half of his windshield. Thunderheads were moving in. It looked like snow.

"Dad?"

"Yes."

"Is Mom going to be okay?"

Joe paused. "She's going to be all right. It takes a while."

"I miss April, too."

"So do I, honey."

"I know we're not going to get April back," Sheridan said. "But I do want my mom back."

Joe reached over and put his hand on Sheridan's shoulder. Her hair was still damp from practice.

"Dad, can I ask you something?"

Joe nodded.

"Are you and Mom mad at me for not watching April closer that day in school? For letting Jeannie Keeley take her away?"

Joe was hurt by the question, and pulled quickly to the side of the road so he could turn in his seat and face her.

"No, honey, of course we're not angry with you," he assured her. "It wasn't your fault."

"But I was responsible for her," Sheridan said, fighting tears that seemed to come, Joe thought, much more easily than they used to.

"That's never even crossed our minds, Sheridan," Joe said. "Never."

As they pulled out into the road, Joe restrained a heavy sigh. He felt badly that he hadn't seen this coming, hadn't thought to talk to Sheridan about this earlier. Of course she would feel this way, he thought. Despite her maturity, despite what she's been through, she's still a child, he thought. And she naturally wondered if the difficulties her parents were having were somehow her doing.

It had been rough on Sheridan and Lucy, Joe knew. They missed April, and they missed the way their mother used to be. Marybeth had seesawed between snapping at them and smothering them with physical affection. Lucy had complained to him that she didn't know what to say to her mother because she never knew what reaction she would get.

Joe knew he was far from faultless as well. He felt distant, and uninterested in so many of the things that used to give him joy. His thoughts were still up there on the mountain, in the compound, in the snow. He sometimes forgot that the living members of his family were in front of him and needed his attention.

"Your mom will be all right," Joe said. "She's tough."

Sheridan nodded.

"We've never really talked about what happened up there on the mountain, Dad," she said. "It seems like the good guys turned out to be the bad guys, and the bad guys weren't all that bad."

Joe smiled. "That's a pretty good way to put it."

"I can't really sort it out," Sheridan confessed.

"Sheridan, it's all about accountability," he said after a pause. It was something he had thought a lot about recently.

"What's that mean?"

"It means that people should be accountable for their actions. They have to be accountable. There need to be consequences for thoughtless or cruel behavior," Joe said, wondering if he'd said too much. He didn't want her to think he was plotting revenge.

Sheridan sat silently for a few moments.

"Who is accountable for me losing a sister for no good reason?"

Joe frowned. "I am, to a certain degree…"

"No, you're not!"

"Yes, honey, I am," Joe said, looking straight ahead out the window. "I didn't protect her as well as I should have. I didn't get her back."

"Dad!" Tears rolled down Sheridan's face.

"Others are even more accountable," he said. That evening, after dinner, the telephone rang. It was Robey Hersig.

"Joe," Hersig said.

Joe could tell that something was wrong. There was no greeting, no small talk, no mention of the coming storm.

"Yup."

"We got an early look at the findings of the joint FBI and Forest Service investigation. Munker and Melinda Strickland were not only exonerated, they were commended for their actions. There will be a formal announcement tomorrow."

Joe squeezed the receiver as if to crush it.

"How could this happen, Robey?"

"Joe, you've got to stay calm."

"I'm calm."

He looked up to see Marybeth staring at him from where she had turned near the sink. It was obvious she could tell what was happening by reading his face. Joe watched as her expression went cold and her fists clenched.

"Don't do anything foolish," Hersig said. "We knew this was a possibility. You and I discussed it. With an internal investigation and all… well, they weren't too likely to find that their own people screwed up. Remember, these are the Feds-the FBI. We knew that going in."

Joe said nothing.

"Joe, promise me you'll stay calm." Marybeth had run upstairs to the bedroom and closed the door after Joe told her what Hersig had reported. He needed to give her some time, he thought, before he went up there. He needed some time to figure out what to say that wasn't angry and bitter. Grabbing his coat from the rack in the mud room, he went outside into the dark to try to clear his head.

It was cold, and there was humidity in the air. The stars were blocked out by clouds. After two months, there would be snow coming again. For some reason, he welcomed it. He zipped his coat as he strode up the walk toward the picket fence.

Joe heard a muffled rustling of bird's wings in the dark and stopped with one hand on the gate. He turned. Next to Joe's pickup in the driveway, Nate Romanowski sat on the hood of an ancient Buick Riviera with Idaho license plates. His peregrine was perched on his fist.

"Have you ever considered just knocking on the door?" Joe asked.

"Thanks for keeping me out of it," Nate said, ignoring Joe's question.

"You were helping me," Joe said, closing the gate behind him and approaching Nate and the Buick. "It was the least I could do."

"I heard about the results of the investigation," Nate said, shaking his head. "Their first rule of survival is that they protect their own."

"How in the hell did you know about it? I just heard."

"My contacts in Idaho," Nate said. "The decision was a foregone conclusion six weeks ago. All the Feds knew about it. Office gossip. It just took them a while to write it up with the proper spin."

Joe sat next to Nate on the hood of the Riviera. He sighed deeply, and fought an urge to hurl himself into something hard. He realized how much he had hoped for a miracle after the investigation, and how naive that hope had been.

"It would be a good thing," Nate said, "if Melinda Strickland went away."

Joe turned and looked hard at Nate. This time, he didn't argue. Joe thought about his family inside the house, and how rough the past two months had been for them all. This wouldn't set things right, or take them back to where they were. But he thought about what he'd told Sheridan about accountability.

"I can take care of it," Nate said.

"No," Joe said hesitantly.

"You don't know what you want, do you?"

"I want her out of this state," Joe said. "I want her out of the Forest Service. I want her to pay something. And I don't mean money. I mean her job at the very least."

"She's evil." Nate frowned. "Leaving her on the street will result in somebody else getting hurt wherever she lands."

Joe thought about it. "That's as far as I'm willing to go, Nate."

"You're sure?" Nate asked.

Joe nodded. He was well aware of the fact that he was crossing a line. But, he thought, it was a line that needed to be crossed in these circumstances. If he was wrong, there would be a world of trouble for him. If he was right, there could still be trouble. The easy and safe thing would be to simply let things run their course. But that was something he couldn't do.

"Maybe a little more," Joe said, feeling both elated and guilty at the same time.

"There's my boy." Nate smiled and nodded and clapped Joe on the back of his coat. "Then we need to persuade her to retire and leave," Nate said. "So we need leverage. How well do you know her?"

"Not well enough," Joe said. "I'm not sure anyone really knows her."

"But you know her well enough to have a good idea about what she likes, what's important to her, right?"

Joe thought about it. He thought of two things. They went inside to Joe's office and Joe asked Nate to wait a moment. He went upstairs to check on Marybeth. She had been crying. Joe tried to comfort her, but she didn't want comforting. Seeing her like that steeled Joe's determination to do something. He left Marybeth, went downstairs to the kitchen. He grabbed a bottle of bourbon, dropped ice into two waterglasses, and carried it all into his office. He shut the door.

For the next two hours, they discussed it. Eventually, they agreed on a plan.

It began to snow. Thirty-five At 4:52 the next afternoon, Joe Pickett entered the U.S. Forest Service office in Saddlestring and sat down on a vinyl couch that looked as if it had been purchased during the Ford Administration. While he brushed snowflakes off the manila folder he had brought with him, he smiled at the receptionist.

"I'm here to see Melinda Strickland."

The receptionist glanced at the clock on the wall. The office would close in eight minutes. She had already put her purse on her desk and gathered up her coat. Joe knew from experience that no one in the office worked a minute past five. It was the same situation at most state and federal offices.

"Is she expecting you?"

"She should be," Joe said, "but I doubt it."

"Your name?"

"Joe Pickett. And please tell her it's important."

The receptionist was a new employee, someone recently hired by Melinda Strickland to replace the last receptionist, who was one of the two women who had filed the grievance. Joe recognized her from a previous job she had held in a local credit union. She was unsmiling, and squat, brusque. He watched her as she rapped on Melinda Strickland's closed door. Then she went inside and shut the door behind her.

Joe heard the murmur of voices, one of them raising in pitch. In a moment, the door reopened and the receptionist returned to her desk for her purse and coat.

"She asked that you make an appointment for later in the week."

"I see," Joe said. "Did you tell her it was important?"

The receptionist glared at Joe.

"Yes."

"Did you tell her it was about her dog?"

She was suddenly flustered. As Joe had suspected, the receptionist had been there long enough to realize the special relationship Strickland had with her cocker spaniel.

"No. What about her dog?"

Joe shook his head. "I need to talk with Ms. Strickland privately, please."

The receptionist huffed and turned on her heel and went back into Strickland's office. Behind him, Joe heard a brief rush of employees turning off lights and closing office doors. It was five, and they streamed out of the building so quickly that the outside door never shut between them.

Melinda Strickland opened her door, clearly agitated. She stood to one side to let the receptionist back through so she could go home. Strickland's hair was the coppery color it had been when Joe first met her three months before.

"What is this about Bette?"

Joe had forgotten the name of her cocker spaniel. He stood up.

"Do you have a minute?" he asked.

Strickland's eyes flashed. She hated surprises, but she loved her dog. Joe knew that.

"Ms. Strickland…?" the receptionist asked, poised behind her desk.

"Yes, go on home," Strickland snapped at her employee. "I'll lock things up in a minute."

Joe pushed by Melinda Strickland in her doorway and walked into her office. The room was in a shambles. Papers, notebooks, and mail were piled on the chairs, on the desk, and in the corners. She had made quite a mess in a short period of time. He cleared a hardback chair of papers and sat down across from her desk to wait for her.

Peeved that he had entered her office uninvited, she strode around her desk and sat down facing him. "What?" she demanded.

He coolly looked around the room. The only things of a personal nature on the side wall were a framed cover of Rumour magazine and a photo of Bette.

"Joe, I…"

"Your actions killed my daughter," Joe said simply, letting the words drop like stones.

She recoiled as if stung.

"You and I both know what happened up there on the mountain," he said, holding her eyes until she looked away. "Your agency exonerated you. But we're talking about the real world now. I was there. You caused her death, and the death of three other people."

"I don't know what you're talking about," she spat. "You are a sick man." She looked everywhere in the room except at Joe.

"You didn't even send my wife a note."

"Leave my office this instant, Warden Pickett."

Joe leaned forward and cleared a spot on her desk for the manila folder he had brought with him. He placed it there but didn't open it.

"There's no way you can bring April back," Joe said. "But there are a couple of things you can do to at least partially absolve your guilt."

Her hands thumped on the desktop. "I'm guilty of nothing!"

"Of course, it's not even close to enough…," Joe continued, opening the folder as if Strickland hadn't spoken, "… but it's something. It will make my wife feel better. And it will make me feel better. It might even make you feel better."

"Get out of my office!" Strickland screeched, her face contorted with rage. It was clear to Joe she wasn't used to people ignoring her orders.

Joe went on, directing his attention again to the paper he was reading. "The first document here is a press release creating the April Keeley Foundation for Children," he said. He glanced up and saw that she was listening, although her face was white and tense. "The initial twenty-five thousand dollars for the Foundation is to be donated by you from the trust fund your father set up for you. If you can give more than that, it would be even better."

He searched the document so he could quote directly from it. "The purpose of the Foundation is to 'advocate for better protection and legislation for children in foster care.' You'll be a hero again. Maybe there will be a story in a magazine about you not only saving a forest but also protecting foster children."

"What is this?" she said. "Where did you get that?"

"I wrote it up last night," he said, shrugging. "Press releases are not my specialty, but I think it's okay."

"What am I supposed to do with it?"

"Release it under your signature. Then call one of your press conferences and announce it." An edge of sarcasm had crept into his voice, and a slight smile tugged at his mouth.

Strickland was clearly aghast. Joe hadn't seen her face so contorted before.

"And something else," he said, removing the other document from the folder. "Your resignation letter. You can sign it and announce it during your press conference. It will look like you're quitting in order to do good work for children. Everybody likes that. The real reason will be our little secret."

The resignation letter had been easy to write for Joe. He had simply used the one he had been working on, and changed the names.

"Sign these, and we can both go home," Joe said, placing the documents in front of her.

"This is sick."

"No, it's not sick."

"I should call the sheriff."

"No, you should sign these documents. There's a copy for you and one for me."

Joe leaned forward in his chair, and any semblance of a smile left his face. "Look, call the sheriff if you want. Tell him I'm threatening you with two pieces of paper. Tell him why this is so upsetting to you, that I would want you to create a foundation for children. That should play pretty well with the media as well, don't you think?"

Strickland erupted violently, lashing out with the back of her hand and sending a stack of paperwork that was piled on the edge of the desk fluttering toward the wall like a flock of wounded birds.

"Get out of my office!" she shrieked. "Just get out!"

Joe snatched the release and the letter before she could destroy them. Watching her carefully, he leaned back in his chair and shouted over his shoulder.

"Nate!"

He watched her eyes as they swung from him over his shoulder toward the door. He heard a shuffle behind him, and watched as her eyes widened and the blood drained from her face.

Joe glanced back. Nate Romanowski stood inside the office now. He cradled Bette in one arm and held the gaping muzzle of his.454 Casull to the head of the cocker spaniel.

"Sign your name," Nate said, "or the little dog gets it."

Despite the situation, Joe almost smiled.

"You're monsters!" Strickland whispered. "My poor Bette."

Joe turned back to her. Silently, he slid the documents back onto her desk. He took a pen from his shirt pocket and took its cap off. Handing her the pen, he said, "Let's get this done."

Relief surged through him as she absently reached out for the pen.

He turned the documents around and pointed to the blank signature lines. Strickland leaned forward and her hand hovered over the papers for a moment, but then he saw something dark and malevolent wash over her face angrily twist her features. Suddenly, she threw the pen aside.

"Go ahead and kill the dog," she snarled. "I'm not signing anything. What's in this for me? Huh? What do I get out of this? Nothing! Fucking nothing."

Joe hoped she was bluffing. But when he looked into her eyes, into the cold fury of madness, he knew she wasn't. He had horribly miscalculated.

Behind him, he heard the metallic click of the hammer being pulled back on the revolver.

But Nate cocking the revolver made no difference. When he looked at Melinda Strickland, he saw a grotesque shell filled with venom and bile. He did not see a glimmer of human feelings. Even the death of her dog, the only thing she appeared to have feelings for, could not break through the armor of her narcissism. He was outmatched, and felt utterly defeated. He knew he wasn't capable of pushing this any further. To do so would be to join her in her malediction.

"Nate, let the dog go," Joe said, sighing.

"What?" Nate's voice was hard with anger. "What are you saying?"

"Let the dog go."

"Joe, you've got to go through with…"

He rose and turned. "It's not going to work."

Nate narrowed his eyes as he studied the leering face of Melinda Strickland, then came to the same conclusion Joe had. The dog licked his hand.

Nate released the hammer and shoved his revolver back into his shoulder holster with indignation. He bent and freed the dog.

"Get out of my office," Strickland said coldly, triumphantly. "Both of you."

Then she called her dog.

Joe walked past Nate into the reception area. He was crushed, humiliated. Nate joined him a beat later. They stared at each other in the reception area, both confounded by what had just happened.

"Bette, damn you, come here!" Strickland shouted from inside her office.

Instead, the cocker spaniel tore through the door and leaped toward Nate. The dog wanted him to hold her again. Thirty-six Joe Pickett stood at the bar in the Stockman's and ordered his third Jim Beam on the rocks. While darkness came and the snow fell outside and drinkers entered complaining about the weather, he stared at his face in the cracked mirror.

He felt impotent and defeated, and the slow warmth of the bourbon spreading through him didn't assuage his humiliation. When the glass came he threw back his head and drained it, then signaled to the bartender. The man looked skeptically at Joe for a moment, but poured another drink.

It was probably dinnertime at home, but it didn't register with him. Pool balls clicked in the back of the bar, but he barely heard them. He realized that somehow he had lost Nate as he walked the three blocks from the Forest Service office to the Stockman's, and he hadn't looked around for him until he was seated on the red leather stool. He didn't want to think anymore. He wanted another drink.

He had never felt like such a failure. He was a poor father and a poor husband. He hadn't protected April and she was dead as a result. She had died because of lack of protection, like winterkill. Now, in confronting Melinda Strickland, he had failed April once again.

Would it have been different if it had been Sheridan or Lucy instead of April? Joe wondered. Would he have reacted differently, been more aggressive early on and not depended on the legal system to work, if it had been one of his own flesh-and-blood daughters up there? Would he have "turned cowboy," as Nate once put it, if it hadn't been April? The question tortured him.

He stared at his face in the mirror. He wasn't sure he liked what he saw. "Waiting for your wife to join you?"

The question startled Joe out of his malaise, and he spilled his drink on the bar. It was Herman Klein, the rancher. Joe hadn't seen him walk into the Stockman's, but he'd been so deep in thought that he hadn't been noticing much. He was now on his fifth drink, and the bar lights were starting to shimmy.

"Nope. Have a seat." Joe recognized the birth of a slur when he said "seat."

Klein sat and removed his hat to shake the snow off.

"I'm glad to see this storm," Klein said, ordering a shot and a beer and another drink for Joe. Joe ignored the skeptical glare of the bartender, who wiped up the spill with a rag. "We need the moisture. That's a strange thing to say after this January, but it's true."

Joe nodded. He felt a burbling in his stomach. He wondered if he would need to throw up.

They drank for a moment.

"Why did you ask about Marybeth?" Joe said.

Klein raised his eyebrows. "Because I never see you in here, and I saw her getting out of her van down the block. I just figured you were meeting her."

It took a moment for this information to filter through Joe's lethargic brain. Then he was puzzled. What would Marybeth be doing in town? The kids would have been home from school for the last few hours, and she should have been at home with them. Was she looking for Joe? He hadn't called her, after all. In fact, he had told her nothing of the plan he and Nate had come up with. It was rare for him not to consult with her, but this had seemed like something she didn't need right now. Or more rightly, something he didn't need. In the back of his mind, knowing her feelings, he had been a little afraid of how far she would have wanted to go with Strickland. It wasn't something he wanted to see in his wife, if he could help it, or something he wanted to give her the opportunity to act upon.

"How long ago was that?" Joe asked Klein.

He shrugged. "Half-hour, I guess."

Joe had left his truck at the Forest Service office. Maybe, he thought, she saw it there on her way home from her job at the library and stopped. Uh-oh.

Hastily but clumsily, he slid off his stool and threw his last twenty on the bar.

"Gotta go," he mumbled, sliding his coat up over his shoulders.

"You need a ride somewhere?" Klein asked, assessing Joe's condition.

"I'm fine."

Joe pretended not to hear Klein's protestations as he weaved his way toward the door.

He spilled out into the darkness, his boots sliding on the three inches of fresh powder on the pavement. He clamped down his hat and buttoned his coat as he walked as quickly as he could down the street.

If Marybeth saw his pickup in front of the Forest Service office, she would probably go inside. Would Melinda Strickland still be there? If that was the case, Joe could only guess what could happen. I've never hated a woman as much as I hate her, Marybeth had said. But Melinda Strickland would surely have left her office right after he and Nate left, wouldn't she? Wouldn't she?

He wished he were sober.

He rounded the corner and could see through the waves of snow that a sheriff's department Blazer, lights flashing, and a Saddlestring Police Department cruiser were parked in front of the Forest Service office. Blue and red wig-wag lights painted the street. The door of the Blazer hung open, as if the deputy had just jumped out. Joe's truck was still parked in front, as was Melinda Strickland's green Bronco. Marybeth's van was not there, and he breathed a sigh of relief. He did not want to see Melinda Strickland again. Had she called the sheriff on him? Had something happened between her and Marybeth after he'd left?

Joe approached the building and eased the door open far enough to stick his head inside. The bourbon had made him bold-or foolhardy, he thought. Probably both. Inside, it was just as he had left it, except that Deputy Reed stood in the reception area, his radio raised to his mouth. The Saddlestring policeman sat on the vinyl couch, still bundled in his winter coat, with a vacant, drained look on his face, like he had seen something awful.

"Sheriff Barnum?" Reed said into the radio, "How fast can you get over to the Forest Service building? We just got a call about the fact that the door was left open and the lights were on at seven at night, so I checked it out and… well, we've got a situation."

Joe looked quizzically at Reed, and Reed nodded toward the hallway where Melinda Strickland's office was. Her door, like the front, was ajar.

He stepped inside and walked across the reception area. The Saddlestring cop was upset. Something he had seen down the hall made him lurch to one side and throw up in a small garbage can. Joe was grateful that both Reed and the cop were too preoccupied to ask him why he was there.

Joe rounded the reception desk and looked into Melinda Strickland's office. What he saw seared the alcohol out of his system.

Strickland was still in her chair, but was slumped facedown over her desk in a dark red pool of blood. The wall with the framed cover of Rumour and photo of Bette was spattered with blood, brains, and stringy swatches of copper-colored hair. Strickland's stainless-steel nine-millimeter Ruger semiautomatic pistol was clutched in her hand on top of the desk. A single shell casing on the carpet reflected the overhead light. The room smelled of hot blood.

Joe gagged, then swallowed. The bourbon tasted so bitter this time that he nearly choked on it.

He knew it wasn't suicide. Just a couple of hours before, he had stared into that woman's soul and there was nothing there to see. Strickland had not succumbed to some sudden pang of guilt. No, Joe thought, someone had made it look like a suicide.

He started to push the door open farther but it stiffened. It wouldn't open enough for him to get through. He looked down and saw that he had shoved the bottom of the door over something that had jammed it.

In a fog, he bent down to clear the door. He pulled the obstruction free, and looked at it.

It seemed as if something had sucked all the air out of his lungs and out of the room itself. He wasn't entirely sure the groan he heard was his own.

The item jamming the door was a single Canadian-made Watson riding glove. It was one-half of Joe's Christmas present to Marybeth. Thirty-seven Joe checked both ways as he left the Forest Service office in the heavy snowfall. There was no traffic on the street. He heard a siren fire up several blocks away. That would be either Barnum or the police chief. The glove was jammed in Joe's pocket.

He was soon out of town and rolling on Bighorn Road toward his home before he allowed himself to think. He was ashamed of what he was thinking. It was unfathomable. Marybeth's van was parked in front of the garage and the porch light was on, but the windows were dark. When he entered, he noticed immediately that the house was cool and that the thermostat had not been turned up since they had left in the morning.

Sheridan and Lucy, who should have been watching television or doing homework, were nowhere to be seen.

"Marybeth?"

"Up here." Her voice was faint. She was upstairs.

He bounded up the stairs and found his family in the bedroom. Lucy was sleeping on the top of the covers at the foot of the bed, and Sheridan and Marybeth were sitting on the side of the bed cuddling.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

"We were just talking about April," Sheridan said, her voice solemn. "We were feeling kind of sad tonight."

Joe looked at Marybeth, trying to read her. She looked drained and wan. She did not look up at him.

"Have you eaten?" he asked.

Sheridan shook her head.

"Please take Lucy downstairs and get yourselves something," Joe said. "We'll be down in a minute."

Marybeth untangled herself from Sheridan, but she wouldn't look at Joe.

When the girls were gone, Joe eased the door shut and sat next to Marybeth on the bed.

"You've been drinking," she said. "I can smell it."

Joe grunted.

"Marybeth, we have to talk about this," he said, pulling her glove from his coat pocket.

He watched her carefully when she looked at it.

"I didn't realize I lost it," she said, turning it over in her hand and squeezing it into a ball.

Joe felt something hot rising inside of him.

"You know where I found it, don't you?"

She nodded. Finally, she raised her eyes to his.

"I saw your truck," she said, her voice flat. "So I went inside the building. Melinda Strickland was sitting at her desk, and her blood was on the wall…"

The relief Joe felt was better than the bourbon ever was. Then he realized something that jarred him.

"You think I did it," Joe said.

The same emotion Joe had felt a moment before was mirrored in Marybeth's face.

"Joe, you didn't do it?"

He shook his head. "I found her like that after you did. And I saw this glove…"

"Oh," she cried, instantly aware of what he must have thought. "Oh, Joe, I knew you went there and I thought…"

They embraced in a furious swirl of redemption. Marybeth cried, and laughed, and cried again. After a few minutes, she pulled away.

"So did she kill herself?" she asked.

Joe shook his head. "Not a chance."

"Then who?"

He paused a beat.

"Nate."

She stood and walked to the window, looking out at the snow.

"He went back after we left, while I was in the bar. He must have watched me go into the Stockman's to make sure I'd have a good alibi before he went back to her office. I thought I had just lost him. I wasn't thinking very clearly at that point. Somehow, he got Melinda Strickland's gun away from her and shot her point-blank in the head."

"My God," Marybeth said, turning it over in her mind.

"He told me once that he didn't believe in the legal system, but he believed in justice," Joe said. "We tried it my way and it didn't work. His way worked."

"What are you going to do?"

Joe sighed, and rubbed his face. He felt Marybeth watching him anxiously, felt her searching his face for an indication of what he was thinking.

He looked up at her and spoke softly.

"I'm going to make Melinda Strickland a hero," he said.

She was clearly puzzled.

"There are some papers on her desk we left there. They'll find them when they investigate the crime scene. But it will take a few days to analyze everything. Tomorrow, I'll call Elle Broxton-Howard and give her that interview she wants. In fact, I'll give her the mother of all interviews-the exclusive inside story of Melinda Strickland's last day on earth. I'll tell her that ever since the shoot-out at Battle Mountain, Melinda Strickland has been tortured by the death of April Keeley, that it was eating away at her. Strickland told me all about it in the meeting we had in her office, when she described the foundation she was creating. Her secretary will corroborate the meeting.

"She just couldn't overcome the guilt," Joe said. "So she took her own life. Before she did, though, she wrote out her resignation and established the April Keeley Foundation as her legacy."

The story was taking shape as he spun it out, and he was becoming convinced it would work. He stopped for breath, and looked to Marybeth for confirmation.

Marybeth looked at him with eyes that shined. "Sometimes you amaze me," she said.

"It'll be a hell of a story," he said, shaking his head.

There was a long pause.

"What are you going to do about Nate?"

Joe thought, and hesitated for a moment. He had crossed a line. He couldn't go back and pretend he hadn't crossed it. He would have to ride it out.

"I'm going to ask him to teach Sheridan about falconry."

He rose and joined her at the window and they looked out at the storm. A burst of wind sent snow tumbling toward them, and Joe felt the lick of icy wind on his hand near the window frame. He would need to put some insulation in the crack later. He had forgotten about it.

He leaned forward and looked down into the front yard. The heavy, wet spring snow was being carried by the wind and was sticking to the sides of the fence and the power poles. There were three small Austrian pine trees in the front yard that Joe had put in the previous spring. The girls had helped him plant them and, at the time, each had claimed a tree. The tallest was Sheridan's, the next was April's, the smallest belonged to Lucy. Joe found himself staring at April's tree, watching the blowing snow pack hard into the branches, changing it into a snow ghost, and felt oddly comforted.