Of course, the chief had not come in yet. What was worse, the chief had phoned to say that he didn't plan to come in at all.

He'd had some kind of trouble. "And what am I supposed to do?" Dunlap asked the policeman on duty.

"Well, maybe if you told me why you had to see him."

Dunlap slumped in a chair. He'd gone through this the day before, but there had been a different person then, a woman, and Dunlap studied the policeman, sighed, then passing through frustration told him very calmly what it was he needed.

"That's no problem."

Dunlap blinked. He didn't think he'd heard correctly. "What?"

"If you had told me who you were to start with. When the chief called in this morning, he explained you might be stopping by. Just hold on while I call him back."

And fifteen minutes later, Dunlap stood across from a row of dingy houses, staring at a barren field with stockpens up at one end and a bar, the Railhead, down at the other. He had carefully avoided mentioning his interest in the recent killing, concentrating only on the compound twenty-three years ago. As a consequence, when he had found out where the chief was sending him, he'd been astonished by his luck. The Railhead. He had heard that name on the two-way radio yesterday. This was where the mutilated body had been found. Dunlap looked at the two policemen who were standing in the middle of the field. They turned to study him when the cruiser that had brought him here pulled away. The sun was stark. A wind hurled bits of sharp, hot sand at him. He licked his gritty lips and started through the field.

The two policemen met him halfway. "Yes, sir, may we help you?" one of them asked.

And Dunlap thought that things might just be getting better as he told them. But the one named Rettig didn't want to talk.

FIVE

Oh, that's wonderful. Just god-damned great. I'm out here in the middle of this stupid field, and this guy Rettig doesn't want to talk. Well, what else did you think would happen? Dunlap asked himself. Just because it got a little easier a while ago, you figured everything would be simple now? Hell, you're the one who's simple. Wake up, do your job. Dunlap knew that Rettig wasn't just the man in charge of this investigation: Rettig had been with the state police back then. Dunlap had learned that from the man on duty at the station. He had learned as well that Rettig was the one who'd spent the most time with Wheeler. Twenty-three years ago. "Look, way back then. I don't see what the problem is."

But Rettig didn't want to talk.

Wheeler was the rancher who had lost his son. "All right, then, you don't even need to talk about it. Let's try this. I'll tell you what I know." And guess, and less than that, just make up on the spot, Dunlap decided, but at least this was a way to draw out Rettig, to get him talking. "You just tell me if I'm right or not. I'm going to do this story anyway. You'll want to make sure that the parts about you are correct."

Dunlap studied him, and Rettig wasn't certain, staring back. So as another gust of wind came up, the dust obscuring them, their faces specked with grit, Dunlap started prompting him, anxious to fill the silence and keep Rettig from having a chance to say no. "You drove out toward the commune, looking for the boy. You headed up the loggers' road. The sentries wouldn't let you through the gate. They made you go back to the town to get a search warrant. But in the meantime Wheeler had decided not to follow your advice. He went up on his own, despite what you had warned him."

"No, that isn't true." Rettig hesitated, then continued. "Wheeler didn't go up in the meantime. We had made him wait back at the station-not the one in town, but the state police barracks out on the highway-and he heard us call in that we had to go to town to get a search warrant. That's when he drove out. The man on duty at the station went to take a leak, and Wheeler left while he was gone."

"And Wheeler was upset enough, the man on duty called you to go back up to the compound," Dunlap said.

"That's right."

"So you couldn't have been very far behind. Wheeler didn't have to go home for the gun. He was a rancher, and he likely had it in the trunk or car or Jeep, whatever he was driving."

"A pickup truck."

Dunlap had an image now of all those pickup trucks that he had seen this morning, families come to town: the guns in racks behind the driver's seat.

"A rifle or a shotgun," Dunlap said. The last word made Rettig's eyes flicker. "Yes, a shotgun," Dunlap said, and now he understood why there'd been no details about the murder. "Wheeler was cursing, angry at the boy for running off, angry at the compound for the trick that it had pulled. More than that, he didn't understand those hippies. He was afraid, going up to find the boy and rescue him. He roared his truck right up that loggers' road and crashed straight through the gate. He drove until the road came to an end, then jumped out with his shotgun, running through the woods, the sentries racing after him. He almost made it to the clearing when they tackled him. There was a fight. He jumped back, shotgun ready, and he blew one bearded hippy's head apart."

Dunlap had to pause, to check for some reaction. He was guessing, based on what he'd read, but it made sense, except he didn't know exactly how the shooting had occurred, especially what part of the body. But it had to be the head. Head or groin-otherwise the paper would have been more specific. But a shotgunned head or groin was something that you didn't mention if you wanted to be delicate, and since as far as Dun-lap knew there was no sex involved in this, the head, its long hair and its shaggy beard, would have been what the rancher likely shot at. Hell, it was symbolic of the trouble. Dunlap kept waiting as the wind died.

In the silence, Rettig murmured, "His face looked like somebody had squashed a quart of strawberries on it. Just this mushy red stuff, no eyes, no mouth, nothing. Just this mushy red stuff." Rettig guided him toward the cruiser. "I've said more than I intended."

"Look, I understand. I'll make a deal. You call your chief, and he'll explain that it's all right. I told you at the start. I cleared this first with Parsons, then with him."

Rettig looked skeptical. "I have to go to his place. I'll be sure to ask him."

"Take me with you?"

Rettig frowned.

"I mean, I don't have any car. You can't just leave me." "I can leave you. If you cleared this as you say, I don't want any trouble, though." Rettig thought about it. "You get in. We'll drive you. But you'd better not be lying."

Dunlap smiled and hurried into the back. The other cop got in the front beside where Rettig drove, and both were taking off their hats, and Dunlap wished that they had rolled their windows down when they had parked the cruiser. The heat had built up in here so that his clothes stuck to him and to the seat. They drove up past the stockpens, Dunlap glancing at the cattle in there and then watching how the slums diminished as they turned left and headed toward a newer section of the town. They were going through an underpass, and quicker than he had expected, they were in the country. Dunlap had noticed in the phone book that the chief's address was R. R. something, but he hadn't really understood how far out that might be. They went past sun-baked grassland. No one spoke. On occasion, there were static-distorted voices on the two-way radio, but neither man picked up the microphone to answer.

Dunlap studied them. Rettig with his red, curly hair. The other man, much younger, blond, his hair cut short in imitation of the style back in the fifties, with the difference that out here the style was not an imitation, rather a continuation. They both looked like football players, big and tall and husky, and the man back at the station had been big and tall as well, and Dunlap was thinking that their size might be a part of what the chief had looked for when he hired them. If that were true, then Slaughter maybe had some big-time notions about how to handle trouble. He might not be just some hick, and Dunlap considered that, then tried to get Rettig talking again. 'You were close enough to hear the shot." Rettig stared at his rearview mirror. "Look, I warned you-"