He scanned the area. No way to sneak up on them, so he settled for a direct approach. Of course the smart thing to do was to dime Oz out to the New Jersey State cops a couple hundred yards away, but that didn't sit right. Never would. And besides, if Nadia had become rakoshi chow, the state cops would find nothing. And the Scar-lip problem would remain.

Jack opened the trunk and stared at the gasoline can. His plan had been Scar-lip first, then Nadia. He'd have to reverse that now. Find Nadia if possible, then go for the rakosh. He pulled the silenced .22 from where he'd hidden it beneath the spare, stuck it in the waistband under his warm-up, walked toward the Oddity Emporium vehicles.

Counted two 18-wheelers and twenty or so trailers and motor homes of various shapes and sizes and states of repair. As he neared he heard hammering sounds; seemed to come from one of the semi trailers. Two of the dog-faced roustabouts stepped from behind a motor home as Jack reached the perimeter of the cluster. They growled a warning and pointed back toward the food court.

"I want to see Oz," Jack said.

More growls and more emphatic pointing.

"Look, he either gets a visit from me or I walk over to the State Police barracks there and have them pay him a visit."

The roustabouts didn't seem to feature that idea. Looked at each other, then one hurried away. A moment later he was back. Motioned Jack to follow him. Jack lowered the zipper on his warm-up top to give him quicker access to the P-98, then started moving.

One of the roustabouts stayed behind. As Jack followed the other on a winding course through the haphazardly parked vehicles, he saw a crew of workers trying to patch a hole in the flank of one of the semi trailers. He pulled up short when he saw the size of the hole: five or six feet high, a couple of feet wide. The edges of the metal skin were flared outward, as if a giant fist had punched through from within. And Jack was pretty sure that fist had belonged to something cobalt blue with yellow eyes.

Shit! He closed his eyes and slammed his fists against his thighs. He wanted to break something. What else could go wrong today?

But his spirits suddenly lifted as he realized Oz hadn't wanted to park his troupe near the police barracks—he'd had no choice. Maybe Nadia was still alive.

The roustabout had stopped ahead and was motioning him to hurry up. Jack did just that and soon came to the trailer he recognized as Oz's. The man himself was standing before it, watching the repair work on the truck.

"It got loose, didn't it?" Jack said as he came up beside him.

The taller man rotated the upper half of his body and looked at Jack. His expression was anything but welcoming.

"Oh, it's you. You do get around."

Took most of Jack's dwindling self-control to keep from taking a swing at Oz right then and there. He was bursting to ask about Nadia but forced himself to stick to the rakosh. That was old news between them; he'd cover that, then press on.

"Had to feed it, didn't you? Had to bring it up to full strength. Damn it, you knew the risk you were taking."

"It was caged with iron bars. I thought—"

"You thought wrong. I warned you. I've seen that thing at full strength. Iron or not, that cage wasn't going to hold it."

"I admire your talent for stating the obvious."

"Where is it?"

For the first time Jack detected a trace of fear in Oz's eyes.

"I don't know."

"Swell." He glanced around. "Where's that guy Hank?"

"Hank? What could you want with that imbecile?"

"Just wondering if he was bothering it again."

The boss slammed a bony fist into a palm. "I thought he'd learned his lesson. Well, he'll learn it now." He turned and called into the night. "Everyone—find Hank! Find him and bring him to me at once!"

They waited but no one brought Hank. Hank was nowhere to be found.

"It appears he's run off," Prather said.

"Or got carried off."

"We found no blood near the truck, so perhaps the young idiot is still alive."

"He is alive," said a woman's voice.

Jack turned and recognized the three-eyed fortuneteller from the show.

"What do you see, Carmella?" Oz said.

"He is in the woods. He stole one of the guns and he carries a spear. He is full of wine and hate. He is going to kill it."

"Oh, I doubt that," Oz said. "Going to get himself killed is more likely."

Jack understood taking a gun, but not the spear; then he remembered the pointed iron rod Hank and Bondy had used to torture it. Neither would do the job. If Hank ever caught up with the rakosh, he wouldn't last long.

He stared at the mass of trees rising on the far side of the parkway. "We've got to find it."

"Yes," Oz said. "Poor thing, alone out there in a strange environment, disoriented, lost, afraid."

Jack couldn't imagine Scar-lip afraid of anything, especially anything it might run across around here.

"On the subject of lost, alone, and afraid," Jack said, motioning Oz toward his trailer, "I need to ask you something."

Oz followed him until they were all but leaning on the battered wall of the old Airstream, out of earshot of the others.

"What?"

"Where's Nadia Radzminsky?"

Oz's eyes told him nothing, but the way his body tensed spoke volumes.

"Nadia… who?"

"The one Dr. Monnet paid you to eliminate. Where is she?"

"I haven't the faintest idea what you're—" Oz spotted the pistol Jack had pulled from his waistband.

"I have it straight from Dr. Monnet and his partners," Jack said softly as he began unscrewing the silencer. "They say they hired you to 'remove' Douglas Gleason and Nadia Radzminsky, so playing dumb won't cut it." He lowered the barrel, pointing it at Oz's right knee. "Now, I'm going to ask you again, and if you give me any more bullshit, I'm going to shoot you. Nothing immediately fatal, but it's going to hurt like hell. And then I'm going to ask you again. And if I don't get the truth, I'll shoot you again, and so it will go."

Jack had to hand it to Oz—he was cool. He glanced at a pair of his doggie roustabouts—how many did he have?—who had noticed the pistol. Low growls rumbled in their throats as they edged closer.

"They'll tear you to pieces before you get off that second shot. Perhaps before you get off the first."

"Don't count on it." Jack leveled the barrel at Oz's midsection. "I can pull this trigger lots of times before I go down. Any idea what a hollowpoint round, even a twenty-two, can do once it breaks up inside you?"

Jack's pistol was loaded with FMJs, but no need to tell Oz that.

"And don't think the shots will go unnoticed over there." Jack cocked his head toward the State Police barracks. "So not only will you be dead, but a bunch of troopers will be treating this whole area as a crime scene. They'll go through it with a fine comb. What'll they find?"

Oz's expression fluctuated between fear and rage. Jack pressed on, heading for home.

"You've gathered a nice little family around you, Oz. What will happen to them when you're gone and they've been broken up and scattered because of certain crimes you've committed? All because you wouldn't answer a simple question."

Jack hoped the bluff would work. He knew he'd be beaten to a bloody pulp if he pulled the trigger, and even if he survived, he feared police scrutiny as much as Oz. More. But Oz couldn't know that.

"Let's suppose, just suppose," Oz said, "that they were here. What happens?"

They? Jack fought to keep from showing the relief surging within him.

"They leave with me and that's that."

"How do I know you won't stop at the first phone and report us?"

"You've got my word," Jack said. "I've got nothing against you, Oz. I have a business relationship with Nadia. If I get her out of this, you and me are even. I'm happy never to see or hear of you again, and I'm sure it's mutual."