"So you're not going to keep out of our affairs?" he asked.

"I'm not interested in your affairs. I have other concerns."

"The girl? Or Billy Purdue?"

He surprised me for a moment, but not for long. If there was a pulse, then Al Z had his finger on it and he would only remove his finger when the pulse stopped.

"Because if it's Billy Purdue," he continued, "then we may have the seeds of a difficulty."

"The missing girl is a friend, but Rita Ferris, Billy's ex-wife, was my client."

"Your client's dead."

"It goes beyond that."

Al Z pinched his lips. To his right, the fat man on the sofa remained as impassive as a Buddha.

"So you're a man of principle," said Al Z. He tackled the word principle like it was a peanut shell he was crushing beneath his heel. "Well, I'm a man of principle too."

I didn't think so. Principles are expensive things to maintain and Al Z didn't look like he had the moral resources to support any. In fact, Al Z didn't look like he could work up the moral resources to take a leak on a burning orphanage.

"I don't think your principles and mine would qualify for the same definition," I said at last.

He smiled. "Maybe not." He turned to Louis. "And where do you stand on all this?"

"Beside him," said Louis, inclining his head gently in my direction.

"Then we have to reach an accommodation," Al Z concluded. "I'm a pragmatist. You step lightly in this matter, and I won't kill you unless I have to."

"Likewise," I said. "Seeing as how you've been so hospitable and all." Then we left.

Outside, it was cold and overcast.

"What do you think?" asked Louis.

"I think Tony's out there on his own, and maybe he hopes he can sort this mess out before Al Z loses his patience. You think he has Ellen?"

Louis didn't reply immediately. When he did, his eyes were hard. "He does or he doesn't, somehow it all ties in with Billy Purdue. Means it's gonna end bad for someone."

We walked around to Boylston and hailed a cab. As it pulled up, Louis slid in and said, "Logan," but I raised a hand.

"Can we take a detour?"

Louis shrugged. The cab driver shrugged too. It was like bad mime.

"Harvard," I said. I looked at Louis. "You don't have to come. I can meet you at the airport."

Louis's eyebrow rose half an inch. "Nah, I'll tag along, 'less you think I'm going to cramp your style."

The cab dropped us off at the monolithic William James Hall, close by Quincy and Kirkland. I left Louis in the lobby and took the elevator to room 232, where the psychology department had its office. My stomach felt tight, and there was sweat on my palms. At the office, a polite secretary told me where Rachel Wolfe's office was located, but she also told me that Rachel wouldn't be in that day. She was at a seminar out of town, and wouldn't be back until the following morning.

"Can I take a message?" she asked.

I considered turning around and walking away, but I didn't. Instead, I reached into my wallet and took out one of my cards. On the back, I wrote the new telephone number for the Scarborough house and handed the card to the secretary. "Just give her this, please."

She smiled. I thanked her, and I left.

Louis and I walked back to Harvard Square to catch a cab. He didn't speak until we were on our way to Logan.

"You do that before?" he asked, with just the faintest hint of a smile.

"Once. I never got that far the last time, though."

"So, you, like, stalking her, right?"

"It's not stalking if you know the person well."

"Oh." He nodded deeply. "Thanks for clearing that one up. Never really understood the distinction before."

He paused before he spoke again. "And what you trying to do?"

"I'm trying to say I'm sorry."

"You want to get back with her?"

I tapped my fingers on the window. "I don't want it to be the way it is between us, that's all. Frankly, I don't know what I'm doing and, like I told your significant other, I'm not even sure that I'm ready yet."

"But you love her?"

"Yes."

"Then life will decide when you're ready." He didn't speak again.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Angel met us at the airport, and we drove to the food court at the Maine Mall to eat before we headed north.

"Shit," said Angel, as we drove down Maine Mall Road. "Look at this place. You got your Burger King, your International House of Pancakes, your Dunkin' Donuts, your pizza parlors. You got your four main food groups right here on your doorstep. Live here too long and they'll be rolling you from one place to the next."

We ate Chinese in the food court of the mall and told Angel about our encounter with Al Z. In return, he produced a crumpled letter addressed to Billy Purdue, care of Ronald Straydeer.

"Cops and the feds did a pretty good job, but they didn't deal with your buddy Ronald the right way," he said.

"You talked to him about his dog?" I asked.

"Talked about his dog, then ate some stew." He looked a little queasy.

"Roadkill?" I knew that Ronald wasn't above scavenging, despite the state's laws on taking roadkill. Myself, I couldn't see the harm in using a deer or squirrel for food instead of letting it rot by the side of the road. Ronald did a pretty mean venison steak, served with beets and carrots preserved by burying them in sand.

"He told me it was squirrel," said Angel, "but it smelled like skunk. It didn't seem polite to ask. Seems this letter came for Billy about a week back, but Ronald hadn't seen him to give it to him."

The letter was postmarked Greenville. It was short, little more than an extension of good wishes, some details of renovations to the house and some stuff about an old dog that the writer still had around the place and with which Billy Purdue seemed to have been familiar when it was a pup. It was signed, in his old man's scrawl: "Meade Payne."

"So they stayed in touch all these years," I remarked. It seemed to confirm what I had thought: if Billy Purdue was going to seek help from anyone, it would be Meade Payne.

We drove nonstop to Dark Hollow, Angel and Louis shooting ahead in the Mercury. The mists gathered as I went farther north, so that journeying from Portland to Dark Hollow was like moving into a strange, spectral world, where house lights glowed dimly and the beams of headlights assumed their own, lancelike solidity; where road signs announced towns that existed only as scattered dwellings without any hub or center. There was more snow forecast, I knew, and soon the snowmobilers would arrive in numbers to hurtle along the Interstate Trail system. But for now, Greenville was still quiet as I drove through, sand mixed with snow by the side of the road, and I passed only two cars on the uneven, pitted surface of Lily Bay Road on the way to Dark Hollow.

When I arrived at the motel, Angel and Louis were already checking in. The same woman with the blue-rinse hair who had greeted me earlier in the week stood behind the desk, examining their details on a single registration card. Beside her, a brown cat slept on the counter, curled in on itself with its nose almost touching its tail. Angel was doing the talking while Louis examined a series of battered tourist booklets in a rack. He glanced at me when I came in, but didn't acknowledge my presence further.

"You gentlemen sharing a room?" asked the blue-rinse woman.

"Yes, ma'am," replied Angel, with a look of homely wisdom on his face. "A dollar spared is a dollar made."

The woman glanced at Louis, resplendent in a black suit, black coat and white shirt. "Your friend a preacher?" she said.

"Kind of, ma'am," said Angel. "He's strictly Old Testament, though. An eye for an eye, and stuff like that."