Jason’s breathing became rapid. His eyes swung back and forth.

Guillermo smiled and stepped forward. “Is this your room?”

“No,” said Jason, backing up. “Just feeding fish.”

“Can I see some ID?”

“What for?”

“ID, please.”

The calmness of Guillermo’s tone was unnerving. Jason pulled a driver’s license from his wallet and presented it with an unsteady hand.

Guillermo read it and stuck it in his own wallet. “Know where we might find Andy?”

“What’s going on?”

“We’re close family friends. His mother’s sick.”

“His mother’s dead,” said Jason.

“Then it’s worse than we thought.”

They stared a moment, Guillermo’s smile broadening. Jason felt faint and almost knocked over the aquarium.

“Someone get him a chair.”

Raul brought one over and Jason fell into it.

Guillermo pulled up his own and sat in front of him. “Where did he go?”

“S-s-spring break. Panama City Beach. Bunch of guys.”

“You’re doing great,” said Guillermo, patting an arm that flinched at the touch. “When did they leave?”

“I don’t know. I mean, they called me from the road. I think it was a last-minute thing.”

“Where are they staying?”

Jason’s mouth opened, but no sound.

“I know they told you the hotel.”

Jason nodded.

“It’s very important we reach him. What hotel?”

Jason still had trouble getting his mouth to work.

Guillermo leaned. “Whisper it.”

Jason did.

Guillermo stood. “Now, that wasn’t so hard.” He noticed a clip on Jason’s belt. “Give me your phone.”

“Why?”

“Give me your phone.”

Jason handed it over, still shaking. “What are you going to do to me?”

“Do to you?” said Guillermo, flipping open the cell. “We don’t have to do anything to you.”

Jason’s expression said he didn’t understand.

Guillermo wrote something on a paper scrap. “You’re a college student?”

Jason nodded.

“Well then, you must be pretty smart.” Guillermo gave the phone back. “So you probably figured out that when we want to find someone, we don’t stop, no matter how long or far.” He patted his wallet, which now contained Jason’s license. “And if you make us want to find you again, it’ll go differently.”

Jason’s chest heaved.

“It’s smart to forget we were ever here.”

The men left.

Jason slowly rose on unsteady legs, then jackknifed over and threw up in the aquarium.

Guppy heaven.

PANAMA CITY BEACH

Three youths crowded around Serge in a church activities hall. A fourth came over. “I got your coffee.”

“Thanks.” Serge blew on it and took a sip. “The thing about evolution is needless bickering among groups who should be enjoying life together. I’ve noticed some people making a creationist end run with the Trojan horse called intelligent design. Except they accidentally stumbled onto something without realizing it. What you need to be marketing is self-organization.”

“What’s that?”

“Evolution only makes my faith stronger. Except the problem with evolution-and this is where I totally understand your objection-is emphasis on the godless randomness of natural selectivity. Like those Galapagos turtles with the longest necks were the only ones who could reach higher leaves and survive when low-hanging food was gone, so now they all have long necks. That’s true, but there’s more. Much more.”

The youths leaned with rapt attention.

“Many evolutionary scientists subscribe to an additional component of their theory. Anyone?”

“Self-organization?”

“Shazam! Anti-religious types would have you believe that the universe follows the ol’ axiom ‘Given an infinite amount of monkeys, typewriters and time, one of them will eventually write Hamlet.’ “ Serge swept an arm in the air.”Look around you. That can’t be right. It’s more like one of the monkeys is Shakespeare in a chimp suit. All life aggressively yearns to organize itself and become more complex, springing forth from every corner of the planet. You think we started with a bunch of prehistoric ooze, and some of it just happened to turn into Bella Abzug?”

They shook their heads.

“There were some dead ends along the way, hence natural selectivity. But for my money, the rest is God in a Darwin costume. So if you can wrap your brain around self-organization, then evolution is intelligent design. The Lord is even greater!… But I’m not sure.”

They got up for another pastoral visit.

“I think we’ve been wrong about evolution.”

“What on earth’s going on over there?”

“He has a lot of good points. I’ve never felt my faith so strong.”

“You’re supposed to convert him, not the other way around.”

They returned.

Serge smiled again. “Warned you about going off the reservation?”

“Eternal life is only possible through belief-”

“Glad you brought that up,” said Serge. “Let’s talk about eternal life…”

The pancake feast hit its peak hour as students felt that empty beer rumble in their tummies. The pastor stood at the entrance, welcoming waves of newcomers.

“Now everyone close your eyes,” said Serge. “This is what I want you to imagine…”

More and more students came pouring in. The pastor was smiling and shaking hands when suddenly, hysterical shrieking erupted from the far side of the hall. Everyone turned.

Serge frantically raced around the table, grabbing shoulders of uncontrollably sobbing youths. “Guys! It’s all okay! Forget everything I said!”

The pastor ran over. “What did you do to them?”

One of the tearful kids looked up. “He said many people believe in God only because of the selfish reward of eternal life…”

Another blew his nose. “So in order for our faith to be pure, we have to stop believing in God.”

“What!”

“Only temporarily-just long enough to imagine eternal darkness…”

“… Then, once we could handle that, we were free to return and believe selflessly.”

“… My belief’s never been stronger.”

Serge grinned awkwardly. “Harmless experiment. I hear they do it all the time in college philosophy classes.”

The pastor shot him a steely glare.

“Give me one more chance,” said Serge. “I promise you won’t be sorry.”

Chapter Seventeen

UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA

Cars poured out of Gainesville in all directions, past the football stadium and brick dorms.

In one of the rooms:

“Who goes north for spring break?” asked Melvin Davenport.

“We do,” said his roommate, Cody. “It’s Panama City Beach! MTV’s there!”

“And?”

“Everybody’s going to be fucking!”

“I can see why the women love you.”

“Don’t be a jerk. We graduate next year and we’ve never been to spring break. This could be our last chance.”

“I don’t know.” Melvin sat at his desk, proofing a term paper. “You’re talking about leaving right now, and we haven’t done any planning. Did you even make reservations?”

“That’s the whole point of spring break. You don’t plan-you just go!”

“Why don’t you just go?”

“Because I need your truck.”

“Figured.”

Cody snatched the term paper.

“Hey!”

“You’ll thank me later.”

NEW HAMPSHIRE

Snow seriously started coming down.

A Hertz Town Car headed south from campus. It avoided the interstate in favor of a looping, scenic night route through empty countryside. Last homes and streetlights miles behind. Nothing but high beams and black ice on a two-laner through white-blanketed woods.

“I don’t get it,” said Raul. “Why’d you let the kid back there live? We never leave a witness unless there’s a good reason.”

“There’s a good reason,” said Guillermo. “I need him alive for disinformation.” He punched numbers on a cell and placed it to his head. “Panama City Beach… Holiday Isles… Yes, I’d like you to connect me for a modest charge…” He let off the gas as the road took a series of hairpin twists down a small mountain. “Front desk? I’d like the room of Sam Jones, please… You don’t have a Sam Jones? Well, I think Sam’s his middle name. Probably registered under his first… No, I don’t know it. You have any Joneses at all?… Four? What first names are they under?… I understand you can’t give out that information, but this is an emergency… Okay, connect me to the room on the top of your list…”