Officials ordered the theme park to be closed temporarily while teams of armed hunters captured and removed the wild reptiles, some of which were nearly six feet in length.

Chelsea said that the Amazing Kingdom will reopen Tuesday morning with a full schedule of events. He added: "While we are confident that the grounds will be perfectly safe and secure, we are also suggesting, as a precaution, that our visitors wear heavy rubber boots. These will be available in all sizes, for a nominal rental fee."

Reporters began calling before eight o'clock. Charles Chelsea was summoned from home; he arrived bleary-eyed and tieless. Clutching a Styrofoam cup of black coffee, he hunched over the desk to examine Joe Winder's newest atrocity.

"Wicked bastard," he said after reading the last line.

A secretary told him about the TV helicopters. "We've counted five so far," she reported. "They're trying to get an aerial shot of the snakes."

"The snakes!" Chelsea laughed dismally.

To ignite his competitive spirit, the secretary said, "I can't believe they'd fall for a dumb story like this."

"Are you kidding?" Chelsea buried his hands in his hair. "Snakes are dynamite copy. Anything with a snake, the media eats it up." A law of journalism of which Joe Winder, the ruthless sonofabitch, was well aware.

Chelsea sucked down the dregs of the coffee and picked up the phone. Francis X. Kingsbury answered on the seventeenth ring.

"I've got some extremely bad news," Chelsea said.

"Horseshit, Charlie, if you get my drift." It sounded as if Kingsbury's hay fever was acting up. "Calling me at home, Christ, what's your job description anyway – professional pussy? Is that what I hired you for?"

"No, sir." The publicity man gritted his teeth and told Kingsbury what had happened. There was a long unpleasant silence, followed by the sound of a toilet being flushed.

"I'm in the can," Kingsbury said. "That's what you get for calling me at home."

"Sir, did you hear what I said? About the snake story that Winder put out?"

"Yes, hell, I'm not deaf. Hold on." Chelsea heard the toilet flush again. Grimly he motioned for his secretary to get him another cup of coffee.

On the other end, Kingsbury said, "All right, so on this snake thing, what do you think?"

"Close the park for a day."

"Don't be an idiot."

"There's no choice, Mr. Kingsbury. Even if we came clean and admitted the press release was fake, nobody's going to believe it. They'll think we're covering up." That was the insidious genius of Joe Winder's strategy.

Kingsbury said: "Close the goddamn park, are you kidding? What about business?"

"Business is shot," Chelsea replied. "Nobody but reptile freaks would show up today. We're better off closing the Kingdom and taking our lumps."

"Un-fucking-real, this is."

"I forgot to mention, we'll also need to purchase some boots. Several hundred pairs." Chelsea's fingers began to cramp on the telephone receiver. He said, "Don't worry, I'll put something out on the wires right away."

"Everything's under control, blah, blah, blah."

"Right," said Chelsea. Now he could hear the water running in Francis Kingsbury's sink.

"I bruffing my teef," Kingsbury gargled.

Chelsea waited for the sound of spitting. Then he said, "I'll call a press conference for noon. We'll get somebody, some scientist, to say the snakes are almost gone. Then we'll reopen tomorrow."

Kingsbury said, "Four hundred grand is what this fucking clown is costing me, you realize? A whole day's receipts."

"Sir, it could get worse."

"Don't say that, Charlie."

In a monotone Chelsea read the phony press release to Francis Kingsbury, who said: "Christ Almighty, they get six feet long! These poison cottonheads do?"

"I don't know. I don't know how big they get." Chelsea wanted to tell Kingsbury that it really didn't matter if the imaginary snakes were two feet or twenty feet, the effect on tourists was the same.

Over the buzz of his electric razor, Kingsbury shouted, "What does he want – this prick Winder – what's he after?"

"Nothing we can give him," Chelsea said. "It's got to stop or he'll kill our business."

"Yes, I know."

"And I'll tell you what else," Francis Kingsbury said. "I'm very disappointed in that fucking Pedro."

Molly McNamara was writing a letter to her daughter in Minneapolis when Danny Pogue rushed into the den. Excitedly he said: "I just saw on the news about all them snakes!" His Adam's apple juked up and down.

"Yes," Molly said, "it's very odd."

"Maybe you could get your people together. The Mothers of Wilderness. Maybe go down to Key Largo and demonstrate."

"Against what?"

"Well, it said on the news they're killing 'em all. The snakes, I mean. That don't seem right – it ain't their fault about the high water." Danny Pogue was rigid with indignation, and Molly hated to dampen the fervor.

Gently she said, "I don't know that they're actually killing the snakes. The radio said something about capture teams."

"No, unh-uh, I just saw on the TV. A man from the Amazing Kingdom said they were killing the ones they couldn't catch. Especially the preggy ones." He meant "pregnant." "It's that Kingsbury asshole, pardon my French."

Molly McNamara capped her fountain pen and turned the chair toward Danny Pogue. She told him she understood how he felt. "But we've got to choose our battles carefully," she said, "if we hope to get the public on our side."

"So?"

"So there's not much sympathy for poisonous snakes."

Danny Pogue looked discouraged. Molly said, "I'm sorry, Danny, but it's true. Nobody's going to care if they use flamethrowers, as long as they get rid of the cottonmouths."

"But it ain't right."

Molly patted his knee. "There's plenty of snakes out there. Not like the mango voles, where there were only two left in the entire world."

With those words she could have hammered an icepick into Danny Pogue's heart. Morosely he bowed his head. As his environmental consciousness had been awakened, the vole theft had begun to weigh like a bleak ballast on his soul; he'd come to feel personally responsible for the extinction of the voles, and had inwardly promised to avenge his crime.

He said to Molly: "What's that word you used before – 'atome' "?

"Atone, Danny. A-t-o-n-e. It means making amends."

"Yeah, well, that's me."

Molly smiled and removed her reading glasses. "Don't worry, we've all made mistakes in our lives. We've all committed errors of judgment."

"Like when you shot me and Bud. Before you got to know us better."

"No, Danny, that wasn't a mistake. I'd do the same thing all over again, if it became necessary."

"You would?"

"Oh, now, don't take it the wrong way. Come here." Molly reached out and took him by the shoulders. Firmly she pulled his greasy head to her breast. The heavy jasmine scent brought the tickle of a sneeze to Danny Pogue's nostrils.

Molly gave him a hug and said, "Both you boys mean so much to me."

Danny Pogue might have been moved to tears, except for the familiar bluish glint of the pistol tucked in the folds of Molly's housedress.

He said, "You want some tea?"

"That would be lovely."

As soon as Carrie Lanier left for work, Skink curled up in the shower, turned on the cold water and went to sleep.

Joe Winder kept writing for thirty minutes, until his will dissolved and he could no longer concentrate. He dialed Miriam's house and asked for Nina.

"It's six-dirty inna morning," Miriam complained.

"I know what time it is. May I speak to her, please?"

"What if chee no here?"