Margery and Katina met at the door, and Margery went on by with a sideways glance and not a single word. Katina, on the other hand, smiled and said, "Hi, Mom."

When she was inside, with the door closed, she asked, "What'd the Witch want?"

"Borrow money," Singleton said. That was always good for an excuse, because his mother genuinely did love money.

Katina bustled around, getting some coffee together. "What's the word on Deon and Jane?" she asked.

"Nobody knows what happened, but the BCA guys found a big pile of money and a bunch of dope up in Deon's bedroom," Singleton said. "They're gonna be all over the dope angle."

"Sheriff Anderson's out? Completely out?"

Singleton dipped his head. "He's out. He's smart enough to know that he was over his head-and if he wasn't smart enough, half the county commission went over to his office to tell him. Harvey Benschneider stood right over him while he made the call to St. Paul."

"Ah, boy," Katina said. She pulled off her gloves, parka, and ski hat, shook her hair out. "I can't believe they're dead. Gene's going crazy. You talk to him?"

"Yeah. He thinks maybe Jane was dealing cocaine at the casino," Singleton said. "Could they be that stupid?"

"Deon was a stupid man, and Jane wasn't much smarter," Katina said. She took cups out of a dish rack in the sink. "My question is, what do we tell the police?"

"Youdon't tell them anything," Singleton said. "Let Gene do the talking. No reason for any of us to get involved. Deon worked for Gene, not for us. If Gene's smart, he'll point the state cops at the casino. There's so much shit going on up there, they could investigate the place for the rest of their lives and not get to the bottom of it."

"Only one problem with that idea," Katina said.

"What?"

"Joe. Where's Joe? Jane told me that all of his stuff was still in the house. If Joe's dead, then it wasn't the casino."

"Could be. Could be if it's coke they were dealing. Can't tell with dopers. The other thing is-what if Joe came back and did this? What if he was looking for that money?"

"Hmm." They sat silently for a moment as Katina struggled with all the conflicting possibilities. Finally, she looked up at him and said, "Whatever happened to all three, we've really got to worry about our own positions."

"That's right. We all ought to stay away. If the state guys find one string, and pull it hard enough, the whole sweater's gonna unravel."

They talked for a while over their coffee, a middle-aged couple who got along. Singleton wasn't like the men she'd met in the Cities, Katina thought. He had some steel in him, some flint. Some Ugly.

She liked it-a man who'd stand up.

She just didn't know.

THE PARTY AT the West house started when two newspaper reporters, accompanied by two photographers, showed up at the front door and asked for interviews. Letty was pleased to do it, though Martha was a bit embarrassed by the mess the house was in. That didn't seem to bother the photographers, who got a couple of shots of Letty sitting in her mother's old rocker. Then the first TV truck showed up. The newspaper people were okay, but compared to the TV people, they were mongrels at a dog show. The TV people were stars- Letty'd even seen some of them on her own TV.

The TV people agreed on one set of lights, and set them up around the living room, while Martha scurried around moving all of her best furniture into place, moving the worst of it into the kitchen. A guy came in with a couple of sacks of black-corn chips, cheese dip, and Coke, and then somebody else brought in a twelve-pack of Bud Light. They asked Letty to get some traps, and she did, and they put them on the floor by her feet, and some of the cameramen crawled in close to get a shot of the traps, using the lights on top of their cameras. Somebody else challenged the cameramen to snap their fingers in the traps, and being cameramen, they did, although none of the on-air talent would do it. Then somebody else asked Martha about her singing career, and she got out her guitar and sang an old Pete Seeger song called "Where Have All the Flowers Gone," and then the main lights came up, and were adjusted, and the first interviewer, a blonde with a foxy face and feathery crimson scarf, said, "Letty, tell me about yesterday."

"I was up in my bedroom… " she began. Letty told them about the traps and the 'rats and the.22 and the bodies hanging in the dark. Then she told a dark-haired Italian-looking guy from Fox, and did it again for CNN, and as many times as they wanted, she stayed on top of it, fresh.

The TV liked her: the kid had this face, a face that looked like it ought to have a smear of dirt on it, though it had been scrubbed clean-a wild face with just a hint of feral, preteen sexuality.

They made her demonstrate the traps, her gun, explain the machete. She cradled the rifle in the notch of her left arm as she talked, and the reporters fluttered around her like sparrows over a spilled patch of Quaker oats. They could smell the connection between the kid and the tube…

"You're gonna be a star, honey," the foxy blonde said. She was a beautiful, smart woman whose socks cost more than Letty's wardrobe, and Letty believed her.

THE BCAGUY, Dickerson, finally chased the TV reporters away. Several asked if they could come back the next morning. Martha said, "Of course." And Martha, as animated as Letty had ever seen her, began to plan for the next day.

"I look like a troll," she said, looking in the kitchen mirror. The house, suddenly silent, seemed cold and lonely and isolated from the world. "I've got to get a different coat, and my hair-ah, baby, I wonder if I can get into Harriet's. What time is it?"

While her mother called Harriet's Mane Line, Letty went up the stairs and threw herself on her bed and closed her eyes. Closing her eyes was almost as good as television.

When she'd been on TV, she'd felt normal. She was surprised by that. She could feel what the TV people wanted, and reflected it back at them: chin up, a little grim, a little tight, the.22 in the crook of her arm. But a smile now and then, too.

She felt she could move them. She'd grown up with TV, and knew how it worked.

Letty got up and closed the door. On the back of the door, she'd mounted a mirror that she'd found at the Goodwill store. She looked pretty tough, she thought, trying to turn so she could catch her own profile. She was weather-smudged from the wind and the ice, but she couldn't help that. But maybe…

She lay down again and closed her eyes. Maybe some lipstick. Just a little teeny hint of lipstick. She should definitely clean up her shoes. She'd seen a girl in a John Wayne movie, a spunky kid just a little older than herself, maybe, and that was the look she wanted. That was the attitude.

Martha West ran up the stairs. "Dick's here, he's gonna take me," she said. Dick was her on-and-off boyfriend; he'd heard about the press conference. "Are you okay? Harriet's gonna give me a quick wash and set, and then Dick and me might go out after. You know, just for a while."

"I'll be okay. I gotta get some traps out, for when the reporters come back tomorrow. And maybe clean up my room-one lady said they might want to look out my window, if they decide to do a reenactment."

"Okay. Maybe catch the kitchen, too, okay? And just run the vacuum around the living room. Spray some of the lemon Pledge around, okay?"

"Okay. Don't be too late. We gotta get up early tomorrow," Letty said.

"We're just gonna go out for a few minutes, see what people are saying."

Martha ran back down the stairs, and Letty sat on the bed and pulled on her knee-high gum boots and got her coat and gloves: going to set some traps. Her mom yelled back up, "Don't miss the six o'clock news. They said maybe five o'clock and for sure at six."