Chaingang

“Next was Weldon Lawley. They sent a payment direct in the mail to him. I don't recall exactly—but it's all in the office papers. A few days later they deposited money here in town and had Sam finalize the deal with the Poindexters. And it went on like that until they had all the ground."

“I want to get all the contracts, copies of abstracts, deeds—everything that Sam kept on this deal, okay?"

“Sure.” They dug out the Alexandria, Virginia, phone number, and Royce dialed it. An intercept clicked on. It was no longer a working number. Directory assistance had no such party in any of the Alexandria or D.C. listings.

“I think we should go to all these people and talk to them personally."

“I already have—some of them."

“I know. But let's start from square one and try to put this deal together just as it happened. See if anything holds up a red flag, y’ know?"

“Okay. I want to put this money back. Let's go down to the office, if you want to, and we'll get all the stuff."

“Fine."

“Royce ... you don't need to waste any more of your time with this. I can ask around. I should never have got you involved. I'm sure you've got your work..."

“I have nothing but time. Come on,” he said, and they left the Perkins house. After the bank, they got the papers, then Royce dropped off Mary at home and took everything back to study overnight.

He wanted this to immerse himself in tonight. He did not want to have to be alone with the Royce Hawthorne who knew him so well, who knew what he'd become and what he'd chosen to do. He wanted no part of his own self-centered thoughts, and the last thing he wanted was time for any self-analysis. Tonight was not the night to look into his own soul. He would occupy his mind fully. So that he'd not accidentally look into himself and see the bottomless black hole that had once been a conscience.

14

BERTHALOU IRBY'S PROPERTY

NEAR WATERTON

Chaingang was tired, hungry, cold, angry, and irritants he could not yet precisely identify were tugging at him. He sensed three things simultaneously—none of them strong vibes—tingles, really, and hardly enough to evoke serious disquietude in the beast's gyro. Yet—anything that stayed at the edges of his mind continued to irritate him until his powerful awareness could pull it into focus.

There was the fire upriver. He'd waddled down through the nearby wood line, covering his tracks from habit, and set traps for any searchers who might follow him. None came.

That was number one. The second thing was the time factor—the hick fire department wailed onto the scene when the blaze had all but gutted Butchie's. Whatever postfire investigation had taken place was ludicrously cursory, and suspiciously inept.

He heard Dr. Norman's admonition “You will be protected ... twenty-five mile radius of—” again, and these things triggered the sense of a hidden pair of eyes. He waited for the word to nudge him.

W A T C H E R came back into focus. Only the suggestion of something: surveillance, an eye on high, an unseen manipulater. That was it—he was sensing their manipulation. It angered him this morning, to find himself doing a suit's bidding. It enraged him to think they considered him so easy to control. He would show them what control was, before this was over. He would feed their control to them, tear it from them with steel sawteeth, fill their orifices with it. Small wonder they gave him weapons. He was being watched!

He had spent the night in a place the map indicated was Willow River Slough. It had turned surprisingly cold. At first light, wrapped in everything he owned that wasn't a tool, food item, or weapon, he waddled back half a klick or so and took down his cop-traps. During the night he'd amused himself watching a two-story frame house. It had caught his eye because it appeared empty of humanity.

Chaingang returned to the site where he'd hunkered down for the night, repacked his gear in weapons cases and duffel, and continued to surveil the lonely home until the sun went under. He killed time by rigging a crude man-trap which he would leave as a parting gift—a surprise for whoever might chance to blunder along. The house continued to appear devoid of people.

As he stood waiting in the last rays of the setting sun, cold and pissed, one of the things that had been pulling at him finally inched into view. There was something in the thick growth of wild honeysuckle beside him. Gingerly he reached a huge paw in and found the soft mass of rags and twigs. Until he pulled it out, he thought it might be an odd bird's nest of some kind, but he saw in his hand a mass of wriggling newborn mice. It had been the tiny heartbeats he'd sensed.