The Triggerman Dance

She stops and faces him, drops her hat, plants her feet and swings a big arching cross with her right fist. She opens and slows just before it hits his cheek. Her other hand shoots up and both pull his face down to hers.

"I love you anyway. Brute. Simpleton. Oaf. Dope."

"In that case I love you, too."

"There. We both win. I'll be satisfied with that, temporarily."

The opening to the cave is now covered by a massive iron gate. It is connected to an equally stout frame, hinged on one side and fastened on the other by a long chain of forbidding size and heft.

"This wasn't here when I was a kid," he says.

"Is now."

"Who built it?"

"Who do you think? Said he wanted his very own dungeon."

"Quite the party gag."

"Just like everything else on Liberty Ridge—doors but no locks. Dad said if he couldn't build a safe home for his family here, he'd go somewhere he could. The electric fence might have something to do with it."

She pulls out the chain a little, then it slides of its own weight to the ground. John steps away as Valerie uses both hands to pull open the gate. It creaks unmercifully, a long, shrill protest.

"Been a while," she says. "After you."

The sunlight gives way to a partial darkness as John moves into the cool of the cave. He remembers the way the ceiling is low at first so you have to crouch a little, then opens up maybe twenty yards further down to the big cavern with a high ceiling, the smooth dirt floor and at the far end the opening in the rock where the spring bubbles forth in its aromatic, mineral-heavy steam. He remembers that the size of the opening is just big enough to climb into if you want to sit in the hot water, and the rock ledge around the opening is a good place to sit. He can smell the clean, fecund odor of fresh water pooling up from the earth. He remembers that once your eyes adjust in the cavern you can see just well enough to keep from banging into the walls or tripping on the rock ledges surrounding the spring.

"Want to crank up the lantern?" he asks, turning.

"Let's wait until we're in, okay?" Valerie has her hat on. In this minor half-light—just as in the glare of the sun—he finds her absolutely beautiful.

He senses the ceiling rising as he steps into the big cavern. He can't see the top but the echoes of their footsteps have extended resonance. He can make out the pale draft of steam rising from the pool at the far end of the vault. He feels Valerie's body press up against his side, the brim of her hat nudging his neck.

"Let there be light," she whispers.

John sets down the basket. He steps to the other side of it kneels, lifts the lid. He looks up at her from across the basket beholding her form in the faint light that has followed her in from the cave mouth behind her. He looks up at her face but he can't see much except for the shine of her eyes. He gets out the lantern and turns the electronic ignition switch, hearing the click-click of the spark and the quiet hiss of the gas coming into the mantles.

"Thank you," he says. "For what you gave me back there.'

"You're really very welcome."

"I feel more than welcome. I feel honored and blessed."

"So do I, John."

He smiles.

In the growing light he sees that she is smiling, too. She has knelt to face him across the picnic basket, her expression revealed by the whitening glow from the lantern that rests on top of it.

"You're beautiful," he says.

"You're just flattering me now."

She turns her back to him and John unbuttons the dress. She drops the top and steps out of it in a motion of pure femininity then walks to the bubbling pool in the rock. He watches her kneel and work the water into the material.

"I knew you'd come here," she says.

"How could you know, when I didn't?"

"From a dream."

"Tell me about it."

"No," she says quietly, looking over her shoulder at him. "We're only as interesting as our secrets."

When they leave the cave the Santa Ana winds have just begun to blow again. They move greatly against John's face as he leads Valerie into the formidable sunlight. John notes the high desert smell, the dryness of the breeze, the clean outlines of the hillsides against the sky. He has Valerie by the hand. Time passing by, he thinks, the future marching backwards to meet us.

Back at the cottage, John has an e-mail asking him to call Adam Sexton. He e-mails back that he can't—no phone handy. A few moments later, Sexton's reply appears on his screen:

SENSE CHANGES IN VANN. PURELY A HUNCH . IF YOUR NOSE IS TO THE WIND, PICKING THINGS UP, WOULD MUCH LIKE TO COMPARE NOTES. ANY LITTLE BIT HELPS. VAL LIKES YOU. LUCKY GUY-

A. SEX

That night, late, Holt summons John to the Big House. John crosses the meadow in the building wind, his dogs bouncing out ahead of him, hunting birds in the moonlight.