He saw nothing but the green hulk of the MGM Grand down the street, concentrating on it, excluding everything else. Not thinking at all. Moving on automatic as he pushed inside, made his way to the back and the monorail station, just outside.

On good days he would talk back to the computerized voice that cautioned him to stay behind the iron-fence barrier until the next train arrived; on good days he would flirt a little with the attendants who worked the gates and once in a while flirted back; on good days he would eavesdrop on conversations, to see who was winning, who was sick and tired of all the heat, who was complaining just to complain.

Today he said nothing, saw nothing, and when the train swept in, he took the first available seat in the nearest car, facing forward, scowling at the kids who piled in after him, followed by beleaguered parents with expressions of permanent apology, themselves on automatic with scolds and instructions.

As the train pulled out, he wondered whose bright idea it had been to turn a gambling city into a family resort, whose dumb idea it had been to run a train between just two stations, whose idea it had been to have him followed.

Watched.

Examined.

By the time the train pulled into the Bally's station, his fuming had boiled over into outright temper, and as soon as he was inside, he stepped quickly out of the passenger flow and leaned against a featureless cream wall. Panting. Ordering himself to calm down, that the day would be a total bust if he let the old man get to him.

It took almost ten minutes and the uneasy glances from a young and nervous security guard before he felt he could move without screaming, without striking out blindly. Then he hurried along a broad shopping concourse to the escalators that led up to the casino, and with a deliberate deep breath let the ritual take over.

It didn't work.

An hour later he gave up, knowing that none of the machines would welcome either him or his money. It was his own fault. He had been wasting half his energy holding a short frayed rein on his temper, but it angered him anyway, and he stalked outside, muttering obscenities just loud enough to make others shy away.

On the next corner he hesitated, then shrugged and went in the Barbary Coast, much smaller, much noisier, much gaudier, and the machines just as unresponsive.

tell him, child, that the dragon is dying Outside again, tapping an impatient foot at the intersection traffic light, trotting across when the light turned green, swinging right and marching again up the long stretch of low wall and misted gardens that fronted Caesar's Palace.

Okay, jerk, he thought; this isn't getting you anywhere. You keep this up you might as well go home and kick in a wall.

It was tempting, and he realized that the pull he felt along the backs of his hands was the result of keeping them in fists. He snapped his fingers out, flexed mem, cracked a couple of knuckles, then shook them like a swimmer before launching into a dive.

A man in a multicolored shepherd's robe stood at the curb in the middle of the block, his long white hair tangled and dark with sweat, his deep-tanned face gleaming with sweat, while sweat dripped from the tip of his pointed chin. He wore a hand-made sandwich board on which had been printed in deep red letters, THE NUMBER OF THE DEAD IS NOW 168,215 AND THE NUMBER OF THE BEAST IS STILL 666.

He carried no cup, made no pronouncements, quoted no Scripture.

He simply stood there in the heat with a reminder of the Sickness for those who had come to the desert to forget.

Despite his mood, Trey stopped and looked at him, waiting for the man's gaze to meet his own. When it did, he nodded to the tally and said, "You print a new one every day?" making sure by his tone that the man understood he wasn't mocking.

"Twice a day," was the answer, the voice coarse.

"It must be a grim job."

"It's the Millennium, my friend, the end of the world. I guess you could say that was pretty grim."

A glance up and down the street, but there was no sign of the old man in the stupid cowboy hat. "You need a donation or something?"

"I manage. But thank you."

Trey turned to leave, suddenly reached into his pocket and pulled out a twenty. He moved closer. "Take it. You'll need a lot more paint."

The man accepted it without comment, just a grateful nod, and his gaze drifted, sending him back into whatever state he used to pass the time away.

A second look at the number of the dead, and Trey moved on, no longer marching, hands in his pockets. Aware now of the sun, the sweat on his back and on the back of his neck beneath his hair.

have you ever wondered why you don't seem to be able to get hurt in Las Vegas?

A twinge in his right shoulder reminded him of the nightstick a cop had used on him in St. Louis. Or maybe it was Austin. Or maybe-he grunted. What difference did it make where it happened? It hadn't happened here.

But lots of things hadn't happened here, so that didn't prove a thing. Like, for example, the Sickness. It pops up in a city, a small town, takes its victims, and moves on. A random sequence he knew from the newspapers drove the scientists and doctors out of their analytical minds. Prediction might mean better preventive action. Like the signs that were posted in every school and church in town, reminding people to get their smallpox inoculation before it was too late. The signs worked, of course, but the vaccine itself didn't always do the job.

So how, he asked himself, did John Harp know about the run of luck he'd been having?

And something answered, over two years is a hell of a long run.

He pushed his hair away from his forehead, and smiled at a little girl prancing alongside her mother, both wearing masks, the little one's with a Mickey Mouse painted across the front, the mother's with a Bugs Bunny. The woman saw him watching and raised her eyebrows in a gesture that told him it was better than looking like you were heading straight for surgery; his own look told her Hey, whatever works.

But the sight lifted him, just as the street shepherd had jolted him out of his anger at John Harp, and he walked a little more quickly, more confidently, not really paying attention to where he was until he had crossed the first loop of Caesar's open oval, long front drive, and found himself in front of what Moonbow had called his personal statue.

He chuckled and walked past it-high on a marble base, a gold sculpture of two charging horses pulling a chariot, its driver with one arm raised high, a snapping whip in his hand.

Not quite a mirror of the chip his mother gave him.

As he stepped off the curb onto the second leg of the oval, he looked over his shoulder at the chariot one more time, shook his head, and jumped, arms flailing, when a blaring horn warned him he'd nearly stepped in front of an airport van. The driver mouthed a curse at him as he stepped back hastily and almost tripped over the curb, faces in the van windows staring, not a single one of them friendly.

have you ever wondered Shaken, feeling more than a little foolish, he decided to pass on Caesar's and make his way farther up, to the Mirage or beyond. By then maybe his heart would have stopped trying to claw its way out of his chest. He shook his hands again, and rubbed his sternum; he licked his lips; rubbed his arms.

rattlesnake He walked a little faster, realizing he'd blown an awful lot of time, both at the restaurant and at Bally's and the Barbary. If he was going to add to his stash, he'd better . . . he'd better . . . and do what? he asked himself suddenly. When you get what you want, what are you going to do, buy a mansion and hide out until the shepherd's numbers are so large he can't carry them anymore?

cowboy An impatient swipe at the sweat on his nape, a pass of his forearm across his eyes. Maybe he was still asleep. Maybe he was still in the nightmare. Maybe there's still some coincidence in the world.

have you ever wondered Maybe.

Maybe I have.

a car that jumped the curb He didn't care about the heat; he didn't care about the danger.

He looked back, he looked ahead, and with a silent cry, he ran.

2.

At the first men's room he could find when he reached the Mirage, he banged into a stall, locked the door behind him, dropped to his knees, and threw up.

Damning the tears, damning Harp, damning the stench, damning the sun.

Rocking on his knees until there was nothing left; rocking on his knees while he mopped his face with toilet paper; flushing the toilet several times, flushing it again even though there was nothing there but water; rocking on his knees, thinking maybe he'd gone crazy.

Sagging to the floor, stretching out his legs, his feet poking under the door, his back against the rim of the bowl. Blinking rapidly enough to make himself dizzy. Working his lips like an old man who can't find the words to speak. Fingers stroking his neck as if he could ease the raw burning in his throat.

Sitting there, panting and sweating, until he heard the restroom door open, heels tap sharply across the tiled floor, and finally, after a long silence, a woman's voice say, in a clear British accent, "Pardon me, Mr. Falkirk, but is there something wrong?"

He couldn't help it; he laughed.

3.

"Let me tell you something," he said, "but don't expect me to make any sense."

Beatrice Harp neither flinched nor smiled. She sat sideways on the stool next to his, watching solemnly, studiously as he stroked the slot machine's side again, just to be sure. Then he slipped in a quarter, pulled the arm, and shook his head when twelve quarters rattled out.

"I think your old man's a nut."

Another quarter; nothing this time.

"But I'm not going to ask how you found me, because then I'll have to think you're a nut, too."

"Can you do this all night?" she asked, nodding to the machine. "Make money, I mean."

"Sometimes. Maybe. But I don't."

"Because they'll mark you," she said.

He looked at her, finally nodded.

"Very clever, then. Spread yourself around, I expect, is that right?"

He nodded again, watching a dozen quarters bounce onto the bed the others made.

She wore baggy tan shorts that reached her knees, a loose matching blouse with a small animal stitched in dark red across her right breast. Kneesocks and walking shoes. A tortoiseshell band over her head to hold the hair out of her eyes. Both hands gripped a small purse in her lap.

Bells and music two rows over, some cheers and laughter, while just behind them a couple argued loudly about how much money they'd spent, how much they had left.

"Good Lord, how do you stand it?" she asked when he leaned back a little to ease the strain on his spine.

"I don't hear it."

"Surely."

"No, really. I don't hear it. White noise, you know? How the hell did you find me?"

"I thought you weren't going to ask."

He swiveled around to face her and laughed aloud at the pure mockery of innocence in her expression. She was, he thought, something else again. Barging into the men's room like that, helping him to his feet while he spun in momentary hysteria, fussing him over to the sink so he could rinse his face off with cold water and find a way to breathe without either weeping or laughing again.

At one point, after she'd introduced herself and handed him a fistful- of paper towels, he asked if she had ever been a nanny, the way she was treating him, and she'd answered, "I've been with Sir John quite a long time. I think that's enough training, don't you?"

At the time he hadn't been sure if she'd been joking, but the look on her face now, her head slightly tilted, was enough to make him laugh again. "So?" he said.

"Mr. Falkirk," she said earnestly, "Sir John was quite serious when he asked you those questions. Quite serious. He does tend to be a bit obtuse, however, I'll grant' you that. He knows it's sometimes a bit maddening, but he prefers it that way. He'd rather you found the answers yourself rather than hand them to you on a silver platter. He believes the results are much more effective that way."

With a wave that told her he was still listening, he turned back to the machine and dropped in another quarter.

"And he's quite right, you know. It truly does not make a whit of difference how he . . . we found you. That we have should be sufficient."

"It isn't," he told her flatly, watching the bars, the stars, the face of a leering clown whirl through their paces.

A dozen women, all of them flirting with the far boundary of middle-age, settled themselves on empty stools to either side, chattering incessantly. Laughs, scolds, a reminder that someone had promised someone else to take pictures of the volcano before they left for home.

Pull the arm, Trey told himself; don't think, just pull the arm.

"Mr. Falkirk."

He raised a finger to tell her to hang on, and Time drifted, the tumblers did their work, and he scooped quarters into a large plastic cup. He knew he was winning too much, but he figured that as long as he only took it one coin at a time there wouldn't be all the fuss, the notoriety, than if he gave the machine its maximum four and hit the jackpot.

"Mr. Falkirk, please."

The couple behind them left, still arguing; the women cornered a waitress and pelted her with orders; chimes and melodies and the ratchet of gears as he pulled the arm down slowly, released it, and watched the tray fill.

"Mr. Falkirk! Please!"

Finally he turned his head.

Beatrice touched his arm. "Someplace more quiet, please, Mr. Falkirk. I can't think here."

A hesitation, a grudging nod, and he scooped the tray clean, mouthed a thank you to the machine, and rose stiffly. A jerk of his head for her to follow, and he went to the nearest cashier to change the coins into bills, stuffed the bills into his pocket, and looked around for a moment before leading her out of the casino and into the lobby. It wasn't very large as Las Vegas lobbies go, only ten or twelve yards wide, but at least the voice of the games was effectively muted.

The registration and checkout desk was long and lightly manned. There were no lines at all, just a handful of people talking with the clerks. The stations at the far end were empty, and he folded his arms on the countertop and waited for Beatrice to join him.

"My," she said.

The entire wall behind the counter was one massive aquarium, reefs and shallow caves and freestanding rocks swarmed around by fish whose vivid colors belonged to tropical birds. He watched a baby shark flash through a rock tunnel, and wondered, as he always did, what happened to it when it grew.

"Very restful," she said, placing her purse on the counter.

"I know."

"I take it you come here often."