When the stones petered to swampy gra.s.s, I slowed in three choppy steps, cool beneath oaks now. I trotted uphill smiling. I wanted to do it again.

I cleared the corner at the final rise, took one glance at my father, and tried to hide my smile. Probably didn't, though, because he cut loose with a big laugh I hadn't heard since I was six years old. "Not bad," he said. "Not bad once you got the hang of it. Feels pretty good, huh?"

I wanted to talk about the feeling. I wanted to ask how he discovered this place, these rocks, this running.

Instead I nodded and said nothing.

We stood side by side. Once I thought my father was going to put his hand on my shoulder. But when I half turned he scratched his side instead, put the hand on his hip.

Soon I said, "Again?"

"Energy," he said. "I remember when I had some. Three two one go!"

I took off, bounding faster than I had before. After thirty yards I felt, rather than heard, something behind me and knew my father was on my tail. So I moved even faster.

"You've ... got ... the reflexes," he panted, his drinking and smoking catching up with him. "But can ... you ... do it ... with a hungry driver ... right on your a.s.s?"

We built momentum until we were skimming down Purgatory Chasm at a dead-nuts sprint. My father's longer legs paid off and he pulled alongside me, needing only two strides for every three I took. "Can ... you ... do it when ... the money's ... on the table?" he panted, and squeezed ahead half a pace, then a full one. With thirty yards to the finish he decided he'd won and eased into a fast jog, trying to win with style.

But I dug up the last bit of air in my lungs and exploded, running absolutely as fast as I would have on a sidewalk. Two strides, four, and I was catching him, his wind too far gone to let him accelerate again as I floated past, eight strides from the finish- My father hit me in the ribs with an elbow.

He would spend that night, the next three years, maybe the rest of his life explaining how it had been a dumb accident-a wheezing geezer flailing, a s...o...b..ating son squeezing a little too close in the excitement of the race.

It wasn't any f.u.c.king accident. Fast Freddy Sax watched me pull alongside, knew he had nothing left in the tank, and threw an elbow that was meant for my left arm but caught me high in the rib cage instead.

The pain-burst blew up my instinctive running. I took an ugly flat-footed step with my left sneaker, one with my right, and sailed through s.p.a.ce. Airborne, I actually reached forward with my left hand like a football player trying to extend the ball past the goal line. I was still thinking about winning.

My right elbow was the first thing that touched down. It shattered on a chunk of granite the size and shape of a straight-six engine block.

An instant later, my head hit the same rock. But I think I was already knocked out.

At seven thirty the next morning, Sophie and I sat in my truck in the Shrewsbury High School parking lot. We were waiting for a bus; Sophie was headed for a Girl Scout camping weekend down on Cape Cod.

The parking lot was a nuthouse: thirty or more minivans and SUVs spilling girls, dads hood-leaning and chatting, moms smearing sunblock on their daughters, pressing money into pockets, triple-checking things they'd double-checked at home.

I'm no expert, but I could see almost all the girls were a year or two younger than Sophie. She was quiet for a change, nervous. I thought I knew why.

Her first two years, she was more or less raised by her sister, Jesse, who was seven when Sophie was born. Those two years were the tail end of Charlene's meth-and-crack career, when the state Department of Social Services took her daughters away and placed them with her sister. It was the kick in the a.s.s Charlene needed; she's been bootstrapping ever since. Now she owns a transcription-and-translation company that's worth a couple million, easy.

For the most part Sophie acts grown up as h.e.l.l, but since the girls went back to their mother nearly a decade ago, she's never been away for anything more than a one-night sleepover.

As two yellow buses rolled in nose to tail, I touched Sophie's head. "Thursday, Friday, Sat.u.r.day nights, home by dinner Sunday. Piece of cake."

"This is training-wheels camp," she said. "This weekend is to get all the little girls"-she made a slicing gesture at the minivan in front of us-"ready for the real three-week camp in August."

"So?"

It was quiet thirty seconds. Finally Sophie said, "So what if I don't want to go for that long?"

"Then you won't."

"Mom will make me."

h.e.l.l. She was probably right about that. Charlene was happiest at work, didn't like it when kid schedules got in the way. She probably should've hired a nanny a long time ago but had refused for the same reason she stayed in her smallish house: She didn't want the girls feeling like they were something special.

I put my arm around Sophie, let her lean into me, kissed the top of her head. "I'll talk to your mom, okay? I'll remind her this is a tryout camp."

"Thanks." She slipped from my one-armed hug, popped her door open. "And be nice to Fred, okay?"

"Okay."

"Promise?"

"Promise."

"Now help me throw my camping s.h.i.t on the bus."

I cracked up. Did as I'd been told, kissed Sophie again, watched her climb on the bus, waited with all the parents. Sophie had found a seat on my side and pretended not to see me. But along with all the moms and dads, I waved like an idiot when the buses pulled out-and at the last second Sophie turned, smiled shyly, waved her fingers once.

I headed north.

There was another jacked-up truck in the Beets' compound-a thirty-year-old International Harvester pickup on some sort of home-brewed cha.s.sis, so tall I could have walked under it. Other than that, the place was the same as when I'd fetched Ollie here five days ago: slow-rotting trailers, swaybacked house with cinder-block front steps, miserable dog wailing out back.

As I rolled to a stop I fist-b.u.mped my horn, trying for a friendly toot-toot. It wasn't nine yet, and if I had to wake these guys I preferred to do it at a safe distance. I fished Ollie's Browning from beneath the seat, stuck it down the back of my pants and climbed out, slamming the door as loudly as I could.

"h.e.l.lo?" I took three slow steps toward the house.

"That's close enough."

The voice came from the living-room window. I couldn't see inside: Against all odds the window still had a screen.

"Friend of Ollie Dufresne," I said, keeping my hands loose and at my sides, feeling a cold spot on my chest where I knew a long gun was pointed. "Here to see the Beets."

The voice said nothing, but in a few seconds I heard a tiny zzzing and knew what the sound was: the barrel of the gun dragging as it was pulled from the screen. The cold spot on my chest vanished.

Ten seconds later the front door opened. The man who stepped through was at least six-four, with a tangle of filthy hair adding another couple inches. A beard owls could nest in ran halfway down his torso. He wore plaid boxer shorts only, no shirt, so it was easy to see he was a once-strong guy gone to pot: sagging t.i.ts covered with gray hair, medicine-ball belly, small scars and bruises everywhere.

He was big enough so the sawed-off shotgun in his right paw looked like a kids' toy.

He tweaked his boxers with his left hand and popped his c.o.c.k out. I saw he had half a morning-glory b.o.n.e.r and looked away while he cut loose with a long p.i.s.s off his porch, staring at me, smiling at his little gross-out.

When he got himself stowed away I said, "I'm the guy came and took Ollie away the other day."

"Bert wasn't happy 'bout that."

"Where is Bert?"

The man nodded toward the living room. "Asleep, with Bobby," he said, and smiled, showing me three black teeth and two brown ones. "I'm Bret, the smart one."

Thing is, he was pretty smart, once you got past the sight and smell of him. I got him to come off the cinder-block porch and tell me about the home-built four-by-fours, and that warmed him up some. Soon we were comparing notes on mercs we might both know, and that led us around to Ollie, and when that petered out, Bret Beet stood, one shoulder against a ma.s.sive tire, sawed-off shotgun over his shoulder like a fishing rod. "That's why you're here," he said. "Ollie."

"He's in trouble."

He waited.

I decided it'd be stupid to hold back. There didn't appear to be much that would shock Bret Beet. "Drug-running trouble. Heroin."

"Heroin," he said, scratching his beard. "Bad s.h.i.t."

"Ollie was running heroin north for a dealer in Montreal," I said. "He wanted out. Montreal wants him in."

"Montreal bust up his knee?"

I nodded. "And he'll do it some more, he can find him." Paused. It was soft-sell time. "Montreal's the one who killed my friend, too."

"You've got Ollie stashed away for now."

I said nothing.

"Maybe at his mom's house," Bret Beet said. "Up-country Vermont."

"s.h.i.t." He was smart.

"I'm not that smart," he said, reading my mind. "If I can figure it out, ain't no reason this Montreal cat can't."

"Want to run something by you," I said. "What if Montreal pulled right up your driveway? Just cruised up in his Escalade like a swinging d.i.c.k?"

"On the Beet Brothers' property?"

"Like a swinging d.i.c.k, demanding this and that, where's Ollie, where's my money."

"Killed your friend, huh?" Bret Beet pulled at his beard, then made a slow brown-teeth smile. "Live free or die," he said.

When I pulled into my driveway in Framingham and Trey, Kieu, and Tuan bubbled from the side door, I saw right away they had something up their sleeve. Trey wore khakis, a short-sleeve b.u.t.ton-down with green stripes, and a necktie. Kieu had on a sundress the color of honeydew melon, and Tuan wore short pants, a white b.u.t.ton-down, and a clip-on bow tie that had already popped from one side of his collar.

As I climbed from the truck I said, "Jeez, are we going to church?"

Trey blushed. "The attire was not my idea."

Inside, Trey escorted me into the living room, where snacks and drinks had been laid out, and barked over his shoulder at Kieu. She trundled Tuan from the room.

Trey stood before me like a brand-new Bible salesman who'd finally talked his way into some lady's home and wasn't sure what came next. He gestured at the coffee table. "Would you like a drink? A soft drink?"

"Trey," I said, "are you going to sell me some Amway?"

"What's Amway?"

"Never mind. Whatever it is, get to it."

"Your kindness to myself and my family has been overwhelming, and so I find it nerve-racking to ask another favor. But I understand it's your intention to sell this home in the near future, is that correct?"

"Sure."

"Kieu and I spent some time researching prices of comparable homes in the neighborhood," he said, pulling and unfolding a sheet of notebook paper. "As you may know, prices have been falling steadily here for the past-"

"Jesus Christ, are you looking to buy this place?"

"Well ... yes, actually. We could use most of my father's cash for a significant down payment, and by renting the apartment upstairs, we're quite-"

"Sold," I said, standing. "Now go change into some real clothes. We're going to sand the joints in the office. It's dirty work."

It took Trey a while to change-once he told Kieu the house was theirs, they spent some time being giddy. When he did join me, Trey explained there were more Vietnamese in downtown Framingham than I'd known. Kieu had discovered this little community and made a few friends, and she wanted to stay put. Trey told her this wasn't much of a neighborhood, especially for Tuan, but she wouldn't budge.

We got the windows open and a fan running. I showed Trey how to use a sanding pole so he wouldn't have to climb up and down stepladders, and he pitched right in.

We were about done when my cell rang. It was Randall. I slapped dust off myself and picked up.

"The case of Patty Marx," he said, "grows curiouser and curiouser."

I waited.

"These reporters fret about their bylines like seventh-grade girls, did you know that?"

"You mean their names?"

"Their names as they appear in the paper," Randall said. "I guess those bylines are about all they've got, so they want them to pop. It's understandable. Who wants to be John Smith of the Fresno Fishwrap?"

"What the h.e.l.l are you talking about?"

"It just made her a bit trickier to back-trace," he said. "She went by D.P.R. Marx for quite a while. I suppose she thought the three initials in a row added some heft to her byline." I could feel him savoring something. "Or maybe she wanted readers to think she was a man, thought she'd be taken more seriously."

"Where is she?"

"Her first job out of Clemson was at a weekly in Swainsboro, Georgia. Sewer-commission meetings and flower shows. But she worked her way north pretty quickly, and the papers got bigger. A black woman, you know, that's a prize employee these days."

I said nothing, figured that was the best way to move him along.