Besides, I would no more have aborted that fetus than I'd have shot myself in the foot. Imagine the degree of inbreeding involved here: hermaphroditic child of brother-sister incest impregnates herself. Her child's mother is also its father. Its grandmother is also its great-aunt, and its grandfather is its great-uncle! One tight genetic line-and genes damaged by Yarnell's use of hallucinogenics, remember.

Virtually a guarantee of a freak of one kind or another, and I wouldn't have missed it for the world." Julie took a long swallow of the bourbon. It tasted sour and stung her throat. She didn't care. She needed it.

"I'd become a doctor because the pay was good," Fogarty said.

"Later, when I gravitated toward illegal abortions, the pay was better, and it became my main business. Not much danger, either, because I knew what I was doing, and I could buy off an authority now and then if I had to. When you're getting those fat fees, you don't have to schedule many office visits, you can have a lot of free time, money and leisure, the best of both worlds. But having settled for a career like that, what I never figured was that I'd encounter anything as medically interesting, as fascinating, as entertaining as this Pollard mess." The only consideration that caused Julie to refrain from going across the room and kicking the c.r.a.p out of the old man was not his age but the fact that he would leave the story unfinished and some vital piece of information unrevealed.

"But the birth of Roselle's first child wasn't the event I'd thought it would be," Fogarty said.

"In spite of the odds, the baby she produced was healthy and, from all indications, perfectly normal. That was 1960, and the baby was Frank."

In the wingback chair, Frank whimpered softly but remained in his semicomatose condition.

STILL LISTENING to Doc Fogarty through Darkle, Violet sat up and swung her bare legs over the edge of the bed, dispossessing some of the cats from their resting places, and eliciting a murmur of protest from Verbina, who was seldom content to share just a mental link with her sister and needed the rea.s.surance of physical contact. With cats swarming at her feet, seeing through their eyes as well as her own and therefore not blinded by the darkness, Violet started toward the open door to the lightless upstairs hall.

Then she remembered that she was nude, and she went back for panties and a T-shirt.

She wasn't afraid of Candy's disapproval or of Candy himself. In fact, she would welcome his violent attentions, for it would be the ultimate game of hunter and prey, hawk mouse, brother and sister. Candy was the only wild creature into whose mind she couldn't intrude; though wild, he was human and beyond the reach of her powers. If he tore out Verbina's throat, then her blood would get into him, and into her throat, and she would become a part of him in the only manner she ever could. Likewise, that was the only way he could get into her: by biting his way in, by chewing into her, the only way.

On any other night, she would have called to him and let him see her nude, with the hope that her shamelessness would at last provoke him to violence. But she could not pursue her fondest desire right now, not when Frank was nearby and unpunished for what he had done to their poor puss, mantha When she had dressed, she returned to the hall, moved all through it in the gloom-still in complete touch with Darkle and Zi and the wild world-and stopped before the door to mother's room, into which Candy had moved upon her death. A thing line of light showed along the sill.

"Candy," she said.

"Candy, are you there?"

LIKE A MEMORY from wars past or a presentiment of a war to come, a searing flash of lightning and a shattering crash of thunder shook the night. The window in the study vibrated. It was the first thunder Bobby had heard since the faint and distant peal when they had come out of the motel, nearly an hour and a half ago. In spite of the thunder in the sky, rain was not yet falling. But though the storm was slow-moving, it was almost upon them. The pyrotech of a storm was an ideal backdrop to Fogarty's tale.

"I was disappointed in Frank," Fogarty said, taking an old bottle of bourbon from his capacious desk drawer and filling his gla.s.s.

"No fun at all. So normal. But two years later she was pregnant again!

This time the delivery was every as entertaining as I'd expected Frank's to be. A baby boy again and she called him James. Her second virgin birth, she said, and she didn't mind at all that he was as much of a mess as she was. She said that was just proof that he, too, was favored by G.o.d and brought into the world without a need to wallow in the depravity of s.e.x. I knew then that she was as mad as a hatter." Bobby knew he had to remain sober, and he was aware of the danger of too much bourbon after a night of too little sleep. But he had a hunch that he was burning it off as fast as he drank it, at least for now. He took another sip before he said, "You're not telling us that beefy hulk is hermaphroditic too?"

"Oh, no," Fogarty said.

"Worse than that." CANDY OPENED the door.

"What do you want?"

"He's here, in town, right now," she said.

His eyes widened.

"You mean Frank?"

"Yes."

"WORSE," Bobby said numbly.

He got up from the sofa long enough to put his gla.s.s on the desk. It was still three-quarters full, but he suddenly decided that even bourbon would not be an effective tranquilizer in this case.

Julie seemed to reach the same conclusion, and put her gla.s.s aside too.

"James-or Candy, if you wish-was born with four testes instead of two, but with no male organ. Now, at birth, male infants all carry their testes safely in their abdominal cavity, and the testes descend later, during infant maturation. But Candy's never descended and never could, because there was no s.c.r.o.t.u.m for them to descend into. And for another thing, there's a strange excrescence of bone that would prevent their descent. So they've remained within his abdominal cavity. But I would guess they've functioned well, busily producing quite large amounts of testosterone, which is related to development of musculature and partly explains his formidable size."

"So he's incapable of having s.e.x," Bobby said.

"With his t.e.s.t.i.c.l.es undescended and no organ for copulation, I'd say he's got a shot at being the most chaste man ever lived." Bobby had come to loathe the old man's laugh.

"But four gonads, he's producing a flood of testosterone, and does more than help build muscles-doesn't it?" Fogarty nodded.

"To put it in the language of a med journal: excess testosterone, over an extended period of time alters normal brain function, sometimes radically, and it's causative factor of socially unacceptable levels of aggressi To put it in layman's language: this guy is seriously stoked s.e.xual tension he can't possibly release, he's rechanneledenergy into other outlets, mainly acts of incredible viole and he's as dangerous as any monster any moviemaker dreamed up." ALTHOUGH SHE HAD released the owl as the storm drewViolet still inhabited Darkle and Zitha, taking their fear a from them when the lightning flared and the thunder boo Even as she stood before Candy, at the door to his room, was listening to Fogarty tell the Dakotas about her brother's deformity. She knew about it already, of course, for within family their mother had referred to it was G.o.d's sign that Candy was the most special of all of them.

Likewise, and in some way Violet had been aware that this deformity was related to great wildness in Candy, the thing that made him so po fully attractive.

Now she stood before him, wanting to touch his huge a feel the sculpted muscles, but she restrained herself.

"He' Fogarty's house." That surprised him.

"Mother said Fogarty was an instrument of G.o.d. He brought us into the world, four virgin bi Why would he harbor Frank? Frank's on the dark side no "That's where he is," Violet said.

"And a couple. His na BobbY. Hers is Julie."

"Dakota," he whispered.

At Fogarty's. Make him pay for Samantha, Candy. Bring him back here after you've killed him, and let us feed him the cats. He hated the cats, and he'll hate being part offorever." JULIE'S TEMPER, not always easily controlled, was dangerously near the flashpoint. As lightning shocked the night outside and thunder again protested, she counseled herself about the necessity for diplomacy.

Nevertheless, she said, "You've known all these years that Candy is a vicious killer, and you've done nothing to alert anyone to the danger?"

"Why should I?" Fogarty asked.

"Haven't you ever heard of social responsibility?"

"It's a nice phrase, but meaningless."

"People have been brutally murdered because you let that man-"

"People will always and forever be brutally murdered. His s.h.i.t buried millions. Stalin, tory is full of brutal murder. Hitler murdered many millions more. Mao Tse-tung, more millions than anyone. They're all considered monsters now, but they had their admirers in their time, didn't they? And there're people even now who'll tell you Hitler and Stalin only did what they had i to do, that Mao was just keeping the public order, disposing of ruffians. So many people admire those murderers who are bold about it and who cloak their bloodl.u.s.t in n.o.ble causes like brotherhood and political reform and justice-and social responsibility. We're all meat, just meat, and in our hearts we know it, so we secretly applaud the men bold enough to treat us as what we are. Meat." By now she knew that he was a sociopath, with no conscience, no capacity for love, and no ability to empathize with other people. Not all of them were street hoodiumr even high-cla.s.s, high-tech thieves like Tom Rasmussen, who had tried to kill Bobby last week. Some got to be doctorsr lawyers, TV ministers, politicians. None of them could be reasoned with, for they had no normal human feelings.

He said, "Why should I tell anyone about Candy Pollard?

I'm safe from him because his mother always called me G.o.d's instrument, told her wretched sp.a.w.n I was to be respected. It's none of my business. He's covered his mother's murder to avoid having the police tramping through the house, told people she moved to a nice oceanside condo near San Diego. I don't think anybody believes that crazy b.i.t.c.h would suddenly lighten up and become a beach bunny, but n.o.body questio it because n.o.body wants to get involved. Everybody feels it' none of their business. Same with me. Whatever outrage Candy adds to the world's pain are negligible. At least, give his peculiar psychology and physiology, his outrages will be more imaginative than most.

"Besides, when Candy was about eight, Roselle came to thank me for bringing her four into the world, and for keepin my own counsel, so that Satan was unaware of their blessed presence on earth. That's exactly how she put it! And as token of her appreciation, she gave me a suitcase full of mone enough to make early retirement possible. I couldn't figur where she'd gotten it. The money that Deeter and Elizabeth piled up in the thirties had long ago dwindled away. So she to explain that she'd never want for cash. That was the firs told me a little bit about Candy's ability, not much, but enough time I realized there was a genetic boon tied to the genetic did saster." Fogarty raised his gla.s.s of bourbon in a toast that they did not return. "To G.o.d's mysterious ways." LIKE THE ARCHANGEL come to declare the end of the worl in the Book of the Apocalypse, Candy arrived just as the heavens sundered and the rain began to fall in earnest, althoug this was not black rain as would be the deluge of Armageddon nor was it a storm of fire. Not yet. Not yet.

He materialized in the darkness between two widely s.p.a.ce street lamps, almost a block from the doctor's house, to be sur that the soft trumpets that unfailingly announced his arrive would not be audible to anyone in Fogarty's library. As he walked toward the house through the hammering rain, he believed that his power, provided by G.o.d, had now grown s enormous that nothing could prevent him from takingachieving anything he desired.

"IN SIXTY-SIX, the twins were born, and physically they were as normal as Frank," Fogarty said as rain suddenly splattered noisily against the window.

"No fun in that. I couldn't believe it, really. Three out of four of the kids, perfectly healthy. I'd been expecting all sorts of cute twists-harelips at the- very least, misshapen skulls, cleft faces, withered limbs, or extra heads!" Bobby took Julie's hand. He needed the contact.

He wanted to get out of there. He felt burnt out. Hadn't they heard enough?

But that was the problem: he didn't know what was left to hear, or how much of it might be crucial to finding a way of dealing with the Pollards.

"Of course, when Roselle brought me that suitcase full of money, I began to learn that the children were all freaks, mentally if not physically.

And seven years ago, when Frank killed her, he came to me, as if I owed him something-understanding, shelter. He told me more about them than I wanted to know, too much. For the next two years, he'd periodically return here, just appear like a ghost that wanted to haunt me instead of a place. But he finally understood there was nothing for him here, and for five years he stayed out of my life. Until today, tonight." In his wingback chair, Frank moved. He shifted his body and tipped his head from the right to the left. Otherwise, he was no more alert than he had been since they had entered the room. The old man had said that Frank had come around a few times and had been talkative, but it couldn't be proved by his behavior during the past hour or so.

Julie, who was the closest to Frank, frowned and leaned toward him, peering at the right side of his head.

"Oh, my G.o.d." She spoke those three words in a bleak tone of voice that was as effective a refrigerant as anything used in an air conditioner.

With a chill skittering up his spine, Bobby slid along the sofa, crowding her against the other end, and looked past her at the side of Frank's head. Wished he had not. Tried to look away. Couldn't.

When Frank's head had been tilted to his right, almost lying against his shoulder, they had not been able to see that temple.

After leaving Bobby at the office, still out of control, travelin against his will, Frank evidently had returned to one of those craters where the engineered insects s.h.i.t out their diamond His flesh was lumpy all the way along his temple to his ja and in some places the rough gemstones that were the caus of the lumpiness poked through, gleaming, intimately melded with his tissue. For whatever reason, he had scooped up handful to bring with him, but when reconst.i.tuting himself he had made a mistake.

Bobby wondered what treasures might be buried in the so gray matter within Frank's skull.

"I saw that too," Fogarty said.

"And look at the palm his right hand." Although Julie protested, Bobby pinched the sleeve Frank's jacket and pulled until he twisted the man's arm of the chair and revealed his palm. He had found the partial roac that had once been welded into his own shoe. At least it a peared to be the same one. It was sprouting from the meat part of Frank's hand, carapace gleaming, dead eyes staring u toward Frank's index finger.

CANDY CIRCLED the house in the rain, pa.s.sing a black cat sitting on a windowsill. It turned its head to glance at him, then put it face to the windowpane again.

At the rear of the house, he stepped quietly onto the porch and tried the back door. It was locked.

Vague blue light pulsed from his hand as he gripped the k.n.o.b. The lock slipped, the door opened, and he stepped insid JULIE HAD heard and seen enough, too much.

Eager to get away from Frank, she rose from the sofa an walked to the desk, where she considered her unfinished bourbon. But that was no answer. She was dreadfully tired, stru gling to repress her grief for Thomas, striving even hardermake some sense out of the grotesque family history that F garty had revealed to them. She did not need the complicatio of any more bourbon, appealing as it might look there in the gla.s.s.

She said to the old man, "So what hope do we have of dealing with Candy?"

"None."

"There must be a way."

"No."

"There must be."

"Why?" "Because he can't be allowed to win." Fogarty smiled.

"Why not?"

"Because he's the bad guy, dammit! And we're the good guys. Not perfect, maybe, not without flaws, but we're the good guys, all right.

And that's why we have to win, because if we don't, then the whole game is meaningless." Fogarty leaned back in his chair.

"My point exactly. It is all meaningless. We're not good, and we're not bad, we're just meat. We don't have souls, there's no hope of transcendence for a slab of meat, you wouldn't expect a hamburger to go to Heaven after someone ate it." She had never hated anyone as much as she hated Fogarty at that moment, partly because he was so smug and hateful, but partly because she recognized, in his arguments, something perilously close to the things she had said to Bobby in the motel, after she had learned about Thomas's death. She had said there was no point in having dreams, that they never came true, that death was always there watching even if you were lucky enough to grasp your personal bra.s.s ring. And loathing life, just because it led sooner or later to death ... well, that was the same as saying people were nothing but meat.

"We have just pleasure and pain," the old physician said "so it doesn't matter who's right or who's wrong, who wins or loses."

"What's his weakness?" she demanded angrily.

"None I can see." Fogarty seemed pleased by the hopelessness of their position. If he had been practicing medicine in the early 1940s, he had to be nearing eighty, though he looked younger. He was acutely aware of how little time remained to him, and was no doubt resentful of anyone younger; and given his cold perspective on life, their deaths at Candy Pollard's hands would entertain him.

"No weaknesses at all." Bobby disagreed, or tried to.

"Some might say that his weakness is his mind, his screwed-up psychology." Fogarty shook his head.

"And I'd argue that he's mad strength of his screwed-up psychology. He's used this business about being the instrument of G.o.d's vengeance to armor him self very effectively from depression and self-doubt and a thing else that might trip him up." In the wingback chair, Frank abruptly sat up straight shook himself as if to cast off his mental confusion thea dog might shake water from its sodden coat after coming from the rain. He said, "Where... Why do I... Is it is it... is it... ?",Is it what, Frank?"

Bobby asked.

"Is it happening?" Frank said. His eyes seemed slowly be clearing.

"Is it finally happening?",is what finally happening, Frank?" His voice was hoa.r.s.e.

"Death. Is it finally happening? Is i CANDY HAD crept quietly through the house, into the hallway that led to the library. As he moved toward the open door the left, he heard voices. When he recognized one of them Frank's, he could barely contain himself.

According to Violet, Frank was crippled. His control of telekinetic talent had always been erratic, which is why Can had enjoyed some hope of one day catching him and finishing him before he could travel to a place of safety. Perhaps the moment of triumph had arrived.

When he reached the door, he found himself looking at the woman's back.

He could not see her face, but he was sure it would be the same one that had been suffused in a beautiful glow in Thomas's mind.

Beyond her he glimpsed Frank, and saw Frank's eyes widen at the sight of him. If the mother-killer had been too confused to teleport out of Candy's reach, as Violet had claimed, he was now casting off that confusion. He looked if he might pop out of there long before Candy could lay a had on him.

Candy had intended to throw the library into a turmoil sending a wave of energy through the doorway ahead of him setting the books on fire and shattering the lamps, with the purpose of panicking and distracting the Dakotas and Doc Fogarty, giving him a chance to go straight for Frank.

But now he was forced to change his plans by the sight of his brother trembling on the edge of dematerialization.

He entered the room in a rush and seized the woman from behind, curling his right arm around her neck and jerking her head back, so she-and the two men-would understand at once that he could snap her neck in an instant, whenever he chose. Even so, she slashed backward with one foot, sc.r.a.ping the heel of her shoe down his shin, stomping on his foot, all of which hurt like h.e.l.l; it was some martial-art move, and he could tell by the way she tried to counterbalance his grip and stance that she had a lot of training in such things. So he jerked her head back again, even harder, and flexed his biceps, which pinched her windpipe, hurting her enough to make her realize that resistance was suicidal.

Fogarty watched from his chair, alarmed but not sufficiently to rise to his feet, and the hush and came off the sofa with a gun in his hand, Mr.

Quick-Draw Artist, but Candy was not concerned about either of them. His attention was on Frank, who had risen from his chair and appeared about to blink out of there, off to Punaluu and Kyoto and a score of other places.

"Don't do it, Frank!" he said sharply.

"Don't run away. It's time we settled, time you paid for what you did to our mother. You come to the house, accept G.o.d's punishment, and end it now, tonight. I'm going there with this b.i.t.c.h. She tried to help you, I guess, so maybe you won't want to see her suffer." The hush and was going to do something crazy; seeing Julie in Candy's grip had clearly unhinged him. He was searching for a shot, a way to get Candy without getting her, and he might even risk firing at Candy's head, though Candy was half crouching behind the woman. Time to get out of there.

"Come to the house," he told Frank.