"So what do you know about him? Has he talked about himself at all?"

"He doesn't volunteer much," Megan responded. "But he answers direct questions. You may know some of his background."

In fact, Covenant had told Linden a little about Joan's past; but she did not interrupt Megan to say so. When Joan had divorced Covenant, she had moved back to her hometown to live with her parents. For several years, apparently, she had striven to relieve her shame with conventional forms of exoneration: counseling, psychotherapy. When that approach had left her pain untouched, however, she had turned to religion: religion in more and more extreme forms.

"According to him:' Megan began, "he doesn't remember much of his early life. But I got him to tell me a bit about that commune she joined. I guess that was about a year before she came back here.

"He says the commune called itself the Community of Retribution. Reading between the lines, they sure sound like a bloody-minded group. They didn't believe in salvation for people who acknowledged their sins and accepted God's grace. They thought the world was too far gone for that, too corrupt-" Megan muttered a curse under her breath. "It needed violence, bloodshed, sacrifices. Ritual murder to destroy sin.

"Anyway, that's how I interpret what he told me.

According to him, they spent most of their time praying for revelation. They wanted God to tell them who had to be sacrificed. And how."

In protest, Megan demanded, "Where do people like that come from, Linden?" Thinking about Lord Foul, Linden replied, "From despair. They're broken by their own hollowness. It makes them implode."

Roger and Joan had studied fanaticism in the same places, from the same sources. But his was of another kind altogether.

"I suppose you're right," Megan conceded. "I don't really understand it.

"The way he tells it," she went on, "he didn't understand it, either. It didn't touch him. He was just along for the ride. What was he? Shit, nine years old?" She swore again, softly.

"Then-?" Linden prompted.

Her voice heavy, Megan said, "After the better part of a year watching hysterics work themselves into a lather, Joan took Roger back to her parents and left him there. I guess she'd had her revelation. He never saw her again. And I got the impression that his grandparents never talked about her. He knew she was still alive. That's all.

"I asked him if he had trouble adjusting to a normal life after all that. You knowmiddle school, ordinary teachers and classmates, clothes, homework, girls.

Hell, he'd just spent a year helping the Community of Retribution pick its victims. But he said it was easy."

Sourly Megan concluded, "He said-this is a direct quote-'I was just passing the time."'

"Until what?" asked Linden.

"That's what I wanted to know. If you believe what he says about himself, the only thing he's actually done since Joan abandoned him is wait for his twenty-first birthday. So he could inherit his father's estate. That's it.

"Why it matters to him, I have no idea." Megan's tone conveyed her bafflement. "Or what he wants to do with it. He has nothing to say on the subject. He doesn't seem to understand the question."

Linden probed at her sore lip with the tip of one finger. It was no accident that she had become Joan's keeper, caretaker. With every nerve of her body and beat of her heart, she knew how Joan felt. She, too, had been paralyzed by evil; left effectively comatose by the knowledge of her own frailty. Like Joan, she knew what it meant to have her mind erased But somehow Roger had made his mother look at him.

Still groping for comprehension, Linden said, "I assume he graduated high school. What's he been doing since then?"

"Shit, Linden," Megan growled. "It's easier to get him to talk about the commune. But I pushed him pretty hard. He says he took some classes at the local community college. Pre-med, apparently. Biology, anatomy, chemistry, things like that.

"And," she added in disgust, "he worked in a butcher shop. Thomas Covenant was one of the most remarkable men I've ever known, not to mention a hell of a writer, and his son worked in a butcher shop.

'Just passing the time' until he could live off his father's accomplishments.

"You make sense out of it," she finished. "I can't."

He wanted to take his mother's place. And his father's.

"That isn't much help," Linden said distantly.

"I know," Megan sighed. "But it's all I've got."

As steadily as she could, Linden replied, "If you can believe it, he says he's been waiting all this time for Covenant's estate so that he'll have money and a place to live while he takes care of Joan. He's obsessed with the idea. It may be the only thing he thinks about. He believes he can reach her."

Abruptly she leaned forward against the edge of her desk. "Megan, he has to be stopped." An urgency which she could not control crept into her voice. "I'm absolutely sure about that. There's something about him that scares me. I think he's dangerous. With his background-" She shuddered. "We all know perfectly decent people who've been through worse. But this place:' Berenford Memorial, "has plenty of patients who haven't been through as much. What only bends one person breaks another. And I think he's broken."

Unwilling to say more, she repeated inadequately, "He has to be stopped."

At once, Megan's manner became crisper, more businesslike. "You say dangerous. Can you give me anything more concrete than that? Anything I can take to a judge? I can't get a restraining order unless I have something solid to go on."

In response Linden wanted to shout, Tell the judge people are going to die! But she controlled herself. "I don't suppose you could just ask him to trust my instincts?"

"Actually, I could," Megan answered. "In this county, anyway. You have a fair amount of credibility." Then she reconsidered. "But even a judge who thinks you hung the moon will want some kind of evidence. He might give us a restraining order for a few days on your say-so, but that's all. If we don't offer him real evidence before it expires, we'll never get another one."

0.

Linden sighed to herself. "I understand."

Again she considered dropping the problem, washing her hands of it. She could leave work right this minute, if she chose. No one would question her. God knew she was entitled to a little time off every once in a while.

And Joan's claim on her did not run as deep as Jeremiah's.

He was her adopted son: he filled her heart. Nothing could replace him, Indeed, his irreducible need for her only made him more essential to her. Simply remembering the way his hair smelled after she washed it for him could bring tears to her eyes.

Anything that threatened her endangered him profoundly. Any attack on her would find him in the line of fire: at risk because she loved him, and he was dependent on her.

He had already been damaged enough.

But she also belonged here. All of her patients had already been damaged enough.

And Joan did not deserve what Roger intended for her.

Quietly Linden asked Megan, "Can you think of anything else?"

Megan hesitated. "Well," she said uncertainly, "you could call Lytton-"

Linden had already thought of that. "He's next on my list." Barton Lytton had been county sheriff for nearly three decades. If anyone had the knowledge and experience to stop Roger Covenant, surely he did?

"Be careful with him, Linden," Megan cautioned. "He isn't what we might call a fan of yours. As far as he's concerned, Berenford Memorial is just a liberal ruse to keep crooks out of jail. From his point of view, that practically makes you an accessory."

"I know." Linden was familiar with Lytton's attitude.

However, she hoped that he might feel otherwise about Joan. How could he not? Beyond question he had played a part in her condition. For the sake of his self- regard, if for no other reason, he might be willing to protect her now.

"Call me after you talk to him." Megan's voice held an undercurrent of anxiety. "I want to know what he says."

"I will." Now Linden was in a hurry to get off the phone. Her urgency had shifted its focus. She needed to get in touch with Sandy.

She was about to thank Megan and hang up when a new concern occurred to her: a possibility like a touch of foresight. Quickly she added, "Call my pager if you need to reach me."

Roger might call Megan, trying to enlist her aid"I will," replied Megan. "I always do."

Finally they hung up.

Staring blindly around her office, Linden looked for some way to contain her primitive alarm. She had made it clear to Roger that he could only obtain his father's ring by theft or violence. He did not know that Jeremiah existed. Nevertheless she under stood obsession well enough to be sure that her own claim on the ring meant nothing to Roger.

Inadvertently she had placed her son in peril.

A butcher shop-?

Instead of calling Sheriff Lytton, she dialed her home number. Helpless to do oth erwise, she counted the rings while she waited for Sandy Eastwall to pick up the phone. Sandy answered after the third. "This is Sandy." Brusque with concern, Linden asked, "Is Jeremiah all right?"

"Sure he is." Sandy sounded worried, troubled by Linden's manner. "Why wouldn't he be?"

Linden could not explain. "Has anything happened this morning? Anything out of the ordinary? Phone calls? Someone at the door?"

"Nothing important;" Sandy replied defensively.

"Sam called. He wants to know if Jeremiah can come Tuesday instead of Monday next week. I was going to give you the message when you got home."

Linden wished to soothe Sandy, but other considerations impelled her. "And Jeremiah?" she insisted.

"Sure," said Sandy again. "He's fine. Why wouldn't he be? I've done everything-"

"I'm sorry," Linden put in hastily. "I didn't mean that. Of course you haven't done anything." In fact, Sandy's unquestioning regard for Jeremiah, like her cheerful attendance to his needs, was precious to Linden. "I trust you. I've just been worried about him this morning for some reason." Trying to account for herself in terms that would make sense to Sandy, she said, "You know those feelings you get sometimes?

Out of the blue, you suddenly think that something bad has happened to someone you care about?"

"And they're almost always wrong." Sandy's tone conveyed a mollified smile. "But that doesn't make you feel any better. I know what you mean.

"I'll be especially careful today;" she assured Linden.

"Just in case,"

For a moment, Linden hesitated on the verge of telling Sandy about Roger. She wanted Sandy to understand her fears. But Sandy was easily frightened; and Jeremiah would not be better off if she panicked.

"Thanks, Sandy," Linden said instead. "I appreciate it."

Abruptly she stopped, caught by the same anxiety which had urged her to insist that Megan page her.

Without transition, she asked, "Is there any chance you could be on call tonight? We have a situation here that might need me."

If Bill Coty's men caught Roger lurking around the hospital "Sure." The request was routine between them. Sandy often stayed with Jeremiah when Linden was needed at night. "I don't have any other plans."

Occasionally Sandy went out with Sam Diadem's son; but she always gave Linden plenty of warning when she would not be available.

Mustering gratitude to counteract her apprehension, Linden thanked Sandy again and put down the phone.

Thomas Covenant had watched over his ex-wife with all of his considerable strength and intransigence, but he had not been able to prevent her abduction. If Roger had designs on Covenant's ring, Linden hardly trusted herself to stop him. Sandy would pose no obstacle at all. And Jeremiah might be hurt in the struggle.

Grimly determined now to organize every possible resource, she put in a call to Sheriff Lytton.

Unfortunately Barton Lytton was "unavailable"

Linden was promised that he would call her back.

With that she had to be content.

For the rest of the morning, she struggled to concentrate. She wrote up her rounds; returned phone calls; read or reread a sheaf of advisory faxes on how to treat some of her patients; signed requisitions for medications and supplies. Studiously she did not look out at her car.

When the pressure to do something, anything, about her gravid fears became too severe to be pushed aside, she went to check on Joan. But she found no relief there.

Over lunch, she pumped Maxine shamelessly for gossip, hoping that some rumor of Roger's actions or intentions had plucked a thread in Maxine's vast web of friends. Uncharacteristically, however, Maxine knew less than she did herself. In a town as small as this one, it was difficult for anyone to visit a lawyer-or wander onto a longabandoned property-without being noticed; remarked upon. Yet somehow Roger Covenant had escaped comment.

Afterward Linden tackled more of her procedural duties. But she cancelled her sessions with her patients, as well as her remaining appointments. The thought that Sheriff Lytton might ignore her vexed her too much for such responsibilities.

To her surprise and relief, however, he did call her back. As soon as she picked up the handset, he said, "Dr. Avery?" He spoke in a good-of-boy drawl, perhaps for her benefit. "You wanted to talk to me?"

"Thanks for returning my call, Sheriff." Now that she had her chance, Linden felt flustered, unsure of herself. He was decidedly not a "fan" of hers.

Somehow she would have to persuade him to take her seriously.

"We have a situation here that worries me," she began unsteadily. "I hope you'll be willing to help me with it." Taking a deep breath, she said, "I believe you've spoken to Roger Covenant?"

"Sure have;" he replied without hesitation. "He came to see me yesterday. Pleasant young man. Son of that writer, the leper who lived on Haven Farm." He stressed the word leper trenchantly.

"He came to see you?" Her voice broke. She had assumed that Roger had phoned Lytton. Had he known that she would call the sheriff? That he would need to forestall her?

"Sure. He's new in town," Lytton explained, "but he's going to be here from now on. He says he'll be living on Haven Farm. Seems he inherited the place. It's been abandoned so long, he didn't want me to think he's some vagrant squatting where he doesn't belong.

"Like I say, he's a pleasant guy."

Pleasant, Linden thought. And plausible when it suited him, that was obvious. No doubt to Lytton his explanation sounded perfectly reasonable.

Her sense of peril mounted, carried by the hard labor of her heart.

But she did not quail. Medicine had trained her for emergencies. And she was Linden Avery the Chosen, who had stood with Thomas Covenant against the Land's doom. Men like Sheriff Lytton-and Roger Covenant-could not intimidate her.

As if she were merely making conversation, she asked, "What did you tell him?"

Lytton laughed harshly. "I told him to burn it to the ground, Doctor. That leprosy shit isn't something he should mess around with. His mother did him a favor when she moved out of that house."

A flash of anger pushed away Linden's fear; but she kept her ire to herself. Calm now, settled and cold in her determination, she continued, "Did he happen to say why he wants to live there? Did he explain why he came back?"

"No, he didn't. And I didn't ask. If he wants to live in the house where he was born, it's none of my business.