For the first time since Walt's known him, Julian is grinning."Hey," Julian says as he slides into the booth.

"What the h.e.l.l is wrong with you?" Walt asks.

"What?" Julian says, confused. He's forgotten to comb his hair and now he runs a hand through it.

"You're smiling," Walt says.

"No. I'm not," Julian says, stricken.

"All right," Walt Hannen says to soothe him. He calls for two more coffees and takes out a pack of Camel Lights. "I'm quitting tomorrow,"

he tells Julian as he offers him a cigarette.

"I won't hold my breath," Julian says. He's looking straight at Walt, but it's Lucy he's thinking about, and he knows he has to stop. He can shut down a whole section of his mind if he wants to.

He'd have to be out of his head to jeopardize everything just for a woman he's taken to bed.

"You know these missing kids?" he asks Walt.

"Unfortunately," Walt says.

"I want you to ease up on the case over the next couple of days,"

Julian says after the waitress brings over their coffees.

Walt Hannen holds one hand to his ear. "Excuse me?" he says. "Pardon me?"

"You can keep looking for the killer and all that," Julian says, since he's gone way beyond his better judgment and straight on into stupidity.

"Well, thanks," Walt Hannen drawls. "I'll do that."

"Just hold off looking for the kids." Julian turns and looks for the waitress; this coffee needs milk and sugar and a detonator.

"Are you telling me you found them?" Walt says.

"I didn't say that." Julian takes a sip of his coffee, then shoves the cup away. "Can you drink this stuff?"

"Jesus Christ, Julian," Walt says. "What exactly are you telling me?"

"I just need a couple of days."

"Yeah?" Walt says. He puts his elbows on the Formica tabletop and leans forward. "And what are you going to give me in return for this favor?"

"What do you want?" Julian asks.

This is the most consecutive talk Walt Hannen has heard out of Julian's mouth in the ten years they've worked together, and it'sdisconcerting.

"I want you to tell me who you f.u.c.ked last night." Walt grins and reaches for another cigarette, but when he looks up he sees Julian has leaned back and he has a closed-down look, like an electrical wire that's been crossed. "That was a joke," Walt says. "Or at least I thought it was."

Walt can't help but wonder if his wife, Rose, is right. Maybe he is a little bit psychic. He knew her brother would lose all his money up in Atlantic City, and he guessed Disney was going to buy a piece of Florida long before he ever took over Orlando, and now it looks like he's right about Julian, too. He's not a gossip and he'll keep his mouth shut, but boy, he'd like to talk this one over with Rose and see who on earth she could figure as a match for Julian. In the past two days, Walt has had to speak at two town meetings; he's had to bite his tongue each time someone mentions the series on local crime Paul Salley is writing in the Sun Herald. If they could produce the children and have their photos on the front page of the Herald, some of the heat on Walt would die down in spite of the murder. If anyone else in town gets hurt, never mind murdered, it will mean Walt's job, not to mention his pension. That's why he won't dare discuss any of this with Rose. She would hit the ceiling if he did, and she'd have a perfect right, since Walt has already decided he's going to trust Julian's instincts.

Twenty years ago this May, Walt Hannen was just starting out; he'd been injured and decorated in the service and had recently married Rose.

He'd been on the Verity police force for three weeks when the call came through from the dispatcher. He was the only officer on duty, and he felt like the only individual on the planet as he got into his new patrol car and drove through the thick, wet night, his tires sliding over turtle sh.e.l.ls. He followed the white line in the road, too inexperienced to have remembered to switch on his siren, his adrenaline racing. All the windows in the car were open and the air moved through in dense waves and he didn't take his foot off the gas until he found the skid marks leading to the gumbo-limbo tree.

Walt jumped out of his car, and while he ran to the scene his ears were ringing. He groped around in the black air, blinded by the Oldsmobile's headlights. The car was all crumpled up on itself, and Walt circled it until he found Julian, down on the ground, cradling his cousin's head.

"It's okay," Walt said.

He knew he sounded panicky, but he couldn't help it.

"I'm calling for an ambulance right now. Do you hear me?" he asked, because it was much too silent. He got down on one knee and reached out to pat Julian's shoulder. Julian turned on him then, as if he'd kill him if Walt even attempted to touch his cousin.

"Let me try for a pulse," Walt Hannen said.

Julian threw back his head and howled, and his cry cut right through Walt Hannen, it cut through the night and brought tears to Walt's eyes before he had time to blink. Walt knew the sound of a soul torn intwo, just as he knew there was no pulse before he grasped the dead boy's wrist. He sat there on the damp ground, helpless, beneath the tree that was as red as a man's blood, listening to Julian weep.

Seeing a man like that makes you owe him something; you know him the way no one else does, whether you want to or not.

So they shake on their agreement, in the last booth at Chuck and Karl's. They don't discuss it any further now, nor will they ever.

They don't mention what the board of selectmen might say if they knew about the bargain that had just been made between two public officials.

They argue over the check, just enough to be polite, and nod their good-byes easily, as if they hadn't both done something that could get them fired.

Julian immediately goes to the pay phone in the parking lot to call Lucy. So he wants her, that's not a crime. It doesn't necessarily mean he's crazy.

What's crazy is the way he feels when she doesn't answer her phone.

It's a churned-up feeling and it won't go away; it just gets worse each time he calls her and finds no one at home. All that afternoon he searches out telephone booths, and by evening he has her phone number memorized. If she were anyone else, he'd go knock on her front door, but he can't quite face her. He tries not to think about her when he gets home, although it's because of her that he can't sleep in his own bed and instead spends the night in an easy chair. In the morning he tries to call before he's had his coffee; he can't eat and he can't keep his mind on anything, and if that's not crazy he doesn't know what is.

He wastes the whole day, driving through town, stopping at phone booths, cursing himself for being a fool. He parks at Drowned Man Beach for over an hour, trying to make sense out of the things he's done in the past few days. But the fact is, he can't; there's no sense to it. Finally, at around suppertime, he drives over to Long Boat Street. He's relieved when he sees her parked car, but when he goes up to the seventh floor, no one answers the door. He stands there, considering, then takes his MasterCard from his wallet and jimmies open the door. She needs a better lock, that much is certain.

He moves quickly through the apartment. Nothing seems out of place, but in her bedroom a dresser drawer is open, and it's only half full.

Julian reaches into the drawer and takes out a white silk slip, and that's when he knows she's already gone. When the telephone rings he goes to the night table, picks up the receiver, and holds it to his ear.

"Lucy, honey?" a woman's voice says.

It's Kitty Ba.s.s, so Julian has no choice but to hang up on her. She'd recognize his voice instantly; she disliked him enough to still remember.

Julian takes the phone off the hook and rests it on the night table,and that's when he sees the white envelope. He studies it, then pulls out the invitation to Lucy's high school reunion. He searches the night-table drawer until he finds Lucy's most recent child-support check, not I yet cashed, then jots down her ex-husband's address on a piece of notepaper. On the way out, he notices Lucy's car keys on the coffee table, and he slips them into his pocket. He's never been on a plane, and he doesn't intend to start flying now; he certainly can't be inconspicuous if he's driving a Florida police cruiser up north. When he goes down to the parking lot, Diane Frankel spots him just as he's unlocking Lucy's Mustang. She watches him, suspicious, one arm thrown protectively around her sulky teenage daughter.

"Radiator," Julian tells her. "Mrs. Rosen's having us check out the cooling system."

He can see this neighbor of Lucy's loosen her grip on her daughter, but she keeps an eye on him as he starts the car and pulls out onto Long Boat Street. There have been so many police cars here recently, no one will make much of his cruiser parked at the far end of the lot. All the way out to the marshes, he's thinking shoulder bone, collarbone, all those pieces that can be so easily broken if you're not careful.

Driving down a road he has taken a thousand times before, he is convinced that Lucy is headed for nothing but trouble. He plans to give the boy one more chance to talk.

It's almost seven when he gets out to Miss Giles's. He honks the horn twice and reaches for a cigarette. When Keith comes out and sees his mother's car, he stops right outside the back door.

"Your mom 5 got a nice car," Julian calls through his open window. "If only the air conditioner worked."

Julian remembers how he was tormented by his dreams during the summer when he was twelve.

He'd wake suddenly, frightened, uncertain as to what was real and what wasn't. On some nights, a stone would be thrown at his window, and he'd scramble from his bed and peer outside, in a fog of sleep and terror, to see Bobby Cash, there behind the willows, grinning, motioning for him to sneak outside. That was the summer when Julian stuck his head into Miss Giles's old cookstove. It was the same oven in which she had warmed him when he was just a few hours old in order to bring him back to life. The old stove burned wood, which meant they ate mostly salads and boiled frankfurters, but Julian must have believed that all ovens used gas. After twenty minutes with his head inside the oven, his cheeks were sooty and his hair smelled like toast, but he had accomplished nothing. He pulled his head out, then had a piece of peach pie and went off to collect toads.

The boy is looking at the Mustang expectantly, and it takes Julian a second before he realizes that he isn't looking for his mother; he's checking out the backseat for Arrow.

Julian gets out and walks to the porch. "I don't have the big guy with me, if that's who you're looking for."

The boy has hooded eyes; quickly he looks away, as if he didn't give a d.a.m.n. He's wearing clean blue jeans and a black T-shirt washed so many times it appears gray. If Julian Cash isn't mistaken, he wore theseclothes when he lived here.

"I don't want you to get the wrong idea about the dog," Julian says.

He studies the boy's face, looking for any resemblance to Lucy and finding none. "He's not a pet. He'll bite you as soon as look at you."

The boy shakes his head. How much more of this does he have to listen to?

Julian takes out a cigarette and points right at the boy. "I've got your number," he says.

The boy blows air through his lips. Yeah. Right.

Julian holds the cigarette out, and when the boy doesn't take it, he places it on the porch steps, along with a pack of matches.

"I used to spend hours out here." Julian sits down on the last step.

He can see that one of those G.o.dd.a.m.ned May turtles is crawling under his left rear tire. "I used to think about maiming people and spitting right in their faces and whatever the h.e.l.l else it is you think about when you're twelve."

The boy's muscles tense, all at once. If he wanted to, if he didn't have to worry about the baby, he could take off right now. He's younger, he's faster, he might just pull it off.

"Take the G.o.dd.a.m.ned cigarette, will you?"

Julian says.

The boy looks him over, then reaches for the cigarette. He's so high-strung he's like a piece of wire.

"Your mother and I made a deal last night," Julian says. The boy has lit his cigarette and inhaled, but as soon as Julian mentions his mother, he coughs. "I'm giving her a couple of days before I turn you over. Mostly because I'm an idiot."

Julian moves sideways on the step so he can get a good look, but there's still no reaction. The boy's eyes are all cloudy; you'd barely guess he was alive. "Just jump in here anytime," Julian says. "Feel free to put your two cents in." He smokes his own cigarette and grins.

"Oh, right," he says. "I forgot. Cat's got your tongue. I So I'll ask you some questions. You don't have to use actual words or anything. You can just nod."

The boy stares at him through a curtain of smoke.

"Did you find the baby in the apartment?"

Nothing.

"In the laundry room?"The boy's eyelids flicker, so Julian knows he's scored.

"You found her in the laundry room after you'd stolen the rings, and then you took off like a guilty b.a.s.t.a.r.d. You should have just left her there. You know that, don't you?"

The boy's breathing shifts slightly; he knows that was his biggest mistake.

"Burying those rings in the shoe box was pretty stupid, too." Julian shakes his head. "You should have just thrown them in the bushes.

They never would have turned up."

The boy's growing more and more fidgety.

He reminds Julian of the ferret he and Bobby once found in a hunter's trap. The d.a.m.n thing wouldn't let Bobby get near enough to save him.

He bit Bobby on the forearm and he would have fought to the death if Julian hadn't hit him with his boot to stun him. Even then, he bit Bobby one more time, on the thumb, deep enough to draw blood, before they could get him out of the trap.

Inside the kitchen, Miss Giles taps on the window and motions to Julian.

"You stay right here," Julian says to the boy.

"Don't f.u.c.king move."

As Julian walks inside he pa.s.ses the pantry, where Miss Giles keeps a shotgun, behind the Hoover and the mops. Her father used to shoot at racc.o.o.ns that came to steal pickies and b.u.t.ter from their larder. He taught Miss Giles how to shoot. She's always kept the bullets hidden, but for years Julian has known they're inside a tin on top of the flour canister.

Julian goes to the refrigerator and gets himself some lemonade. He used to do this every day; back then it was the only thing that could quench his thirst.

"The baby's asleep," Lillian Giles says. "You know, that boy is the first one I've ever had who won't say a word. Not even Pa.s.s the ketchup."' "I don't want anyone to find these kids for the next couple of days," Julian says. "Just in case somebody comes looking for them."

"I can take care of these children," Miss Giles says. "Don't worry about that."

Julian puts his empty gla.s.s in the sink, as he's been taught. "I'm not worried," he insists, although he's never really thought about how far she is from her nearest neighbor or a hospital.

Julian can see the porch from the window above the sink; the boy hasn't moved, not an inch. He still doesn't move when Julian comes outside, not even when the screen door slams shut. His shoulders are so rigid it's painful to see; the sneakers Miss Giles has given him to replace his own are a full size too big. Somehow, Julian has become more of asucker than he ever would have thought possible.

"Come on," he tells the boy.

The boy looks at him, but doesn't budge.

"I know I told you not to move, but I changed my mind. Move."

The boy rises and grudgingly follows Julian to the car.

"I don't want to hear that you're giving Miss Giles any trouble,"

Julian tells him as they get inside. "Put your seat belt on."

The boy curls his lip, but he buckles up.

"You know, I've never been out of Florida," Julian says as he heads down the driveway. "You watch what I'm doing now," he adds as he turns onto the road. "Make a right out of the driveway and go half a mile."