Elmore swallowed. He was not a brave man. ''We gotta do something.''

''I'm gonna walk down the driveway,'' Sandy said. ''I'll figure something out.''

SANDY PUT ON HER PARKA AND PACS, AND HER GLOVES, and stepped outside. The night was brutally cold and slapped at her skin like nettles; the wind was enough to snatch herbreath away. She crunched down the frozen snow in the thin blue illumination of the yard light, thinking about it, worrying it. If she could only keep things under control. If only Dick would disappear. If only Elmore would hold on…

Elmore.

Sandy had never really loved Elmore, though she'd once been very fond of him; and still felt the fondness at times. But more often, she suffered with the fact that Elmore clearly loved her, and she could hardly bear to be around him.

Sandy had grown up with horses, though she'd never owned one until she was on her own. Her father, a country mailman, had always wanted to ride the range-and so they rode out of the county stables on weekends, almost every weekend from the time she was three until she was eighteen, three seasons of the year. Candy hadn't cared for it, and quit when she was in junior high; Sandy had never quit.

Never would. She loved horses more than her father loved riding them. Walking down the drive, she could smell the sweet odor of the barn, manure and straw, though it was more than a quarter-mile away… She could never leave that; never risk it.

She'd gone to high school with Elmore, but never dated him. After graduation, she'd left for Eau Claire to study nursing, and two years later, came back to

Turtle Lake, took a job with a local nursing home and started saving for the horse farm. When her parents died in a car accident-killed by a drunk-her half of the money had bought four hundred acres east of town.

Elmore had been working as a security guard in the Cities, and started hanging around. Sandy, lonely, had let him hang around. Made the mistake of letting him work around the ranch: he wasn't the brightest man, or the hardest worker, but she needed all the help she could get, working nights at thenursing home, days at the ranch. Made the mistake of sleeping with him, the second man she'd slept with.

Then Elmore had fallen off a stairwell and wrenched his back: the payoff, twenty-two thousand dollars, would buy some stock and a used Ford tractor. And there wasn't anybody else around. And she was fond of the man.

Sandy often walked down the drive when life got a little too unhappy, when

Elmore got to be too much of a burden. The ranch, she'd thought, was the only thing she wanted in life, and she'd do anything to get it. When she'd gotten it- and when the breeding business actually started to pay off- she found that she needed something else. Somebody else. Even if it was just somebody to talk to as an equal, who'd understand the business, feel the way she did about horses.

Elmore was an emotional trap she couldn't find a way out of. There was the man in Montana; he was married now, but she thought about him all the time. With somebody like that…

She brushed the thought away. That's not who she had.

She turned, circling, crunching through the snow: prison for life. And she got around to the north, and saw the first slinky unfolding of the northern lights, watched as they pumped up to a shimmering curtain above the everlasting evergreens, and decided that she might have to talk to someone about Dick

LaChaise.

''But not quite yet,'' she told Elmore when she was back inside. ''Just a couple of more days-we let it ride. Maybe they'll take off. Anyway, we gotta build a story. Then maybe we talk to old John.''

ANDY STADIC WENT INTO THE LAUNDROMAT AND SAT down. The place smelled of spilt

Tide and ERA and dirty wash water, and the hot lint smell of the dryers.

A woman glanced at him once, and again. He was justsitting there, a well-dressed white man, and had nothing to wash. She started to get nervous. He sat in one of the hard folding chairs and read a two-week-old copy of People. The woman finished folding her dry clothes, packed them in a pink plastic basket, and left. He was alone. He walked over to the door, turned the Open/Closed sign to

Closed, and locked the door.

Stadic watched the windows. A blond-haired hippie strolled by, a kid who might have been the southern boy who'd jumped Daymon Harp. A minute later, a hawk-faced white man walked up to the door, stuck his head inside.

''You Stadic?''

''Yeah.''

''Sit tight.''

Damn right. He'd told them he wouldn't go anyplace private. He'd told them Harp would be watching.

Another minute passed, and then a bearded man came around the corner, Pioneer seed-corn hat pulled low over his eyes. He walked like a farmer, heavy and loose, and had a farmer's haircut, ears sticking out, red with the cold, and a razor trim on the back of his neck. The farmer took his time getting inside.

Stadic recognized the eyes beneath the bill.

LaChaise.

''What the fuck do you think you're doing?'' Stadic said. He wanted to get on top of the guy immediately.

''Shut up,'' LaChaise said. His voice was a tough baritone, and his eyes fixed on Stadic's.

''You don't tell me to shut up.'' Stadic was on his feet, squared off.

LaChaise put his hand in his pocket, and the pocket moved. He had a gun.

''Go for your gun,'' LaChaise said.

''What?'' As soon as he said it, a temporizing word, uncertain, Stadic felt that he'd lost the edge.

''Gonna give me trouble, go for your gun, give me some real trouble. I already killed one cop, killing you won't be nothing.''

''Jesus Christ…''

LaChaise was on top, knew it, and his hand came off the gun. ''Where're the records?''

''You gotta be nuts, thinking I'd give you those things.''

''I am nuts,'' LaChaise said. His hand was back on the gun. ''You should know that. Now, where're the records?''

''I want to know what you're gonna do with them.''

''We're gonna scare the shit out of a lot of people,'' LaChaise said. ''We're gonna have them jumpin' through hoops like they was in a Russian circus. Now quit doggin' me around: either give them to me, or tell me you don't have them.

You don't have them, I'm gone.''

When they'd set up the meeting, by phone, LaChaise had said that if he didn't bring the papers, the next call would be to Internal Affairs.

Stadic let out a breath, shook his head. ''Scare the shit out of them? That's all?''

''That's all,'' LaChaise said. He was lying and Stadic knew it. And LaChaise knew that he knew, and didn't care. ''Gimme the goddamned papers.''

''Jesus, LaChaise, anything else…''

''I'm outa here,'' LaChaise said, turning toward the doors.

''Wait a minute, wait a minute…'' Stadic said, ''I'm gonna stick my hand in my coat.''

LaChaise's hand went back to his pistol and he nodded. Stadic took the papers out of his breast pocket and held them out at arm's length. LaChaise took them, didn't look, and backed away. ''Better be the real thing,'' he said, and he turned to go.

''Wait,'' Stadic said. ''I gotta know how to get in touch with you.''

''We'll get in touch with you,'' LaChaise said.

''Think about it,'' Stadic said, his voice tight, urgent. ''I want you outa here-or dead. I don't want you caught. Anything but that. If they figure out where you're at, and they're coming to get you… I oughta be able to call.''

''Got no phone,'' LaChaise said. ''We're trying to get one of them cellulars.''

''Call me, soon as you get one,'' Stadic said. He took an index card from his pocket, groped for a pen, found one, scribbled the number. ''I carry the phone all the time.''

''I'll think about it,'' LaChaise said, taking the card.

''Do it,'' Stadic said. ''Please.''

Then LaChaise was gone, out the door, pulling the hat down over his eyes, around the corner. Harp came through the back door two minutes later.