"This isn't about her or me," said Kurtz. "What do you want?"

O'Toole nodded at Trinh, who lowered the hammer, stepped back, and slid Kurtz's pistol into his belt The man had a stomach flatter than most fences.

"We need to meet, your masters and I," said the Major, speaking in a rapid, clear clip that must have been perfected in a thousand briefings. "This war has become too expensive for both sides."

Rigby glanced over at Kurtz as if seeking to find out if any of this made any sense to him. Kurtz's face revealed nothing.

"When?" said Kurtz.

"Tomorrow. Noon. Both Gonzaga and the Farino daughter must come. They can each bring one bodyguard, but everyone will be disarmed before the meeting."

"Where?"

"This town," said the old man, sweeping his powerful-looking right arm toward Neola visible in the valley to the northwest. With the sunlight gone, all color had faded from the trees and the steeples visible were more a dismal, chimney gray than a New England white. "It has to be in Neola. Sheriff Gerey here…" The Major nodded toward the sheriff who never changed his bassett-hound expression or blinked. "Sheriff Gerey will provide security for all of us and offer the meeting space. You still have that secure conference room in the back of the station, Sheriff?"

"Yeah."

"There you have it," said the Major. "Any questions?"

"You're letting both of us go back, right?" said Kurtz.

The Major looked at Colonel Vin Trinh, then at Rigby, then at Kurtz, and smiled. "Wrong, Mr. Kurtz. Detective King stays as our guest until after this conference."

"Why?"

"To insure that you do your absolute best at convincing your principals to be at the Neola sheriff's office at noon tomorrow, Mr. Kurtz."

"Or what?"

The old man's black eyebrows rose toward his steel-colored crewcut. "Or what? Colonel Trinh? Would you like to demonstrate the 'Or what? to Mr. Kurtz?"

Without blinking, Trinh pulled the.38 from his belt and shot Rigby in the upper leg. She fell heavily, arms still cuffed behind her, and struck her head on the flagstone. One of the Vietnamese bodyguards dropped to one knee, pulled his belt off, and rigged a makeshift tourniquet.

Kurtz had not moved and he did not move now. He made sure that his face showed no concern.

"Does that explain the 'Or what? Mr. Kurtz?" said the Major.

"It seems like more trouble for you than it's worth," Kurtz said calmly. "Kill me, nobody much notices. Kill her…" He nodded toward Rigby where she lay, face sweaty, eyes wider, but not speaking. "Kill her and you'll have the entire Buffalo Police Department on your ass."

"Oh, no, Mr. Kurtz," said the Major. "We're not going to kill Detective King if you fail in your mission by tomorrow noon. You're going to kill her. In Buffalo. Probably in that abandoned flophouse you call a home. A lover's quarrel, perhaps."

Kurtz looked at the.38 still in Trinh's hand. "No GSR with me," he said.

"Gun shot residue?" said the Major. "On your hands and clothing? There will be, Mr. Kurtz. There will be." The old man in the wheelchair nodded again and two of the young men grabbed Rigby, lifted her—she moaned once—and carried her into the house.

The Major glanced at his heavy and expensive digital watch. "It's after two P.M. You'll be wanting to go. It's a long drive back to Buffalo and it looks as if it might rain." Colonel Trinh slipped the.38 into his belt but pulled a Glock-nine from a holster behind his back. Two other bodyguards lifted their M-16s.

Kurtz looked toward the driveway to the north of the house.

"No, Mr. Kurtz, the easiest way out for you is down this way." The Major nodded his head toward the almost vertical staircase down the cliff face.

Kurtz took a step closer to the edge, very aware of the two men behind him, who could push him over with a shove, and peered down.

It was not so much a staircase as a descending concrete ziggurat. The steps were oversized—each at least twenty-four inches high, maybe thirty inches—and cut into the almost sheer rock cliff face. Far below—two or three hundred feet at least and half as many sheer steps almost straight down—the stairway ended in the black asphalt of the curving driveway.

"You're joking," said Kurtz.

"I never joke," said Major Michael O'Toole.

Kurtz sighed and held his arms up for someone to cut the flexcuffs.

"Perhaps later," said the Major. "Sheriff Gerey will meet you at the bottom." The old man in the chair nodded again and someone behind Kurtz gave him a hard shove.

He almost went over headfirst, staggered, and kept from falling only by jumping from the terrace to the narrow first step. The impact shocked up his spine and almost made him pitch forward again. He teetered there, raising his cuffed arms behind him for balance.

"Tell Mr. Gonzaga and Ms. Ferrara to be there tomorrow at Sheriff Gerey's office precisely at noon," said the Major. "One minute late, and there will be several dire consequences—the demise of Detective King being the least of them."

The man in the blazer pushed the Major's wheelchair through the doors and into the house. Colonel Trinh and four of the other Vietnamese with their rifles at port arms stood at the edge of the terrace and watched Kurtz descend.

At first, Kurtz thought it was going to be easy. That is, if the men above didn't shoot him—which still seemed very possible. Or if he didn't trip and fall with his hands cuffed behind his back—which seemed more probable on every step.

But at first it did seem easy. It was two or three hundred feet—it was hard to tell at this horrible angle—of almost vertical ziggurat slabs, each at least two feet above the other—although it rose to Kurtz's knees, so he guessed more like twenty-eight or thirty inches—with just eight or ten inches of horizontal concrete on each "step" — but if he just balanced easily on the edge of each and sort of hopped down to the next, his hands behind his back but extended for balance—it shouldn't be a problem. Easy as cake, as the Russians might say. A piece of pie.

Except that after nine or ten drops, with only a hundred and fifty or so to go, the impact had jarred his spine, hurt his knees, and pounded red-hot railroad spikes of pain into his aching skull.

Kurtz was glad that they'd pulled everything out of his pockets when they'd cuffed him, and tugged his Ray Charles glasses off his face and taken them as well, because all that junk would be flying out into space right now. It'd be a bitch, Kurtz thought, to have to stop and pick up all that stuff with your teeth. And Daddy Bruce would be mad as hell if he came back without Ray Charles's sunglasses. He stepped to the edge of the tenth or eleventh step and dropped.

The shock, ran up through his spine and exploded in fireworks in his head. His vision blurred.

Not yet. Not yet. He'd do a deal with this fucking headache; it could make him throw up, or even faint, once he was all the way down—or even on any of the bottom three steps. But not here. Not here.

Another three steps down. He tried just stepping down the mere twenty-eight inches or so. That was better. But the pain still jagged up his back to his skull and exited through the crack in his skull on the right side every time he dropped the other leg and foot. And it was harder to keep his balance that way with his arms behind him. The overly tight flexcuffs had long since cut off circulation to his wrists and hands, and now his forearms were going numb, with a line of pain moving up above the pins and needles of numbness advancing like little forest creatures running from a forest fire.

What? Stay focused, Joe. He paused on the narrow concrete shelf, his toes hanging over, panting, sweat in his eyes—sweat he couldn't blink or rub away—and looked up the near-vertical ziggurat steps at the dark forms looking down at him. The Major wasn't there, but Colonel Trinh was. He wasn't smiling. The other Vietnamese men were. They were enjoying this, probably betting on when he'd fall. Trinh looked like he was enjoying it as well, just too much so to smile.