“A Taser,” he said. “A stun gun.”

“You stun-gunned the man’s genitals?”

“Not a simple task,” Sebastian said. “The wires that shoot out from a stun gun don’t have pinpoint accuracy. But I was lucky.”

A lot luckier than Buddy, I thought.

“You might as well tell the rest,” Welland said.

Sebastian said, “I explained to Buddy that when you have blood in your urine, it makes it a lot trickier to use it for invisible ink. To be honest, I wasn’t sure fifty thousand volts would do anything but make Buddy a candidate for state-supplied Viagra, but as it turned out, it achieved the desired effect.”

There was a moment of quiet in the car. Finally, Sebastian said, “I never would have thought it was possible to make a member of the Aryan Brotherhood cry.”

“I think it would be hard not to, having something like that done to you,” I offered.

“Oh, it wasn’t that,” Sebastian said. “Once he’d recovered from the shock, I showed Buddy a picture of his six-year-old son, living with his girlfriend on the outside, and explained how unfortunate it would be if any of the recently released inmates he’d sodomized and otherwise terrorized were to find out where his little boy lived. That was when I saw that solitary tear run down his cheek.”

“Well,” I said.

“Indeed,” said Elmont Sebastian. “So, I would very much appreciate it if you would tell me who wrote to you at the Standard and invited you up here to meet with her.”

“I don’t know how you know about that email,” I said, although I had a pretty good idea. “But since you clearly do, you know it was anonymous.”

He nodded. “Quite true. But there are countless other ways to get in touch with people. And I think even though your first rendezvous was unsuccessful, it’s entirely probable that this woman found another way to contact you.”

“She didn’t,” I said. “I think she must have had second thoughts.”

“Then what are you doing back here again?”

“I drove up to talk to the manager of that store back there. I wanted to ask him about my wife. She went in there to buy some drinks when we came up here Friday. I thought she might have said something to him that would help me find her.”

Sebastian appeared to be mulling that one over.

“You see, David, I can’t afford to have leaks in my organization. No company can. Not Apple, not Microsoft, and certainly not Star Spangled Corrections. I have to assume that email came from one of two places. From within my organization, or from within Promise Falls city hall, specifically someone connected in some way to Stan Reeves. Now, as I explained to you the other day, all of my dealings with political representatives have been totally aboveboard. But a false allegation can be as damaging, perhaps even more so, than one that turns out to be true.”

Welland was slowing the car. I glanced ahead and saw no obvious reason to do so.

“So it’s very important to me to find out who would contact you and suggest any kind of malfeasance on my company’s part. The author of that email admitted to a couple of things. One, that she was female, and two, that she had a white truck. My own investigation has determined that Star Spangled has four female employees within a two-hour drive who either have, or have access to, a white truck. And at city hall, among those who might be privy to the correspondence of council members, perhaps half a dozen are women. What vehicles they have I’m in the process of nailing down. I am prepared to escalate my investigation of these women unless you’re willing to save us all some trouble.”

I heard Welland repeat the word “escalate” under his breath. He had the turn signal on, and a moment later was driving down a narrow gravel road slicing its way into a thick forest.

“Mr. Sebastian, my hat’s off to you,” I said. “You’re no slouch at this whole intimidation thing. It would have been hard to miss the point of your little Aryan crybaby story. I’d toss whatever journalistic standards I might have out the window in a minute if I believed, even for a second, that you were threatening my son.”

Sebastian made a face of mock outrage. “David, is that what you took from that story? I just thought you’d find it interesting.”

I continued, “If I really thought you might hurt my boy, and all it took to save him was to betray a source, well, I’d burn that source. I wouldn’t much like myself for it, but blood runs thicker than newsprint ink.”

Sebastian nodded.

I added, “And if you did harm him in any way, if you so much as took away one of his action figures, I would find you and I would kill you.”

Sebastian smiled wearily. “You know what would be really interesting? What would be really interesting is if they nail you for this. If they find your wife’s body and find a way to pin it on you, and they put you on trial and convict you and send you up for ten or twenty years, and it turns out to be one of my jails. If we get this thing fast-tracked, it might actually be the one in Promise Falls. Wouldn’t that be something?” He chuckled softly. “Welland, wouldn’t that be something?”

“You know what that would be, sir?” he said, bringing the car to a stop. “That would be ironic.”

“Indeed.”

I looked outside. We were in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by forest.

I asked Sebastian, “Don’t you worry about yourself?”

“What do you mean?”

All those other Aryan Brothers out there, aren’t you afraid someone might want to get even for what you did to Buddy? Maybe pay a visit on a member of your own family?”

“If I had any family, that might be a concern. But a man in my line of work functions best when he doesn’t have the burden of loved ones.”

I looked out the window again. I didn’t want to ask, but couldn’t stop myself. “What are we doing here? Why are we stopping?”

Welland shifted in his seat so that he could catch his boss’s eye in the rearview mirror. He was awaiting instructions.

“It’s beautiful out here, isn’t it?” Sebastian said. “Only a mile off the main road, and it’s like you’re a hundred miles from civilization. Magnificent.”

I put my hand on the door handle. I was getting ready to run. I didn’t like my chances of escaping, out here in the middle of nowhere.

“But being out here, in the open, can be as dangerous as being kept behind bars in one of my facilities,” he said. “Certainly for you. Right now. At this moment.”

We locked eyes. I was determined not to be the first to look away, even though I was pretty much scared shitless. He could have Welland kill me and dump me here and my body might never be found.

Finally, Sebastian sighed tiredly, broke eye contact, and said to Welland, “Find a place to turn around and head back.” To me, he said, “This is your lucky day, David. I believe you. About your source. I actually do.”

I felt, briefly, tremendously relieved. Elmont Sebastian, by giving me something new to worry about-whether I might live to see the end of the day-and then giving me a reprieve, had made me forget, at least for a while, my other troubles.

“But we’re not done,” he said. “While you may not know who this source is, I would be most grateful if you’d make an effort to find out, and then let me know. You may be contacted again. There may be an opportunity for another meeting.”

I said nothing. The limo was moving again. Welland found a narrow intersection up ahead and managed to turn the beast around, then headed for the highway that would take us, I hoped, back to Ted’s.

“So was it Madeline?” I asked.

“I’m sorry?” Sebastian said.

“Madeline Plimpton. My publisher.”

“And what is it you think she did?”

“She fed you the email from that woman. It’s not much of a stretch to think the publisher would have some kind of clearance that would allow her to read every message attached to one of the paper’s email addresses. I deleted it as quickly as I could, but I guess I wasn’t fast enough. Is that the deal? She betrays her staff, keeps the heat off you, and in return you buy her land?”