"Doesn't it bother you?" Veronica asked. "That he's dead?"

"Look, I'm not crazy about violence either. But you have to remember. The guy was scum. With him dead, his daughter takes over GF amp;G. It becomes a women's corporation, and that's going to make things better for women everywhere." Veronica remembered Loeffler's childlike energy, the way he threw himself into sex with unrestrained enjoyment. She remembered the flowers he'd always brought her, his sense of humor. "I guess," she said.

The next Saturday, one of the women brought in photos of Zelda and Loeffler that she'd printed up herself at work. They were passed around to much laughter and admiration.

There was a nervousness behind the bravado. Veronica felt it, and the others probably did too, but no one mentioned it. Veronica left the meeting early, and the next Saturday she stayed in her room. No one came to invite her downstairs, and Nancy never mentioned W O. R. S. E. again.

Donald-whoever he was-had put Veronica off her feed. She left Close Encounters and went home, put a frozen dinner in the micro, and turned on the news. They had a feature story on the Rox, a follow-up on the unsuccessful park ranger raid back in February.

"Admit it," the reporter said to some man in a ranger uniform. "Those kids could have done a lot worse if they wanted. It was like they didn't even take you seriously. A few people got shot up, but that was all. They made fools out-of you."

"Mister," the ranger said, "you don't know what's out there on that island. It's worse than you could ever imagine. Just pray to God you don't ever find out."

Veronica had saved one photo of Hannah. It had been sitting on an end table, but she'd gotten to where the constant sight of it was a reproach. Now she took it out again and sat down with it in front of the TV She realized she had never cried for Hannah, not once in the sixteen months since her death. With that thought, the tears came.

Jumpers, she thought. They made fools of all of us.

She turned the TV off. She couldn't seem to get herself back together since that man in the restaurant. It was the past come to haunt her. Like all hauntings, it was something she'd brought on herself. It was something she'd left undone. For over a year, she'd been pushing it away, but the questions had been there all this time, fighting to get out.

She walked nervously around the apartment. She wasn't going to be able to sleep tonight, not in this state. She had to do something, no matter how small, to buy off her conscience. She sat down and dialed Nancy's number.

"Hello?"

"Nancy?"

"Yes?"

"It's Veronica." After the odd terms they'd parted on, she didn't know how Nancy would react.

"Yes?" she said again, this time nervous, reluctant.

" I don't mean to bother you. It's just… there's this question I always wanted to ask you. It's about… it's about Hannah."

"Go on."

Veronica could picture her standing on the faded carpet in the hallway, back stiff, eyes staring straight ahead, waiting for some inevitable ax to fall. "Ichiko told me W O. R. S. E. paid for Hannah's lawyer. I just wanted to know… I mean… how did you know she was in jail?"

"You mean, did she use her one phone call to call us, instead of you? Is that what you're asking?"

"I guess so. I mean, she told me she was through with all of that."

"She was. She didn't call us. Latham, Strauss did."

"They called you?"

"It was Latham himself. He said they would provide Hannah an attorney free of charge, but they didn't want that fact to get out. They wanted us to say we were paying for it. It wasn't an offer I was willing to refuse at the time."

"How did he know where to find you?"

"I have no idea."

"Really? You don't have any ties to Latham?"

"We'd talked about targeting Latham for an action. Believe me, it was as much a surprise to us as it was to you." After a few seconds, Veronica said, "Are you okay?"

"Yeah. Life goes on. You know?"

"I know," Veronica said.

When she hung up, her hands were shaking. Latham. She's seen him on TV: elegant suits, razor-cut hair, eyes as cold as a winter sky. Jerry's brother was the Strauss in Latham, Strauss, and he'd told her stories about him. He was so inhuman that Jerry's brother had wondered if maybe he was a secret wild card, that the virus had somehow killed all his emotions. Just the idea that he could somehow be mixed up in Hannah's death was terrifying. It was like opening up a tiny box and finding everything in the world inside it.

There was nothing left to do that night. She went to bed but didn't sleep. Instead she lay awake, seeing Latham and Hannah. And Nancy.

When snow fell on Long Island, it stayed. It had lawns to pike up in and kids to make snowmen out of it. Veronica had sat in her cell that December and listened to the wind howl outside.

On Christmas Eve, Nancy brought her a bottle of white wine with a ribbon on it. Veronica had wrapped an antique silver comb just in case, and Nancy had seemed touched by it. Later, Veronica heard her crying downstairs.

She had only been in Nancy's apartment for W. O. R. S. E. meetings. She agonized for ten minutes, then went down quietly. Nancy was stretched out on the couch, clutching a pillow. She didn't even look up when Veronica lay down next to her and took her in her arms.

"Nobody should be alone on Christmas," Veronica said. "Everything, everything just kind of fell apart," Nancy said. "I was supposed to go to Connecticut, and then their kids got measles, and I…"

"It's okay," Veronica said.

"I can't believe you're being so sweet to me when everything's gone so badly. I've left you alone up there, night after night…"

"You've done so much," Veronica said, trying to be generous.

"No I haven't. I was jealous. Of you and Hannah. We used to be…" She didn't seem able to finish.

"You were lovers."

"Years ago. But she got tired of me."

Veronica kissed the top of her head. Nancy looked up at her, helpless and vulnerable. Veronica unhooked Nancy's glasses and put them on the table, then kissed her on the mouth.

They made love awkwardly, with vague passion and no conviction. Veronica was ashamed of her body. With nothing to do all day, her addict's metabolism had developed a craving for sugar that she couldn't control. It took all her strength to stay on methadone and off heroin. There was no strength left to diet. In a month and a half she'd already gained fifteen pounds and was still gaining.

Nancy's body was covered with fine dark hairs, and her skin seemed unhealthily pale. The taste of her vagina seemed odd and sour. Veronica would find herself remembering Hannah, then have to force herself to go on.

Eventually they moved into the bedroom. They held onto each other through the night but didn't try to make love again. Toward morning, Veronica woke to find that Nancy had turned away and was snoring softly into her pillow. Veronica got up a little after dawn and got into her clothes. She came back to kiss Nancy lightly on the forehead. Nancy woke long enough to squeeze her hand, then went back to sleep.

After that, Veronica stayed in her room. She stayed there through the bitter cold of January, into the worse cold of February. One Sunday, the temperature fell below zero, and all of Long Island was covered in ice. Veronica was unable to get out of bed. She thought about Hannah, about the things they'd done together. She thought about the scene in the bank, the change that had come over Hannah's face just before she took the guard's gun and started shooting. She thought about Hannah hanging in her jail cell, dead.

She curled deeper under the covers. She'd gained another ten pounds, and now she felt heavy all the time. Liz settled into the small of her back, and the two of them slept through the day.