Tracking what? he wondered.

They rode through a gnarled stand of knotty pine. The trees were twisted and beautifully grotesque with football-sized growth tumors bulging out from the trunks and branches. It was as if they’d left the forest and entered some kind of primeval funhouse, and Farkus said, “Do you realize what this wood is worth if we took it back and sold it? I know furniture makers who’d pay a fortune for this stuff.” Then, remembering that he’d claimed knowledge of the area, he said,

“Every time I come here, I try to figure out how to get a vehicle into the area to gather up some of this knotty pine. But as you can see, there aren’t any roads.”

He got silence in response, except for the now-inevitable, Shut up, Dave. He was grateful no one challenged him.

They cleared the knotty pine stand and rode into a mountain park where the trees opened up to the now-leaden sky. Farkus noted how overcast it had become, like the clouds that were previously bouncing across the sky had hit a barrier and gathered up, blocking out the blue, like tumbleweeds stacked against a barbed wire fence.

Parnell pulled up and climbed down from his horse, looking up at the sky as if it were sending him a message. Smith said to Parnell, “Think we’ll get a reading yet?”

“That’s what I want to find out.”

Parnell let his reins drop and his horse stepped to the side of the trail and began grazing, clipping long bunches of tall grass with its sharp yellow teeth and munching loudly enough to cue Farkus’s horse to do the same. When the fat horse bent her head down, she nearly pulled Farkus out of his saddle because he’d been holding the reins too tightly.

Recovering his balance, he said to Parnell as the man walked past, “I think I’ll stretch my legs, too.”

“Stay mounted,” Parnell said, flicking his sharp, dark eyes at Farkus.

Farkus sighed and stayed in the saddle. He took his boots out of the stirrups, though, and flexed his legs. God, his knees hurt.

Parnell walked back to his horse after digging through the panniers in back. He carried an electronic instrument of some kind about the size and thickness of a hardback book. Farkus could see several lit-up digital windows on the instrument as well as a screen that glowed like a GPS display. Good, he thought. Parnell knows exactlywhere they were.

Parnell mounted up, holding the panel between his arm and his tactical vest. He unfolded a stubby antenna from the unit and adjusted a dial. To Smith and the others, he said, “I’ve got a faint signal. We’re headed the right direction.”

From in back of Farkus, Campbell said, “Any idea how far?”

Parnell adjusted the metal knob. “Nearly ten miles. Over the top and down the other side of the mountain.”

“Where we thought they’d be,” Smith said, nodding.

Farkus moaned. “Ten more miles? On horseback?”

“Shut up, Dave,” Smith said casually.

Even with the overcast, Farkus could tell there was only an hour of daylight left, at most. He said, “Don’t tell me we’re gonna keep riding in the dark? I’m tired, hungry, and I’ve got a little hangover. I could use a rest.”

It happened quickly behind Farkus, the sound of a swift boot kick into the flanks of a horse and the squeak of leather and thumping of hooves. Suddenly, Campbell was right beside him, their outside legs touching. Campbell had his sidearm out, a deadly-looking two-tone semiauto with a gaping muzzle that he pressed against Farkus’s cheekbone.

“Do you know what this is?” Campbell hissed. Farkus didn’t move his head-he couldn’t-but he swung his eyes over. Campbell was squinting and the skin on his face was pulled tight. “This is a Sig Sauer P239 SAS Gen 2 chambered in.357SIG. I’ve been wondering what it would do to a man’s head from an inch away. Do you want me to find out?”

Farkus knew he shouldn’t say anything, but he couldn’t help himself. “No, please.”

Smith had turned in his saddle and was watching them now with a smirk on his face. “I was kind of wondering that myself.”

“Please, no,”Farkus said, his voice cracking. “Put the gun away. You see, I’ve always been a talker. I’m sorry. I’ll shut up. I’ll start now.” To himself, Farkus said, “Shut up, Dave.”

Campbell’s face twitched. “What’s that smell?”

Farkus felt hot tears in his eyes from fear and shame. He said, “I’ve ruined the saddle.”

Campbell leaned away and lowered the pistol. Farkus looked down as well. A wet stain blotted through the denim of his crotch. Dry leather on the pommel soaked it in, turning it dark.

To Parnell, Campbell said, “This guy is becoming a liability.”

Parnell’s dead-eye silence didn’t reveal a thing about what he was thinking. But what he didn’t do, Farkus noted, was disagree with Campbell.

Campbell said, “Dave, I’m starting to think you’re just a bullshitter, because all I’ve heard out of your pie-hole is bullshit. And don’t think I didn’t notice how you caught yourself back there when we rode through that knotty pine. You’d never been there in your life, have you? I’m thinking you don’t know where the hell you are right now and I don’t see how the hell you’re going to help us.”

A minute went by. Toward the end of it, Campbell raised the Sig Sauer to eye level.

Despite the cold feeling of dread that coursed through him, Farkus said, “That’s where you’re wrong. Hell, I’ve not only hunted up here, I used to move cows from the mountains down to pasture on the other side.”

Campbell shook his head, not buying. Then he gestured to the horizon, toward the highest point. “What’s the name of that peak?”

To Parnell, Campbell said, “Check his answer against your map, and we’ll see if he’s lying.”

Farkus pointed, stalling for time, “That one? That one there?” He searched his memory, trying to recall conversations from his buddies around the campfire talking about where they’d been that day. Years of conversations to sort through. He wished he’d paid more attention.

His mouth was dry. He could recall his friend Jay telling a story about wounding a young bull elk and tracking it in the snow all the way to.

“Fletcher Peak,” he said.

Parnell studied his map. While he did, Farkus tried to think of how he could talk his way out of this. Could he say, Well, that’s what we always called it.

But Parnell said, “Fletcher Peak. Ten thousand, eight hundred feet.”

Farkus tried not to close his eyes as joy replaced dread.

Campbell lowered the weapon.

And Farkus thought, I wish I knew where the hell we are.

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2

With Marybeth at work and the girls at school, Joe had the revelation that he’d never been alone in his own house before. It was remarkably quiet. He felt like both a voyeur and a trespasser as he limped through the rooms carrying a plastic five-gallon bucket filled with tools and equipment. His only company was Tube, who, since they’d returned two days before, had not let Joe out of his sight. In fact, Tube trailed him so tightly that the dog would bump into the back of his legs if Joe stopped.

At dinner the previous night, Joe had queried Marybeth and his daughters for their wish lists of repairs, maintenance, and projects. He listed the chores on a legal pad and finally begged them to stop after he filled the first page and after April requested he build “a wall of separation” between her bed and Lucy’s in the room they shared so she “wouldn’t have to look at her face, like, ever.” He was embarrassed there was so much to get done, which was a testament to his long absences over the past two years. In addition to his own list-painting the house, fixing a leak in the garage roof, cleaning the gutters, shoring up his leaning slat-board fence, sorting out his long-neglected Game and Fish office-Joe figured he had at least a week’s worth of projects ahead of him. By then, he hoped, his in-house sentence would be over and Governor Rulon would lift his order of administrative leave.