The tech was still dealing the round of five-card stud, flipped another ace out to the Iceman. "Whoa, two pair, aces and eights," he said. He flipped over his own cards. "You can have it."

When Climpt and Davenport left, the Iceman stood up and drifted toward the window, watched them as they stopped at the nose of the truck, said a few words, then got in the truck. A moment later they were gone.

"I guess we oughta get back," the older tech said. "Goddamn, a couple more days of this shit and we're outa here."

"If anything can get out of here," said the other man. He went to the window, pulled back a curtain, and looked out. "Jesus, look at it come down."

After the techs had gone, the Iceman sat alone, thinking. Time to get out, said a voice at the back of his head. He could start packing his trunk now, be ready to go by dark. With the storm, nobody would be stopping by the firehouse. He could be in Duluth in two hours, Canada in another four. Once across the border, he could lose himself, head north and west out to Alaska.

If he could take down Weather Karkinnen… But there'd still be the Schoeneckers and Doug and the others. But they were thousands of miles away. Nobody might ever find them. It could still work.

And besides, he wanted Weather. He could feel her out there, a hostile eminence. She deserved to die.

Get out, said the voice.

Kill her, thought the Iceman.

The Wisconsin state trooper had buried himself in a snowdrift across from the fire station. He wore an insulated winter camouflage suit that he'd bought for deer hunting, pac boots, and a camo face mask. He kept a pair of binoculars in a canvas bag with the radio, and a Thermos of hot chocolate in another bag. He'd been in place for two hours, reasonably warm, fairly comfortable.

He'd watched Davenport and Climpt go into the station to nail Helper down. After they'd been inside for a minute, the FBI man, the black guy, jogged up from the back, used a key to go through the access door into the truck bay. Two minutes later the FBI man slipped out and disappeared into the snow. Then Davenport and Climpt pulled out, followed by the crime techs from Madison. Since then, nothing. The trooper had expected immediate action. When it hadn't come, sitting in the drift out of the wind, he'd felt a bit sleepy; the winter storm muffled all sound, dimmed all color, eliminated odors. He unscrewed the top of the Thermos, took a hit of chocolate, screwed the top back on. He was pushing the jug back into his carry sack when he saw movement. The door on the far truck bay, where the FBI man had gone in, was rolling up.

The trooper pulled the radio from the bag, put it to his face: "We got movement," he said. "You hear me?" The radio was unfamiliar, provided by the FBI, all talk scrambled.

We hear you. How's he moving?

"Hang on," the patrolman said. He studied the open door through the binoculars. A moment later Helper bumped out through the door on his snowmobile, looked right and left, then turned toward the highway.

"He's on the sled," the patrolman said into the radio. "He's moving, he's on the trail down 77. He's coming up toward your post… He's not moving too fast… wait a minute, he's moving now, he's really taking off."

Davenport, are you monitoring?.

"Yes, I heard." Lucas was at the hospital, among the smells of alcohol and disinfectant and the stray whiffs of raw meat and urine. "Are you tracking him?"

We got him, and he's moving your way. The caller was the FBI man who'd provided them with the special handsets and the radio beacons now attached to Helper's sled and truck. He's coming up on us. We'll let him pass and then try to hang on.

"We're set here. Keep us posted," Lucas said. He looked at Weather. "He's coming." Lucas pulled the magazine from his.45, checked it. Climpt, who'd been sitting on an examination stool, picked up his Ithaca twelve-gauge and jacked a shell into the chamber. "He ought to be here in twenty minutes."

"If he's coming here," Carr said. The sheriff had buckled on his pistol again, but left it untouched in its holster.

"I got a buck that says he is," Lucas said. He slipped the magazine back into the.45 and slapped it tight with the heel of his hand.

"You're going to kill him, aren't you?" Weather asked.

"We're not trying to kill him," Lucas said levelly. "But he has to make his move."

"I don't see how you won't kill him," Weather said. "If he has a gun in his hand…"

"We'll warn him. If he opts to fight, what can we do?"

She thought for a moment, then shook her head. "If we had more time, I could think of something."

"Women shouldn't be involved in this sort of thing," Climpt said.

"Hey, fuck you, Gene," she said harshly.

"Take it easy," Lucas said mildly. He put the.45 up to his face and clicked the safety on and off, on and off, on. He saw the look on her face and said, "Sorry."

"I'm not being silly about this," she said. "Better he dies than anyone else. This ambush just seems so… cold."

"We ain't playing patty-cake," Climpt said.

The FBI came back: He's passing us… Okay, he's past, he looked us over pretty good. No chance that we can keep up with him, Jesus, this snow is something else, it's like driving into a funnel… He must be doing forty down there in the ditch, he must be flying blind… we're doing thirty… Manny, he'll be coming up on you in five minutes.

A second voice, the other FBI man: Got him on the scope… Davenport, we're five minutes out, he's still coming, he's maybe two miles back.

"Got that," Lucas said. To Climpt, Weather, and Carr: "Get ready. I'll talk to the twins." He ran down the hall, pushed open the double doors at the end of the corridor. Two cops were climbing onto snowmobiles, pistols strapped around their waists, one with a shotgun in a jury-rigged scabbard hung on the side of the sled.

"You been listening?"

"Got it," said one of the cops. Rusty and Dusty. In their helmets they were unidentifiable.

"All right. Stand off behind the lot, there. As soon as he gets off his sled, we'll bring you in. If something happens, be ready to roll. One way or another, we take him."

"Got it."

The two men took off and Lucas ran back down the corridor, clumping along in his boots, zipping his jacket over the body armor. Henry Lacey trotted down the hall toward him.

"Good luck," he called as he passed Lucas.

Carr was hanging up the phone when Lucas got back. "More stuff coming in on the sonofabitch. Lot of stuff from Duluth. He resigned there, just like he told us, but if he hadn't, the cops were gonna get him for ripping off homes after fires. A couple of arson guys think he might have set some of the fires himself."

"Good. The more we can pile up, the better, if there's a trial."

Davenport, you got it right. He's coming, he's past us, he's on the hospital road, he's on the hospital road, we're running parallel down the highway… Goddamn, it's hard to see anything out here.

"Shelly, you know where to go. Weather, get your coat on. Tighten up the straps, goddammit." He pulled the adjustments tight on the body armor, helped her with her mountain parka. She'd be cold without her regular jacket, but it'd only be for a minute or two. "You know what we're doing now."

"Pace it out, take it slow, stay with you. As soon as anybody yells, get down. Stay on the ground."

"Right. And everybody knows the panic drill if he decides to come inside." Lucas looked at Climpt and Carr, and they nodded, and Carr gulped and wiped his nose with the back of his hand.

"Nervous?" Lucas asked Weather, trying a smile.

"I'm okay." She swallowed. "Cottonmouth," she said.

Even on a blizzard day, there'd be twenty or thirty people in the hospital-nurses, orderlies, maintenance people. Unless Helper had freaked out, he wouldn't try a frontal assault on the building. And he knew that Weather had a deputy as a bodyguard. His only chance was to snipe her with a rifle or to get in close with a pistol or shotgun, shoot it out with her bodyguard, like he'd tried when he ambushed Weather and Bruun. They'd set up Weather's Jeep within a rough circle of cars, they'd given him places to hide, places they could reach with snipers on the roof. They'd show her to him, just long enough.