Plus, and Shane knows a thing or two about programming, it must be really cool software. Now that he understands the mechanism that drew him in, he loses interest in the content-a lot of lofty-sounding stuff about using the hidden powers of the mind to find the One True Voice that will lead, essentially, to the pot of gold at the end of your personal rainbow. He tunes it all out and concentrates on the problem at hand: finding the power couple who snatched Haley Corbin from the airport.

Shane’s gut tells him Haley is alive, and that she’s somewhere nearby. Locating her begins with locating Mr. and Mrs. Barlow, whose ski lodge must be among those that overlook the campus. There are hundreds of condos and lodges, so he can’t simply go door-to-door, not without triggering a reaction from BK Security. He has to find another way. If he had weeks or months he might pull off a direct infiltration, posing as a Ruler wannabe with big pockets, or maybe by infiltrating the security force. But he doesn’t have weeks or months. From what he’s seen of BK Security, they’ll twig to him sooner rather than later, possibly before the three-day seminar concludes. He has to make a move in the next few hours, before all the doors slam shut.

The session concludes with a fairly brief description of the Ruler hierarchy. New members enter at the lowest level, of course, and gradually proceed upward through a series of ‘graduations,’ ultimately achieving the “seventh level of oneness.” Each level requiring a considerable investment of not only time, but increasingly hefty initiation fees. By level five, qualification includes having a net worth of no less than five million dollars. The implication being that by the time you’ve gotten that far along, money will be sticking to you like stink on a monkey. Not that the lecturer, speaking in Arthur Conklin’s voice, puts it quite so indelicately, but that’s what Shane hears beneath all the smooth talk. Join the Rulers and become a money magnet. Revel in your selfness. Empathy is a weakness. Guilt is for losers. Celebrate the glorious oneness of you, and grab all the loot you can with both hands.

After the session concludes, and most of the new recruits have stumbled out of the auditorium looking somehow both stunned and energized, Shane lingers behind and seizes the hand of the speaker, shaking it enthusiastically.

“Heckuva talk, partner! You could sell ice to the Eskimos, and coming from me that’s a compliment. Ron Gouda, Dayton, Ohio, pleased to make your acquaintance.”

“Thanks,” says the startled speaker, attempting to extricate his hand from Shane’s big paw. “If you’ll follow the others to the Hive, there’s free hot chocolate.”

“I’ll do that, sure, you bet. Lemme tell ya, friend, when they told me the fee for a three-day seminar was five grand, my first thought was, for that kind of money I can go to Club Med, soak up the sunshine and the piña coladas. But now I been here and heard the presentation, I’m thinking it’s worth every penny. Five hundred thousand pennies, to be exact.”

“I, um, they have cookies, too. In the Hive. To go with the hot chocolate. Just follow along with the others,” the man urges, trying to step around.

“Can I ask you a personal question?” Shane says, blocking his way. “What level are you? I’m betting a guy who talks as good as you must be at least a Level Six.”

“Level Six is very high,” the man says uneasily. “Most of the instructors are, um, Level Two.”

“You’re a Two? Well, I’ll be darned. That raises my appreciation of the whole enterprise, if a fella as accomplished as you is only got that far along. My opinion, they need to bump you up to at least a Five! I met a Five and he’s a pretty smart dude, but no smarter’n you. You know him? Eldon Barlow? Something to do with them computer games, I don’t know what, exactly. But I do know he’s got himself a beautiful aircraft, ’cause that’s where I met Eldon, him and his wife, Missy, they were at Dayton Airport, that’s the birthplace of American aviation in case you didn’t know, on account of Wilbur and Orville Wright are from Dayton, and there’s this gorgeous Gulfstream G-450-are you familiar with the 450?-and I just had to go over and admire it and that’s when I run into the Barlows. Really nice people. They got a ski lodge here and told me to drop in and say howdy, was I ever in the vicinity. But wouldn’t you know, I misplaced their number and my cell don’t seem to work worth a darn. I don’t suppose you could point out where the Barlows live? Or if there’s a phone book or directory where I can look ’em up?”

The speaker, by now trembling with nerves, is staring at Shane the way an unarmed hiker might look at the sudden appearance of a grizzly bear on the trail. His eyes flitting to the exits, calculating where to retreat and how fast he has to run to get there, all the while not wanting to antagonize the bear in his path.

“We’re, um, not allowed to give out any personal information,” he says.

“Sure, a course. But you know the Barlows, right? At least you heard of them?” A flicker in his eyes confirms that he has, indeed, heard of the Barlows. “Are they home by any chance? Maybe you could call ’em yourself, tell ’ em Ron Gouda from Dayton happens to be in the vicinity. They want, they can call me. No loss of privacy, we do it that way, right? Whattaya say, Mr. Two Level, can you help me out? Can you call the Barlows?”

“Um, not directly, but I’ll, um, see what I can do.”

“Fantastic! Tell you what, you’re ever in Dayton I’ll buy you the biggest steak dinner you ever seen. Thirty-two ounces of prime, grain-fed steer. Or we could do the pork rib barbecue. Your choice.”

“Sure, I’ll keep that in mind. Could you excuse me? I’m, ah, running late.”

“Eldon and Missy Barlow! As a personal favorite to me.”

“Yes, yes. If you’ll just go along to the Hive.”

“Absolutely,” Shane says, letting the man get by him. “Free hot chocolate, cookies. Wouldn’t miss that for the world.”

Five minutes later Randall Shane has found an exit from Profit Hall. As he steps out into the beautiful, frozen landscape of the Conklin Institute, his eyes scanning the mountainside residences for activity, he’s thinking two things.

One, there’s a pretty solid chance that a security cruiser will be dispatched to warn, and/or question the Barlows about the presence of a potential troublemaker, and with any luck he’ll be there to see it happen.

Two, he really, really regrets leaving his new down parka at reception, because if something doesn’t happen in the next fifteen minutes he’ll be frozen solid.

He’s trying to dance the cold away, stamping his feet and flapping his arms, when the flinty-eyed grab-and-go queen shows up, all decked out in an ankle-length parka, fake-fur earmuffs, and long and very pink wool scarf.

“What in the name of God are you doing out here?” she wants to know, clapping her mittens together “We’re having a cold snap! You’ll get frostbite!”

“Just clearing my lungs! Stuffy in there!” Teeth chattering, Shane tries to respond cheerfully.

“I thought we got all the nuts in Southern California,” she says, staring up at him. “Apparently they kept a few in Ohio.”

Shane grins like a madman. Maybe if she thinks he’s crazy she’ll leave him alone. Whatever, he’s invested now. Has to stay out in the open ground where he’s got a clear view of the surrounding community, the terraced streets rising above the campus. Looking for any sign of security response that might lead him to the Barlow residence.

“You know what the temperature is?” she demands, her California tan turning almost as pink as the scarf. “In the last hour it’s fallen to five degrees! That’s without the windchill. With the wind it’s below zero.”

“Feels good!” Shane tells her, hugging himself. “Gets the old heart pumping!”