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"It&039;s okay"

"It isn&039;t okay And I&039;m sorry"

I opened an envelope, read it, and blurted, "Oh, you&039;re kidding me"

"What?"

"I just opened a letter It&039;s frohis car and his studio"

"He can&039;t prove that," Susan said "Can he?"

"Whether or not he can, this is going to cost al fees Smarmy, mealymouthed jerk"

"Then I hate to addHe&039;s called in all his strongest knights and let it be widely known that he&039;s co to kill you personally"

"I&039;ll cross that bridge when I come to it Did you see the subtle humor there? Vampires, cross? God, I&039; in Spanish, not into the phone, and sighed "Da nuns and orphans?" I asked

"Leaping tall buildings in a single bound I should probably put on soht a smile to my face "You joke around a lot more than you used to," I said "I like it"

I could picture the sad s with a lot of scary things," she said "I think you have to react to theo insane Or you beco not to feel"

"So you joke," I said

"I learned it from you"

"I should open a school"

"Maybe so," she said "I love you, Harry I wish things were different"

My throat got tight "Me too"

"I&039;ll get you a drop address If you ever need et in touch"

"Only if I need your help?" I asked

She exhaled slowly and said, "Yeah"

I tried to say, "Okay," but ht to speak

"Good- bye, Harry," Susan said

I whispered, "Good-bye"

And that was the end of that

I woke up to a ringing telephone the next day "Hoss," Ebenezar said "You should watch the news today" He hung up on me

I went down to a nearby diner for breakfast, and asked the waitress to turn on the news She did

"- extraordinary event reminiscent of the science-fiction horror stories around the turn of the millennium, what appeared to be an asteroid fell froe of Casaverde in Honduras" The screen flickered to an aerial shot of an enorround, and a half-mile-wide circle of trees that had been blasted flat Just past the circle of destruction stood a poor-looking village "However, inforencies around the world indicates that the so-called meteor was in actuality a deactivated Soviet communications satellite which decayed in orbit and fell to earth No estiic freak accident have yet reached authorities, but it seems unlikely that anyone in the manor house could possibly have survived the i my lips I decided that maybe I wasn&039;t sorry Asteroid Dresden turned out to be an old Soviet satellite after all And I et on Ebenezar&039;s bad side

The next day I tracked down Marcone It wasn&039;t easy I had to call in a couple of favors in the spirit world to get a beacon-spell going on hi a tail I had to borrow Michael&039;s truck so that I could have a prayer of following him inconspicuously The Beetle may be way sexy, but subtle it ain&039;t

He changed cars twice and soical equivalent of a destructive electronetic pulse that scra and soative skills let ht on into the evening, to a private hospital in Wisconsin It was a long-term-care and therapeutic facility He pulled in, dressed in casual clothes and wearing a baseball cap, which alone generated enough cognitive dissonance toHe pulled a backpack out of the car and went inside I gave him a little bit of a lead and then followed hi in s at lit hallways, keeping pace and watching

Marcone stopped at a roo track of hi on the door fro, pere There was a single bed in the rooirl on it

She wasn&039;t old I&039;d place her in her late teens or early twenties She was so thin it was hard to tell She wasn&039;t on life support, but her bedcovers were flawlessly unwrinkled Co she was in a coma, whoever she was

Marcone drew up a chair beside the bed He pulled out a teddy bear and slipped it into the crook of the girl&039;s ar to her, out loud He sat there reading to her for an hour, before he slipped a bookmark into place and put the book back into the backpack

Then he reached into the pack and pulled out the Shroud He peeled down the outermost blanket on her bed, and carefully laid the Shroud over the girl, folding its ends in a bit to keep it fro out Then he covered it up with the blanket and sat down in the chair again, his head bowed I hadn&039;t ever pictured John Marcone praying But I saw hi the word please, over and over

He waited for another hour Then, his face sunken and tired, he rose and kissed the girl on the head He put the teddy bear back into the backpack, got up, and left the room

I went to his car and sat down on the hood

Marcone stopped in his tracks and stared at me when he saw me I just sat there He padded warily over to his car and said, voice quiet, "How did you find me?"

"Wasn&039;t easy," I said

"Is anyone else with you?"

"No"

I saw the wheels spinning in his head I saw hi ainst any rash action He nodded once, and said, "What do you want?"

"The Shroud"

"No," he said There was a hint of frustration to his voice "I just got it here"

"I saw," I said "Who is the girl?"

His eyes went flat, and he said nothing

"Okay, Marcone," I said "You can give me the Shroud or you can explain it to the police when they come out here to search this place"

"You can&039;t," he said, his voice quiet "You can&039;t do that to her She&039;d be in danger"

My eyes widened "She&039;s yours?"

"I&039;ll kill you," he said in that same soft voice "If you so much as breathe in her direction, I&039;ll kill you, Dresden Myself"

I believed hi with her?" I asked

"Persistent vegetative state," he said "Coma"

"You wanted it to heal her," I said quietly "That&039;s why you had it stolen"

"Yes"

"I don&039;t think it works like that," I said "It isn&039;t as siht work," he said

I shrugged "Maybe"

"I&039;ll take it," he said "It&039;s all I have"

I looked back toward theand was quiet for a minute I made up my mind and said, "Three days"

He frowned "What?"

"Three days," I said "Three&039;s aChrist rapped in it In three days, three sunrises, you should knohether it&039;s going to help or not"

"And then?"

"Then the Shroud is returned in a plain brorapper to Father Forthill at Saint Mary of the Angels," I said "No note No nothing Just returned"

"And if I don&039;t, you&039;ll expose her"

I shook my head and stood up "No I won&039;t do that I&039;ll take it up with you"

He stared at ht"

I left him there

When I&039;d first h I hadn&039;t known the specifics, I knew then that he had a secret-one that gave hith needed to run one of the nation&039;s largest cri that drove him to be remorseless, practical, deadly

Now I knehat that secret was

Marcone was still a black hat The pain and suffering of the criminal state he ruled accounted for an untold a it for a noble reason I could understand that But it didn&039;t change anything Marcone&039;s good intentions could have paved a new lane on the road to hell But dammit, I couldn&039;t hate him anymore I couldn&039;t hate him because I wasn&039;t sure that I wouldn&039;t have made the same choice in his place

Hate was simpler, but the world ain&039;t a simple place It would have been easier to hate Marcone

I just couldn&039;t do it

A few days later, Michael threw a cookout as a farewell celebration for Sanya, as heading back to Europe now that the Shroud had been returned to Father Forthill I was invited, so I showed up and ate about a hundred and fifty grilled haers When I was done with thelance into the sitting room by the front door

Sanya sat in a recliner, his expression puzzled, blinking at the phone "Again," he said

Molly sat cross-legged on the couch near hi list she&039;d picked up in the tree house laid flat over one half of it Her expression was serious, but her eyes were sparkling as she drew a red line through another entry in the phone book "How strange," she said, and read off another nu "Hello?" he said a moment later "Hello, sir Could you please tell ain, ain"

"Weird," Molly said, and winked at h I had to hold back, and went out into the front yard Little Harry was there by hiht of his sister, inside

"Heya, kid," I said "You shouldn&039;t be out here all by yourself People will accuse you of being a reclusivearound saying, &039;Woahse-bud&039;"

I heard a clinking sound Sorass by little Harry, and he immediately pushed himself to his feet, wobbled, then headed for it

I panicked abruptly and lunged out ahead of hi my hand down over a polished silver coin before the child could squat down to pick it up I felt a prickling jolt shoot up ible i up fro

I looked up to see a car on the street, driver-siderolled down

Nicode you, Dresden"

He drove away I tookhand froil lay before my eyes I heard a door open, and on pure instinct palmed the coin and slipped it inup and down the street His nostrils flared a few times, and he paced over to stand near me He sniffed a few more times and then peered down at the baby "Aha," he rumbled "So hih "You mind if I steal your playmate for a et going anyway"

Sanya nodded and grinned athis hand I shook it "It has been a pleasure to ith you," Sanya said "Perhaps ill see each other again"

The coin felt cool and heavy in my pocket "Yeah Maybe so"

I left the cookout without saying good-bye, and headed ho al, and got to work

Ten hours later, I put down the excavating pick and glowered at the two-foot hole I had chipped inin ued into "Sympathy for the Devil" by the Stones

"Harry," whispered a gentle voice

I dropped the coin into the hole I slipped a steel ring about three inches across around it IThe whispering abruptly cut off

I dumped two buckets of cement into the hole and smoothed it until it was level with the rest of my floor After that, I hurried out of the lab and shut the door behind me

Mister came over to demand attention I settled on the couch, and he jus I petted hi in the corner

"He said that I reys To trust my heart" I rubbed Mister&039;s favorite spot, behind his right ear, and he purred in approval Mister, at least for the ht place But it&039;s possible he wasn&039;t being objective

After a while, I picked up Shiro&039;s cane and stared down at the sainst le Japanese character carved into the sheath When I asked Bob, he told ood to hold on too hard to the past You can&039;t spend your whole life looking back Not even when you can&039;t see what lies ahead All you can do is keep on keeping on, and try to believe that tomorroill be what it should be-even if it isn&039;t what you expected

I took Susan&039;s picture down I put the postcards in a brown envelope I picked up the jewel box that held the dinky engage I&039;d offered her, and that she&039;d turned down Then I put them all away in my closet

I laid the old man&039;s cane on s just aren&039;t e juice and toothpaste

Me and Susan

But tomorroas another day