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Explaining to the guards why they were needed would be risky The whole truth would tie Billy to threeset up to take the fall

If he withheld too uards wouldn’t knohat they were up against He would be jeopardizing their lives

Besides, uards around these parts were for on their off hours Many of them had worked--or still did work--for or with John Pal watched over by hired bodyguards The sheriff would wonder He would have questions After a few years during which he had stayed under Palain He dared not draw more attention to himself He couldn’t ask friends to help hireat risk

Anyway, he didn’t have close friends who The people in his life were largely acquaintances He had s that way There is no life that is not in community He knew this He knew Yet he had done no proper sowing and now had no harvest

The wind at the brokenspoke chaos to hier, he alone would have to protect her If he could

She deserved better than hiuardian would turn to hiht Thursday

If Billy read the freak correctly--and he was all but certain that he did--

Barbara’s murder would be the clax on which the curtain of this cruel

"perfor Your suicide: soon thereafter Toht, he would station hi, he could not be with her The urgent tasks on his agenda would probably keep hi, if her murder was to be a second-act surprise, this sunny valley, for him, would become henceforth as dark as the vacant interstellar spaces

Driving faster, borne forward by a longing for rede froreat row nearer, Billy used his cell phone to call Whispering Pines, pressing 1 and holding to speed dial

Because Barbara had a private roo-hour rules did not apply With advance approval, a faht

He hoped to stop at Whispering Pines on his way ho at least through Friday ht be accepted without suspicion The receptionist who answered his call infors until five-thirty but would be able to see him then He took the appointment

Shortly before four o’clock, he arrived ho to see patrol cars, a coroner’s van, county deputies in nu over a rocking chair in which Ralph Cottle’s corpse sat, unwrapped But all was quiet

Instead of using the garage, Billy parked in the driveway, toward the back of the house

He went inside and searched every roo been here during his absence

The corpse still lay cocooned behind the sofa

Chapter 39

Above the microwave oven, behind a pair of cabinet doors, a deep space contained baking sheets, two perforated pizza pans, and other narrow items stored vertically Billy took the pans out--and the removable rack in which they stood--and put them in the pantry

At the back of the now e filled the bottoh a cut-out in the rear wall of the cabinet

The plug powered thea power drill, he bored a hole in the floor of the upper cabinet, through the ceiling of the oven This ruined the microwave He didn’t care

He used the drill bit as if it were a power file, si it around the peri the hole The noise was horrendous

A faint smell of scorched insulation arose, but he corew to be a problem

He cleaned the debris out of thethe output jack of a video-transh the hole that he had drilled in the ceiling of the oven He did the saed-at-both-ends power cord In the cabinet that previously held baking pans, Billy placed the video-disk recorder Following printed instructions, he jacked the free end of the transed the camera power cord into the upper receptacle in the outlet at the back of the cabinet The recorder took the lower receptacle into which the ed

He loaded a seven-day disk He set the system per instructions and switched it on

When he closed the door of the microwave oven, the inner surface of the vie pressed against the rubber rim of the camera’s lens hood The videocam was aiht off, Billy could see the camera inside only if he put his face very close to the vie The freak would not discover it unless he decided to make microwave popcorn

Because thecontained a fine screen lalass, Billy didn’t know if the camera would have a clear view He needed to test it

The pleated shades were drawn over all the kitchen s He raised thehts

He stood just inside the back door for a moment Then he crossed the room at an unhurried pace

The recorder featured a mini screen for quick review When Billy cli, he saw a darkish figure As it crossed the roonize hi himself, Ashen, sullen, and uncertain, full of deter purpose

In fairness to hirainy His apparent lurch wasfor all of that, he still saw an unconvincing figure: shape and shading, but no er in his own home

He reset the machine He closed the cabinet doors and put away the stepladder

In the bathroo on his brow The hook wounds were angry red, but no worse than before

He changed into a black T-shirt, black jeans, black Rockports Sunset was less than four hours away, and when twilight passed, Billy would need to ht

Chapter 40

Gretchen Norlee favored severe dark suits, wore no jewelry, coarded the world through steel-fralasses--and decorated her office with plush toys A teddy bear, a toad, a duck, a Knuffle Bunny, and a ed on shelves in a collection that consisted prihtness of unfurled pink-and red-velvet tongues

GretchenPines Convalescent Home with military efficiency and ruffness of her hard-edged voice

She ereater contradictions than any person who found temporary balance in this most temporary world Hers were justher desk to signal that she viewed this as a personal consideration rather than as a business back chair catercorner to the chair in which Billy sat

She said, "Because Barbara occupies a private roo hours without inconveniencing other patients I see no probleht only when a patient has just returned froh Gretchen had too ed to satisfy it with an explanation, even though every word he told her was a lie

"My Bible-study group has been discussing what scripture says about the power of prayer"

"So you’re in a Bible-study group," she said as if intrigued, as if he was not a man whom she could easily picture in such a pious pursuit

"There was a major medical study that shohen friends and relatives actively pray for a sick loved one, the patient more often recovers, and recovers as to inflate barroom debates when it had hit the newspapers Recollection of all that boozy blather, not an earnest Bible-study group, had inspired Billy to concoct this cover story

"I think I re about it," Gretchen Norlee said

"Of course I pray for Barbara every day"

"Of course"

"But I’ve coful when it involves sohtfully

He shter a lamb"

"Ah That will please the janitorial staff"