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the Zion Lutheran Church was lit with floodlights, blazing white against the dark evening sky. There was something wonderfully simple in the solid colors and the straight lines, and Cork stared a long time. He wondered if he should tell Schanno about Arkansas Willie Raye.
    “Anything else?” Schanno asked.
    “I guess not,” Cork answered.
    He opened the door. Only Harris and Sloane came back in.
    “Well?” Harris said.
    “I’ll do what I can,” Cork told him. “But if I’m going to help, I’ll do things my way.”
    “Elaborate,” Harris said.
    “The people I’ll be talking to are Ojibwe. They won’t trust you. I’ll talk to them alone.”
    “I’d prefer one of us accompany you,” Harris insisted.
    “You’re strangers,” Cork reminded him. “More than that, you’re federal law. It would be like throwing a skunk at these people—no offense. If I do this, I have to do it alone.”
    “He’s right,” Schanno said.
    Harris crossed his arms, his hands fisted and sheathed in the bends at his elbow. He looked like a man who’d invited himself to dinner only to discover that the special of the day was a plateful of shit.
    “All right,” he finally agreed unhappily. “Just remember, whoever murdered the Dobson woman may be here now. They could be after Shiloh at this moment. We don’t have much time.”
    “In that case,” Cork said, “I’d best get started. How do I contact you?”
    “We’ve got a cabin at a place called the Quetico. Here’s the phone number.” He wrote it on the back of an FBI business card. “One more thing, O’Connor. We’ve tried to keep a lid on this. But the tabloid that posted the reward for Shiloh has a front-page story on the Dobson death ready to go. By midweek, your little town here is going to be middle ring in a three-ring circus.”
    “I’ll keep that in mind,” Cork said. He held up the photocopied diary of Elizabeth Dobson. “Mind if I hang onto this?”
    Harris waved him an okay. “We’ve got other copies.”
    At the desk outside Schanno’s office, Deputy Marsha Dross handed Cork a brown paper bag. “Fried chicken,” she said, and smiled. “Sheriff’s orders.”
    Outside the county building, Cork found Grimes waiting for him. The man leaned against Cork’s Bronco and watched him approach.
    “A word of advice, O’Connor,” Grimes said, stepping out to intercept him.
    Cork held up and waited.
    Grimes chewed while he talked, moving the wad of Juicy Fruit around in his mouth like it was chaw. “I’ve seen local lawmen screw up more times than I care to remember. Working with them is always like trying to dance a ballet in diver’s boots. You understand what I’m saying? So what do you say you do us all a favor: Just give us what we ask for and try to stay out of the way the rest of the time. Comprende?” Grimes took the wad of Juicy Fruit from his mouth and dropped it.
    Cork stared into his blue-white eyes. “Comprende,” he said. “Comprende real good.” He nodded down at the gum on the parking-lot cement. “Careful there. You might end up stepping in your own mess. Comprende?”
    He shoved past Grimes, who stood grinning in his wake.

6
    G RANDVIEW WAS A GREAT DEAL MORE than just a summer cabin. It was an estate built of yellow pine logs, a huge two-story structure that dominated a southern inlet of Iron Lake called Snowshoe Cove. Marais Grand had had it constructed at the height of her fame; but she’d had little opportunity to use it. Now, it was generally rented in season by wealthy families out of the Twin Cities or Chicago. As far as Cork knew, no one connected with Marais Grand had stayed there since her murder. The place was hidden from the highway by an acre of hardwoods, mostly maple. As Cork approached Grandview, the wind ran through the trees, shaking down crimson leaves that fell into his headlights like drops of blood.
    He knocked at the front door, waited, then knocked again. He checked his watch. A couple of minutes past