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had a way with secretaries—he should have remembered that.
    ‘Nice country,’ Fisher said, looking up the canyon toward the falls. ‘Wouldn’t mind staying here myself.’ He glanced at Mumsie and added, ‘under the circumstances.’
    ‘Stick around,’ Red told him. ‘There’s an extra room.’
    Fisher pushed past Red into the cabin. He leaned against the table and looked at Mumsie. ‘Where’s the money?’
    ‘She didn’t take it,’ Red protested, trying to make the protest convincing.
    ‘That’s what she says. She’s a dirty, lying little bitch.’
    Red hit him. Off balance Fisher fell back over the table, lay on the rough boards cursing them both. Painfully he pulled himself up. Red hit at him again. This time Fisher ducked and went for his gun. Red kept on coming. Fisher backed up against the wall and his little eyes were black with fear. He licked his fat lips and pointed the gun at Red. Suddenly they were fighting for the gun. When Fisher pulled the trigger the muzzle was aimed the wrong way.
    Mumsie wouldn’t stay in the cabin with Fisher’s body. They went down by the creek and waited for dark and now there was a wall between them. It would be all right, he kept telling himself, because he wanted it to be, because he didn’t want to lose her, because he wanted to stay blind. When you create something, you hate to see it dissolve into nothingness. They’d move on together and the doubt would go and they’d forget Jack Fisher. That wouldn’t be too hard to do.
    The canyon filled with darkness. East, the sunlight faded from the range and soon the trees stood out no longer. Soon they were vague shadows on the darkening hills.
    Red kissed her. ‘I won’t be long.’ He climbed the path to the cabin.
    As he bent to pick up Fisher’s body, a thought occurred to him. In the bedroom he found Mumsie’s purse and tucked in a pocket of the purse was an account book on a Los Angeles Savings bank. He lighted a match and by its feeble flame looked at the figures in the book and then he knew. Mumsie had deposited fifty-one thousand dollars in the bank. All over. The dream ended.
    There was a little meadow just off the creek up near the falls and he carried Jack Fisher’s body there and put it on the grass. Then he started digging a grave.
    He had stopped to rest when he heard, above the murmur of the creek, the sound of a car starting. Lights swung away from the cabin and down the road to the highway. He watched them disappear. He went back to his digging, not angry with her, not angry with himself for being such a fool.
    He’d get over it, he knew. He’d be lonely for a while, lonely for a myth. And Mumsie? With that wad of money she should be very happy. Money was something you could hold and count. Love? Hell, you could pick that up in a Mexican cafe when you needed it.
       
    The sound of Guy’s voice awakened him. Red sat up and rubbed his rough jaw.
    ‘Feel better?’ Guy asked. ‘Fine,’ Red said.
    Guy came over and sat on the bed. ‘Here’s the setup. There’s a girl who works for this Eels. She’s okay. You see her first —’

Five
    At noon, Jimmy Caldwell, the game warden, left his office and walked briskly up the street toward the Miller Realty Company. It was a fine clear day, warm without being hot, the sort of a day that made you forget Bridgeport didn’t have the finest climate in the world, that there were weeks on end when snow blanketed the great meadow. In front of the hardware store Caldwell stopped for a minute to look at the display of fishing poles. Automatically his right hand moved in the gesture of a fly fisherman and that brought Ellis Gore, the owner, out.
    ‘Hello, Jim,’ Ellis said. ‘When did you get back?’
    ‘Last night.’
    ‘How was L.A.?’
    ‘Same as ever.’
    ‘Hear you bought the Carlisle place. That right?’
    Caldwell nodded. ‘Yep.’
    ‘Nice place. Going to move out there?’
    ‘I don’t know yet,’ Caldwell said.
    Ellis winked at him.