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reincarnation,” I said.
        “Not me. Once down the track is enough of a test. Pass me or fail me, Dear Lord, but don’t make me go through high school again.”
        I said, “If there’s something we want so bad in this life but we can’t have it, maybe we could get it the next time around.”
        “Or maybe not getting it, accepting less without bitterness, and being grateful for what we have is a part of what we’re here to learn.”
        “You once told me that we’re here to eat all the good Mexican food we can,” I reminded him, “and when we’ve had our fill, it’s time to move on.”
        “I don’t recollect being taught that in Sunday school,” Chief Porter said. “So it’s possible I’d consumed two or three bottles of Negra Modelo before that theological insight occurred to me.”
        “It would be hard to accept a life here in Camp’s End without some bitterness,” I said.
        Pico Mundo is a prosperous town. But no degree of prosperity can be sufficient to eliminate all misfortune, and sloth is impervious to opportunity.
        Where an owner showed pride in his home, the fresh paint, the upright picket fence, the well-barbered shrubs only emphasized the debris, decay, and dilapidation that characterized the surrounding properties. Each island of order did not offer hope of a community-wide transformation, but instead seemed to be a dike that could not long hold back an inevitably rising tide of chaos.
        These mean streets made me uneasy, but though we cruised them for some time, I didn’t feel that we were close to Danny and Simon.
        At my suggestion, we headed for a more welcoming neighborhood, and the chief said, “There’s worse lives than those in Camp’s End. Some are even content here. Probably some Camp Enders could teach us a thing or two about happiness.”
        “I’m happy,” I assured him.
        For a block or so, he didn’t say anything. Then: “You’re at peace, son. There’s a big difference.”
        “Which would be what?”
        “If you’re still, and if you don’t hope too much, peace will come to you. It’s a grace. But you have to choose happiness.”
        “It’s that easy, is it? Just choose?”
        “Making the decision to choose isn’t always easy.”
        I said, “This sounds like you’ve been thinking too much.”
        “We sometimes take refuge in misery, a strange kind of comfort.”
        Although he paused, I said nothing.
        He continued: “But no matter what happens in life, happiness is there for us, waiting to be embraced.”
        “Sir, did this come to you after three bottles of Negra Modelo, or was it four?”
        “It must have been three. I never drink as many as four.”
        By the time we were circling through the heart of town, I had decided that for whatever reason, psychic magnetism wasn’t working. Maybe I needed to be driving. Maybe the shock from the Taser had temporarily shorted my psychic circuits.
        Or maybe Danny was already dead, and subconsciously I resisted being drawn to him, only to find him brutalized.
        At my request, at 4:04 a.m. according to the Bank of America clock, Chief Porter pulled to the curb to let me out at the north side of Memorial Park, around which the streets define a town square.
        “Looks like I’m not going to be any help with this one,” I said.
        In the past, I’ve had reason to suspect that when a situation involves people especially close to me, about whom I have the most intense personal feelings, my gifts do not serve me as well as they do when there is even a slight degree of emotional detachment. Maybe feelings interfere with psychic function, as also might a migraine headache or drunkenness.
        Danny Jessup was as close to me as a brother could have been. I loved him.
        Assuming that my paranormal talents have a higher source than genetic mutation, perhaps the explanation for uneven function is