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asked.
    “It’s just that I’m not sure I can stay.”
    “What do you mean?”
    “I wasn’t really planning on it.”
    “You’re talking about tonight ? Portia, really . . . It’s too late to go.”
    “There’re trains all night.”
    Lis’s face grew hot. “I thought you’d be here for a couple of days.”
    “I know we talked about it. I . . . I guess I’d really rather just get the train back. I should’ve told you.”
    “You don’t even call and say you’ll be late. You don’t even tell us you’ve gotten a ride. You just show up, get your money and leave?”
    “Lis.”
    “But you can’t just sit on a train for two hours and then turn around and go back. It’s crazy.” Lis walked to the bed. She reached for the bear then thought better of it. She sat on the chenille spread. “Portia, we haven’t spoken in months. We’ve hardly said a damn word since last summer.”
    Portia finished her champagne and put the flute on the dresser. A questioning look started to cross her face.
    “You know what I’m talking about,” Lis said.
    “Right now’s tough for me to be away. Lee and I’re going through a hard time.”
    “When’ll be a good time?”
    Portia waved her hands at the room. “I’m sorry you went to all this work. Maybe next week. A couple weeks. I’ll come out earlier. Spend the day.”
    The silence was suddenly broken by Owen’s voice, calling sharply for Lis. Startled, she looked toward the door then back to her lap and found that she’d picked up the bear after all. She stood abruptly, setting the toy back on the pillow.
    “Lis,” came Owen’s urgent voice, “come down here.”
    “Coming.” Then Lis turned to her sister. She said,
    “Let’s talk about it,” and before Portia could open her mouth to protest, walked out of the room.

    “This smells of being whipped.”
    “Well, I’d guess.”
    Before the two men lay a sharp valley that rose fifty feet above them, filled with black rocks and tangles of vine and barkless branches, many dead and rotten. Moisture glittered on undergrowth like a million snake scales, and the dew stained their jumpsuits the same dark blue the uniforms turned when they worked the Piss ’n’ Shit Ward.
    “Look at that. How d’we even know it’s his footprint?”
    “Because it’s size fourteen and he’s barefoot. Who the hell’s do you think it is? Now shut up.”
    The moon was fading behind clouds and in the growing darkness each man thought the scene before him was straight out of a horror film.
    “Say, meaning to ask—you bumping uglies with Psaltz?”
    “Adler’s secretary?” Stuart Lowe snickered. “Like that’d be a real smart thing to do. I’m really thinking we should’ve bitched more. Didn’t either of us have to come. We ain’t cops.”
    The men were large—both muscular and tall—and sported crew cuts. Lowe, a blond. Frank Jessup was dark. They were easygoing and had neither hatred nor love for the troubled men and women under their care. Their job was a job and they were pleased to be paid decent money in an area that had little money for any work.
    They were not, however, pleased about this assignment tonight.
    “Was a honest mistake,” Lowe muttered. “Who’d’ve guessed he’d do what he done?”
    Jessup leaned against a pine tree and his nostrils flared at the aroma of turpentine. “How ’bout Mona? You fucking her? ”
    “Who?”
    “Mona Cabrill. Mona the Moaner. The nurse. From D Ward.”
    “Oh. Right. No. Are you?”
    “Not yet,” Jessup said. “I myself’d slip her a dose of thiopental and jump her bones the minute she conked out.”
    Lowe grunted disagreeably. “Let’s stay focused here, Frank.”
    “We’d hear him. Big fellow like that can’t walk past without knocking something down. She didn’t wear a bra last week. Tuesday. The head nurse sent her home to get one. But it was Tit City for a while.”
    There was a faint scent of campfire or woodstove smoke in the damp air. Lowe