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aren’t,’’ Bone said. ‘‘There are usually one or two, and most of the time, they know on the spot who did the shooting.’’
    ‘‘Besides, it wasn’t an accident,’’ O’Dell said positively.
    ‘‘How do you know?’’ McDonald asked. He finished the loaded coffee and rubbed his mouth with the back of his hand. He could use another.
    ‘‘Maybe she did it,’’ Robles said. He tried to laugh, but instead made a small squeaking noise, a titter.
    O’Dell ignored him. ‘‘Karma’s wrong for an accident,’’ she said.
    ‘‘Great: we’re talking karma,’’ McDonald said. ‘‘ Superstitious hippie nonsense.’’
    Bone slumped a little lower in his chair and a thin grin slipped across his dry face: ‘‘But she’s right,’’ he said. ‘‘Dan was a half-mile onto his own property. Who’s going to shoot him through the heart from more’n half a mile away? Nope. I figure it was one of us. We all had guns and good reasons.’’
    ‘‘Bullshit,’’ McDonald said.
    AS THEY WATCHED THE PARADE APPROACHING, O’Dell said, ‘‘We should decide who’ll speak for the bank. The board’ll have to appoint a CEO, but somebody should take over for the moment. Somebody in top management.’’
    ‘‘I thought Wilson might do it—until a decision is made on a CEO,’’ Bone said. He looked over at Wilson Mc-Donald, whose eyes went flat, hiding any reaction; and past him at O’Dell. The top job, Bone thought, would go either to himself or O’Dell, unless the board did something weird. Robles didn’t have the background, McDonald wasn’t smart or skilled enough. ‘‘If you think so,’’ McDonald said carefully. This was the moment he’d been waiting for.
    O’Dell had done her calculations as well as Bone, and she nodded. ‘‘Then you’ve got it,’’ she said. She put her battered hunting boots up on the porch railing and looked past McDonald at Bone: ‘‘Until the police figure out if one of us did it. And the board has a chance to meet.’’
    After a moment’s silence, Robles said, ‘‘My gun wasn’t fired.’’
    Bone rolled his eyes up to the heavens: ‘‘I’ll tell you what, Terry. It would take me about three seconds to figure a way to kill Kresge and walk out of the woods with a clean weapon.’’ He took a final drag on the cheroot, dropped the stub end on the porch, ground it out with his boot, and flipped it out into the yard with his toe. ‘‘No sir: I figure a fired weapon is purely proof of innocence.’’
    He was breaking Robles’s balls. Bone and O’Dell had the two dirty rifles, while McDonald and Robles were clean. Usually, Bone wouldn’t have bothered: Robles wasn’t much sport. But Bone was in a mood. Davenport and the others were dropping the last few yards down the trail to the clearing around the house, and Bone muttered to the others, ‘‘Bad dog.’’
    LUCAS LED THE PARADE UP THE PORCH STEPS, WITH Krause and Sloan just behind, and the four bankers all stood up to meet them. Lucas recognized Bone and nodded: ‘‘Mr. Bone,’’ he said. ‘‘Did Sally get the Spanish credit?’’
    Bone’s forehead wrinkled for a second; then he remembered and nodded, smiling: ‘‘Sure did. She graduated in June . . . Are you running things here?’’
    ‘‘No, I was just about to leave, in fact. Sheriff Krause runs things up here. We’ll be cooperating down in Minneapolis, if he needs the backup.’’
    ‘‘So why did you come up?’’ O’Dell asked. She put a little wood-rasp in her voice, a little annoyance, so he’d understand her status here.
    Lucas grinned at her, mild-voiced and friendly: ‘‘Mr. Kresge carried a lot of clout in Minneapolis, so it’s possible the motive for the shooting will be found there. Quite possibly with the bank, from what I hear about this merger. Detective Sloan’’—Lucas looked at Sloan, who raised a hand in greeting—‘‘has been assigned to help Sheriff Krause with his interviews, so we can get you