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one another, to think about Howard Matlock and why this American had ended up dead in Algonquin Bay.
    Down by the lake, the fog was still thick, wedged like grey batting among the cabins and the trees. The Loon Lodge vacancy sign glowed dull red. The parking lot was empty.
    Cardinal opened the cabin that had been Howard Matlock’s and ducked under the yellow police tape. Inside, he flipped a switch, but the light didn’t come on; the proprietor would have turned off the power until he had another paying tenant. No heat either. Cardinal switched on his flashlight and shone it over the bed, the chair, the nightstand. Ident had been so busy with the scene in the woods that they would not be finished here until the next day at least. Howard Matlock’s personal effects were still here, right down to the half-smoked pack of Marlboros beside the loon lamp.
    In the dark and the silence Cardinal tried once more to visualize what had happened here. He imagined the American sitting in the white wicker chair, watching the tiny television, when there was a knock at the door. But who would come to him, and kill him, and drive him away in his own car? Did someone follow him here from New York?
    Cardinal sat on the edge of the bed. Trying to figure out this case was like trying to catch smoke. Half the time—at least in a place the size of Algonquin Bay—it was the killer himself who called cops to the scene of the crime. Now here was a genuine mystery and Cardinal didn’t have a single lead. An American citizen had come up to his town and—if he hadn’t been followed—had managed in a very short time to upset somebody enough to get himself murdered. And whoever it was didn’t just kill him, they fed him to the bears. Why?
    Cardinal could feel the fine end of a theory in his mind but couldn’t quite grasp it. He stared at the closet door. It had been open earlier; now it was closed, dotted with powder where ident had gone over it for prints.
    Cardinal stood up and slid back the door. Before it was half open, a hand shot out from the darkness and fixed itself around his neck. A fist plunged into his gut and doubled him over.
    Cardinal staggered back, gasping. An expert kick swept his legs out from under him, and then he was face down on the floor, one arm pulled up behind his back. The cold barrel of a gun was pressed into the back of his head. His own holstered Beretta was digging painfully into his ribs.
    “You wouldn’t happen to be armed, would you?” The voice was young, male, unfamiliar— WASP , at a guess.
    “No.”
    “Uh-huh. And what’s this?” Cardinal’s jacket was yanked up and his Beretta removed.
    “You’re making a mistake,” Cardinal managed to say before his head was forced down again.
    A hand went for his inner pocket and removed his wallet. “You’re a cop?”
    “In my spare time. When I’m not getting beaten up in tourist cabins.”
    The man’s weight shifted on Cardinal’s back. “I can’t believe you walked into this,” he said. “On your own? In the middle of the night? I could have been anybody.”
    “Yes. I’ve been meaning to ask you about that.”
    “All right. Here’s what I’m gonna do. I’m going to get off you. I’m going to hang on to your gun, but I’m going to get off you. So let’s be civilized, okay? Don’t try anything or I’ll have to put you down again.”
    “Fine.”
    “You’re going to get up and put your hands against the wall. I’ll stand over by the door.”
    The man got off him, and Cardinal took a deep breath before he stood up and dusted himself off. Jesus, the indignity.
    Behind the snub-nosed .38 that was pointed at him stood the youngest gunman Cardinal had ever seen—blond hair cropped close to the skull, pale fuzz on the cheeks and chin. He wore a houndstooth sports jacket, as if trying to impersonate an older man. He opened the door slightly and peered out at the parking lot.
    “You really did come alone.” When he spoke, the kid’s mouth