The young pharmacist was certainly conscientious. “Ma’am, you understand you have to take these with food,” he said, holding up a brown plastic pill container. “And these have to be taken twice a day. If you have any of these symptoms listed here on this sheet, you need to call a doctor.” After we’d discussed that for a moment, Tolliver asked where we paid, and the pharmacist pointed to the register at the front of the store. I had to get up to follow Tolliver, and when we got to the checkout clerk, we had to wait for another customer to get her change and have her chat. Then we had to reveal to the clerk that our insurance didn’t cover a pharmacy bill and that we were paying cash for the entire amount. She seemed surprised but pleased.

We’d actually stepped outside the store to get back in the car when the sheriff found us. We got so close to being out of Doraville.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “We need you again.”

It wasn’t snowing at the moment, but it was still gray everywhere. I looked up into Tolliver’s face, which seemed as pale as the snow.

“What do you need?” I asked, which was probably stupid.

“It’s possible there are more,” she said.

WE had to renegotiate. The consortium hadn’t written me a check for the first successful episode, and I didn’t work for free. And the reporters were everywhere. I don’t work in front of cameras, not if I can help it.

Since the parking lot at the back of the police station was protected by a high fence topped with razor wire, we got in the back door of the police station without anyone the wiser—anyone among the media, that is. Everyone on duty that wasn’t out at the burial site made an opportunity to walk past Sheriff Rockwell’s office to have a peek at me. With my arm in a cast and a little bandage on my head, I was something to look at, all right. Tolliver sat at my good side so he could hold my right hand.

“You need to be in bed,” he said. “I don’t know what we’re going to do about housing if we stay. I gave up our motel room, and I’m sure it’s gone by now.”

I shook my head silently. I was trying to decide if I was up to any more bodies or not. There was always the fact that it was the way I made our living; but there was also the fact that I felt like hell.

“Who do you think the bodies are?” I asked the sheriff. “I found all the locals that were missing.”

“We went over the missing persons reports for the past five years,” Rockwell said. “We found two more, somewhat over the age range of the boys in the Davey homesite.”