What Quickwater told us yesterday had caused a weight to settle over me. As I'd listened to his account I knew that what was to have been peripheral involvement on my part, undertaken only to permit me to work on Emily Anne's case, would now become a major task, and the thought of al I'd have to do was pressing me down like a school-yard bul y. I reminded myself that a nine-year-old child lay in the morgue, and her shattered family would never be the same. I was there for them.

The Viper shooter who'd obliterated the Vail ancourt brothers had been wil ing to deal. Facing his third bust and murder-one charges, he'd offered the location of two bodies. The crown had countered with second degree. Voila. Daybreak in St-Basile.

As we trudged up the drive dawn gave way to morning. Though I could see my breath, I knew the day would warm with the sun.

Gravel crunched underfoot, and now and then a pebble dislodged, skittered across the uneven roadbed, and rol ed into a side trench. Birds twittered and scolded, announcing their displeasure over our arrival.

Suck eggs, I thought. My morning began before yours.

Don't be a baby, Brennan. You're annoyed because Quickwater is a jerk. Ignore him. Do your job.

Just then he spoke.

"I need to find my new partner. He's just been loaned over to Carcajou."

Though Quickwater didn't offer a name, I felt sympathy for the unlucky cop. I took a deep breath, hiked up my pack, and looked around as I fol owed his back.

One thing was clear. The Vipers were never going to win Landscaper of the Year. The front of the property was a good example of what nature preservationists in the U.S. Congress had fought to protect. The bottomland that stretched to the highway was a sea of dead vegetation splayed against the reddish-brown spring mud. The scrub forest behind the house had been left to the decorating of its quadrupedal inhabitants.

When we crossed the asphalt and entered the courtyard, however, a design plan was evident. Inspired by the better prisons of America, the enclosure had al the essentials, including twelve-foot brick wal s topped with surveil ance cameras, motion detectors, and floodlights. Wal -to-wal cement covered the ground, with basketbal hoops, a gas barbecue, and a doghouse with chain-link run. Steel doors had replaced the original courtyard gate, and the garage entrance was steel-reinforced and welded shut.