Jerome stands by, ready in case Brady should decide to use that final round on Hodges instead. But he doesn’t. Brady tries to point the gun at his head. He can’t. His arm twitches, but won’t rise. He groans again. Blood pours over his lower lip and seeps out from between Felix Babineau’s capped teeth. It would almost be possible to feel sorry for him, Hodges thinks, if you didn’t know what he did at City Center, what he tried to do at the Mingo Auditorium, and the suicide machine he’s set in motion today. That machine will slow down and stop now that its prime operative is finished, but it will swallow up a few more sad young people before it does. Hodges is pretty sure of that. Suicide may not be painless, but it is catching.

You could feel sorry for him if he wasn’t a monster, Hodges thinks.

Holly kneels, lifts Brady’s hand, and puts the muzzle of the gun against his temple. “Now, Mr. Hartsfield,” she says. “You have to do the rest yourself. And may God have mercy on your soul.”

“I hope not,” Jerome says. In the glare of the Sno-Cat’s headlights, his face is a stone.

For a long moment the only sounds are the rumble of the snow machine’s big engine and the rising wind of winter storm Eugenie.

Holly says, “Oh God. His finger’s not even on the trigger. One of you needs to help me, I don’t think I can—”

Then, a gunshot.

“Brady’s last trick,” Jerome says. “Jesus.”

36

There’s no way Hodges can make it back to the Expedition, but Jerome is able to muscle him into the cab of the Sno-Cat. Holly sits beside him on the outside. Jerome climbs behind the wheel and throws it into gear. Although he backs up and then circles wide around the remains of Babineau’s body, he tells Holly not to look until they’re at least up the first hill. “We’re leaving blood-tracks.”

“Oough.”

“Correct,” Jerome says. “Oough is correct.”

“Thurston told me he had snowmobiles,” Hodges says. “He didn’t mention anything about a Sherman tank.”

“It’s a Tucker Sno-Cat, and you didn’t offer him your MasterCard as collateral. Not to mention an excellent Jeep Wrangler that got me out here to the williwags just fine, thanks.”

“Is he really dead?” Holly asks. Her wan face is turned up to Hodges’s, and the huge knot on her forehead actually seems to be pulsing. “Really and for sure?”

“You saw him put a bullet in his brain.”

“Yes, but is he? Really and for sure?”