Scrawny Jared got out, the puppy at the center of all this arranging. He was dressed as if for his English class at Princeton, in jeans, sneaks, and a sweater, sleeves rolled up. No cuffs, no shackles, since for this part of the operation he was a cooperating witness, not a felon. He had a pair of wire-rimmed glasses on, and he seemed like a feral beatnik cat next to the two Marshals, who quickly fell in beside him. In comparison to his boho insouciance, they were like Kansas football coaches. He did not look at, nor did he receive any acknowledgment from, the FBI party that waited for him to walk up the stairs and fell in behind him.

The stairs were gentle in incline, low in height, broad in depth, and ceremonial in execution. Everybody covered them easily, and up the party of six went.

•   •   •

Okay, on Fourth Street,” said Alberto. “You should have them any second.”

Juba gave the focus ring of the Leupold a last tweak, and it brought the scene into startling clarity, much bigger, because he was so used to tiny dot-like targets at over a mile through the Schmidt & Bender 25×. Now it seemed like a movie, blazing with color, crisp to the edges of the frame, and he saw the steps, the terrace up top, the two Marshals flanking the doors, the ornate bas-relief pictographs of Labor and the Eternal Prairie etched lovingly into the building’s walls seventy-odd years ago.

“Okay, on-site,” said Alberto. “Do you have them?”

“I do. Now, shut up,” commanded Juba. “Wait for my command.”

He didn’t care to track them, preferring to let them rise as they ascended the steps into his crosshairs.

At the bottom of the perfect circle that was his field of vision, he could see motion: heads, as the party assembled itself outside the black vehicle. It seemed to take some time, as if it were a parade being set up, not a mere trudge to an appointment. But finally they arranged themselves as they preferred and they began the climb.

Three in front, three in back, the target obviously in the middle of the first rank. They moved without hurry or ceremony, totally unaware they were being observed by the predator from afar, not even in step or cadence, just an unruly batch of people heading inside.

“Now!” said Juba.