“Yeah,” Lizzie said. The sun was shining onto the terrace at an angle; it was about three thirty in the afternoon. “Yeah, Kate did.”

“How’d you come to think of that, Kate?” I asked.

Kate was clearly in a bad state. Her face was white, her breathing panicky. Her hands were tied to the arms of the chair, and I saw her wrists were chafed raw. It took her a moment to understand the question.

“Drex,” she said, her voice jerky. “Drex told me that he’d met you once.”

Chip’s head whipped around like he was a snake about to strike. “Drex, thanks to you, we’ve lost everything,” he said in a deadly voice. “What were you thinking?”

“It come on the TV when we were watching the news,” Drex whispered. “About her being in North Carolina, finding those boys’ bodies. I told Kate I’d gone to her trailer when she was living in Texarkana, ’cause I knew her stepfather. I’d met her.”

“And you told Lizzie,” I said to Kate.

“She’s always looking for something new,” Kate said. “That’s the name of the game, here. Find things for Lizzie, keep her happy.”

Lizzie looked absolutely astounded. If we lived through this day, she would have a lot of mental rearranging to do.

“So it’s a TV newscaster that brought me down.” Chip laughed, and it was an awful sound.

“How much of a snake handler are you, Chip?” I asked.

“Oh, now, that’s Drex’s strong point,” he said, grinning at the man standing beside him.

“Jesus, no!” Lizzie said, shocked out of her senses. “Drex? Chip, are you saying that Drex threw a rattler at Granddaddy?”

“That’s what I’m sayin’, darlin’,” Chip said. His grip on Lizzie’s shoulder never wavered.

“Have you gone nuts, man?” Drexell said, and his face looked different now. He didn’t look as bewildered and befuddled as he had. He didn’t look as weak as he had. He looked craftier and harder. “Why are you telling my sisters lies?”

“Because we’re not going to get away with it,” Chip said. “You hadn’t gotten that yet, I see.” Drexell looked blank. “There’re too many loose ends, fool. We should have killed the doctor. Yes, you asshole, sometime within the past few years we should have moseyed on over to Dallas and taken care of that old idiot. And we knew Matthew was getting out of jail sooner or later. We should have been waiting outside the gate for him with a gun.”

Now there was a sentiment I could agree with.

“You say we’re not going to get away with it,” Drex said. “So why are you doing this hostage thing? I thought you were playing a deeper game. I thought you had a plan. You’re just crazy.”