“Fusk, this is your life: your son doesn’t write. Or call. He posts on social media when your birthday comes up. He definitely doesn’t visit. Your daughter doesn’t even bother with social media. Your wife’s been dead a decade. You had some boom periods, but now you’re about three months from going out of business. You like bondage porn. You visit prostitutes. You aren’t a criminal, not really, but you know criminals. And that’s just the start of what I know about you. Answer my questions or this could get worse for you. In a lot of ways.”

Fusk breathed into the phone like someone on life support.

“Fusk?”

“I knew from the look of you that you had a mean streak,” he said. Flat, neutral.

I almost laughed at that. The last thing I cared about was an insult from Fusk.

“Tell me what I need to know. You’ll never hear from me again.”

Almost in the woods. Out of the sudden sun. Out of sight.

“Promises.”

“Truth.”

“Won’t matter,” Fusk said. Matter-of-fact. Fatalistic.

“To who, Fusk?”

Something was in the spot where a vagrant had watched our house. Obscured by the branches of a bush, enveloped by a rush of dead leaves.

“I dunno. Wildlife traffickers. Anarchists. Lots of folks. You tripped a wire. I don’t want to be in the cage with you.”

“Because of Silvina Vilcapampa.”

Now I could see it clear: next to the empty bottle, propped upright like an impromptu gravestone: the little bird drone. Smashed. I had to work on my breathing again. I was suffocating, my chest tight.

A loud, bitter laugh from Fusk jolted me back to reality.

“What’s funny?”

“Silvina. There’s a name to forget you ever heard.”

“Tell me why.”

As I stood there, looking down at the drone, the bottle.

Worse, this time it wasn’t one cigarette butt. Instead, a half dozen, each a different brand. The boot prints that obliterated the former shoe prints looked melodramatic, like someone had taken care to push the tread into the drone and the leaves and earth beneath. Marking territory.

An irrational pity for the drone, the delicate cracked beak, the shimmering brittle brokenness of the wings. The vacant eye that had never truly seen as a bird sees.

“I don’t think I will tell you why.”

“Names—I need names.”

Defiant. Despite the uptick in how my hand on the phone shook, how Shovel Pig felt double heavy on my shoulder. I could smell the cigarette smoke, cloying, on the leaves. Recent?

“If you’re involved with the Vilcapampa family, they’ll be tracking you already. They’ll find you. You’ll know their names soon enough.”

“Silvina’s dead. Why do they care?”

Said as I squatted beside the bottle and drone.

“Well, there you go. Your first clue.” Contemptuous.

“I need to know about a salamander, too. Taxidermy.”