“Then let’s shoot him in the back of the head and take away his options.”

I breathe deeply, then sigh. “I’d rather talk to him, if we can manage it. All of them. If not . . . we’ll do what we have to do.”

After a few moments of reflection, Lincoln kneels on the floor, then turns and sets his broad back against the front wall. I crouch and move to the other side of the door, then sit and press my back against the mildewed wallpaper. Leaning my rifle against the wall, I take my Springfield nine millimeter from my pocket and jack the slide, then lay my arm across my knees.

Maybe a minute passes. Then Lincoln says, “What you think they’re doing in the main house?”

“Eating. No stove or fridge out here.”

“Yeah. No shitter, either.”

“You saw Snake was on his phone?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Let’s hope he’s not calling reinforcements.”

Lincoln says nothing at first. Then he laughs with bitter humor. “I’d hate to be surrounded by a trigger-happy motorcycle gang in this place. These walls wouldn’t keep us safe from a BB gun.”

Looking around the shack, it strikes me how odd it is that Snake passed up a chance to live out his days with his son Billy in the luxury of Andorra in order to try to rebuild his former criminal enterprise—without the benefit of his nephew’s political connections or army of dirty cops. Did Snake realize when he made that choice that his life would likely end in a mildewed shack near the Mississippi River? Probably not. But even if he had, he might have made the same choice. Snake Knox is a southerner through and through, and dying on soft sheets in a tax haven between France and Spain would almost certainly feel to him like a coward’s way out.

“What’s the point of this place, anyway?” Lincoln asks.

“Keep your voice down.”

“This town, I mean. You know anything about it?”

“A little. This two-bit place was almost the capital of the Mississippi Territory. During the Civil War, a Yankee gunboat was stationed down in the river, and the sailors on board broke regulations to come ashore. With some regularity, apparently. Enough to make time with the local belles. Some local Confederates got word of it and busted into the church one Sunday, captured most of the crew. One of the Yankees actually hid beneath the hoopskirt of his girlfriend. The whole thing made national news in 1863.”

“You a history buff or something?”

“Not really. My dad brought me—our dad, I mean—he brought me up here when I was about eight, I guess. Maybe ten.”

Lincoln nods, his expression hard to read. “Old Junius Jelks didn’t waste time with that kind of field trip when I was growing up. If he took me anywhere, it was to work a con.”

“I’m sorry, man.”