She made a pish noise. “Not really. Just our church preached a pretty immediate Gospel. Now, mind, I wasn’t fussed myself too much about Armageddon. Jesus himself said, ‘But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, but My Father only.’ So why do all that math? But the folks at Christ Redeemer thought it was soon. They were bracing for a world war, and famine, and disease, and Satan ruling for a thousand years of torment. They had a whole chart with Revelation matching up to politics and world events and whatnot. That’s why we bought the property with the Funtime Gold Mine on it. Larry liked how it was up on a hill, out of all the main ways, with well water instead of being on a city system. Larry added the carousel, and he also built his hidey-hole behind it. Kept it stocked with these awful freeze-dried dinners-in-a-bag he got at Army Surplus, and he put in a gas genny and a compost toilet. He figured if things got bad, we could wait for the Rapture there, snug as bugs. But of course the Rapture didn’t happen. That was what split the church, having the day come and go.” She shrugged. “Revelation is a tricky book.”

Marshall’s heart was pounding. He could feel it in his fingers, his ears. This got him no closer to Lexie. But it might not matter. Not if he was right. “How far behind Funtime?” His voice had a creak in it. Misdirection, he was thinking. That was what Coral Lee Pine did best. Every cop hair on his body was standing straight up.

“A half a mile, if that, back through the woods, up a little trail that I bet by now is grown over. They built a new highway so no one had to pass the road to Funtime to get up to Highlands anymore. The power and such was costing more than we made. We had to close it down. We put it up for sale, too, but no one ever bought it, so there it sits. I’m going to leave it to my sister’s middle girl. She might could do something with it.”

She was off again then on another tangent, but Marshall let her go down it. His blood was singing in his veins, as if it had been heated. Nothing she’d said would get him to Lexie. It didn’t matter. They didn’t need her. He thought. He was sure. He was almost sure.

He knew where Robert was.

20

Marshall arrived an hour before sunrise. He’d gone home to shower, shave, and change. Trey and I did the same, putting on jeans and good walking shoes. Then I started a fresh pot of coffee, and I made us all eggs with fruit and toast. We needed fuel, whether or not any of us felt like eating.