“Come on down, Gareth,” a familiar state trooper’s voice called up. “We have the place surrounded and we know Sidney’s there with you . . . So come on down and turn yourselves in, and we can straighten this thing all out before no time . . .”

In a kind of panic, yet still cool, and holding his rifle with loving caution and poise, he turned away from the window to face the two “lovers” lying in bed.

What he observed now both sickened and thrilled him, stirred in him his deepest yearnings and passion. The two men held one another in a perfervid embrace such as angels might be capable of but which men are said to have lost. They kissed one another oblivious to any other time or place, thirstily, their longing for one another it was clear could never be appeased.

“That’s right, kiss and hug all you want, go ahead, see if I care!”

Then turning to the open window, he shouted below: “We ain’t never coming down till you drag us, is that clear, you shit hounds!”

A warning shot rang from below, and then Gareth, a fury aroused in him, a fury which had lain recumbent and sleep-­ridden for so long, was set free, sundered from its chains, and he shot at his target below, brightly lit by searchlights, bringing the deputy to the ground.

“I got the bugger, I got him!” Gareth turned to his two friends.

But the sight of the fraternal rapt and entwined affection of Roy and Sidney made him for a moment speechless, numb, almost as mindless as when Sidney had first come to him.

“And now,” he came again to the bed, squatting, bristling, “I got something to say to you two. I want you to quit what you’re doin’ and listen to me.”

Sidney stirred and turned briefly to him to say, “Go downstairs, Gareth. March!”

“But I killed the deputy!” Gareth touched Sidney with his outstretched left hand. “Did you hear, Sid? Killed him . . .”

“I heard you, yes, but look here.” He motioned to Roy whom he held in his arms.

“What about him? What about me? Are you mine, Sid . . . ? Answer me.”

Gareth put down his gun and threw his arms around De Lakes.

“Tell me you’re mine, Sid.”

“I don’t know, Gareth,” Sidney replied, letting his head fall over the boy.

“What do you mean, you don’t know.”

A bullet from below all at once crashed through the upper part of the window pane and ricocheted off the wall, but nobody in the room paid the least attention.