“Glenn!” Sonny said sharply. “Snap out of it!”

The drone only grew more insistent.

“You know how easy morphine is,” Snake said in an oily voice. “You saw it in the war. Fentanyl’s a hundred times more powerful. If I had to meet St. Peter tonight, no question which route I’d pick.”

Morehouse’s eyes opened, looking suspicious. “How do I get the fentanyl?”

“Tell us everything you told the reporter. You hold back, you die a gelding.”

Morehouse was struggling to swallow. Sonny picked up a glass of water from the bedside table and helped him take a sip.

“There you go,” Sonny said. “All primed up now. Spill.”

“I didn’t tell Sexton nothin’, boys. I didn’t trust him.”

“He was here for a whole hour this morning,” Snake said. “You must have told him something.”

Morehouse shook his head.

Snake held up the knife and turned it in the lamplight. “I’ve only got three questions, Mountain.” Stepping forward, he slid the point under Morehouse’s inflamed eye. “First, did you say the name Forrest Knox? Did your lips form those two words?”

“Jesus, no. I ain’t crazy!”

“You’re lying, Glenn. I’m gonna cut this eye out.”

“No!” Morehouse wailed.

“What about Brody Royal? Did you say anything about Brody?”

At the mention of this name Morehouse lost his color. “I swear before God, boys. I wouldn’t do that.”

“Did Sexton ask about Brody or Forrest?”

“Neither one. He just wanted to know about …”

“Us?” Snake finished.

Morehouse nodded, then pulled up the covers and hugged himself beneath them.

“How much did you tell him?”

“Nothin’ about ya’ll. I talked about the war mostly. All he cared about was Albert Norris. I think him and that nigger was related or something. I told him I thought Pooky had killed Albert and run off with whatever whiskey and cash Albert had stashed in the store. Or reefer, that he kept for them musicians.”

“Did Sexton tape any of this?”

“Hell, no. I wouldn’t let him. I told him that, straight up.”

Snake gave Sonny a sidelong look. Glenn actually sounded convincing.

“I can’t sleep no more, Sonny!” Morehouse cried. “Every time I close my eyes, I see the things we done. I can’t get no peace. It’s like when I got back from the war. I keep seein’ Jerry Dugan down in that acid tank, and that Lewis boy a-bleedin’ under that tree. That alone’s enough to send us all to hell.”

“Do you see Jimmy Revels?” Snake asked in a perverse voice. “I figured you’d see him most of all. Considerin’ what you done to him. And how much you liked it.”

“Ya’ll made me do that! I didn’t know what I was doing. That still don’t make it right, I know. Not to God.”

“That’s between you and God,” Snake said. “Not you and some newspaper reporter.”