She tried not to think of Ruby, her second daughter and fourth child, and as always, she failed. So she was glad when the door to the living room opened. She looked up. “Come on, you know the mail plane wont be here until eleven, Ioh.

A man she had never seen before stood in the doorway, short, stocky, dressed in faded blue jeans and a dark blue windbreaker. A red bandanna was tied round his forehead in a failed attempt to discipline a tremendous bush of dirty grayish blond hair that repeated itself in tufts curling out from the neck of his shirt and the cuffs of his sleeves. He carried a dark blue interior frame pack, fabric stained and worn at the seams with long use, with a shot gun in a sheath fastened to the back.

Opal was used to waiting on hermits, as this area of the Bush supported more than its share, and she smiled, teeth very white in her tanned and healthy face. “Hi there, she said. “What can I do for you?

He looked around the room slowly and carefully, missing nothing, and suddenly the hair on the back of her neck stood up.

“Nice place youve got here. His voice was rough, almost rusty-sounding, as if he didnt talk much and wasnt used to it when he did.

“Thanks, she said, watching him. “My father built it. Felled the logs, finished them, built the place from the ground up.

“He the collector? The man walked over to the nugget, sitting in a place of honor on a little table of its own.

It was nothing a hundred other people hadnt done over the years, but all at once Opal was realizing that she was all alone in the house, and pretty much alone in the village, as most people were at fish camp, waiting for the last salmon of the season to make it this far north. Her husband and children werent due back until the weekend. “Yes. What can I help you with? Did you want to check general delivery for mail? Ill need to see some identification.

He touched the nugget with one forefinger, moved on to a hair clasp made from ivory and baleen in the shape of a whale. “No, you wont have to do that. He swung his pack down from his shoulders and pulled out a pistol. He didnt aim it at her, or even in her general direction, let it hang at the end of his arm, dangling at his side.

“You have to come with me, he said, and smiled at her.

Newenham, September 1

Bills Bar and Grill was one of those prefabricated buildings common in the Alaskan Bush, housing post offices, ranger stations, grocery stores, trooper posts and not a few private homes. The roof was always tin, the siding always plastic in blue or green or brown, the front porch always cedar that weathered gray in a year. Insulation was problematic at best, as during winter the metal siding contracted and shrank from doors and window frames alike, resulting in enormous heating bills. In summer, windows had the occasional alarming habit of bursting unexpectedly from their frames, and doors either wouldnt open in the first place or wouldnt close again if they did.