They continued north on the coastal highway, talking very little for some miles, catching frequent glimpses of Penobscot Bay behind and between the tourist traps on the right side of the road--its shoreline extending in belts of jumbled stone and harsh wind-carved ledges, giving intimations of a primal wildness that seemed dormant rather than lost, capable of hostile reassertion. There was a constant sense of nearness to the sea, the sky swirling with gulls, the water refracting enough pale sunlight to lift some of the cloud cover's gravid heaviness.

"It's much different here from inland, isn't it?" Megan said at length. "Still sort of forlorn, but, I don't know..."

"Beautifully forlorn," Nimec said.

"Something like that," she said. "There's a disconnection from the rest of the world that makes me understand why Ricci chose this place to hide out. If you'll pardon my choice of words."

"Nothing wrong with it," Nimec said. "That's exactly what he's been doing for the last eighteen months."

Nimec nodded toward a green and white road sign ahead of them that read:

ROUTE 175--BLUE HILL, DEER ISLE, STONINGTON

"Looks like we're coming up to our turn," he said. "Another forty minutes or so and you'll be meeting my friend and former colleague for yourself."

As it happened, he was right about the turn but wrong about the length of time remaining on their trip, for only ten minutes later Megan Breen got her introduction to Tom Ricci ... as well as two local law-enforcement officers.

It was by no means a pleasant encounter for any of them.

Nor was it one Megan would soon forget.

2:00 P.M. Pacific Daylight Time

It always struck Nordstrum as fascinating that Roger Gordian, who had made opening up and changing the world through telecommunications a crusade, rarely opened himself up to the world, and possessed the most contained and unchanging nature of anyone he knew. But that sort of contradiction seemed a familiar story with men of towering accomplishment, as if by directing vast amounts of energy outward to achieve their broad public goals, they drained off reserves that most ordinary people applied to their private lives.

Or maybe I'm getting carried away and Gord just likes his furniture, Nordstrum thought as he entered Gordian's office.

He paused inside the doorway, giving the room a bemused visual audit, comparing the way it looked now to how it had looked a decade ago, a year ago, or the previous autumn, when he'd last been inside it. Not to his surprise, everything was precisely the same--and in the same condition--as always. The place was a testament to careful upkeep, a paradigm of maintenance and preservation. Over the years, Gord's desk had been refinished, his chair reupholstered, the pens on his blotter refilled, but heaven forbid that any of them ever might be replaced.

"Alex, thanks for coming." Gordian got up from behind his desk. "It's been too long."

"Gord and Nord, together again for one outstanding SRO performance," he said. "How are Ashley and the kids?"