“Yeah?” Garrett said. “Maybe you’ll get to like it. Someday.”

He led her along a road and after ten minutes he turned down a short, overgrown driveway. There was an old trailer sitting in a clearing. In the gloom she couldn’t see clearly but it seemed to be a ramshackle place, leaning to the side, rusted, tires flat and overgrown with ivy and moss.

“This is yours?”

“Well, nobody’s lived here for years so I guess it’s mine. I have a key but it’s at home. I didn’t have a chance to get it.” He went around to the side and managed to open a window, boosted himself up and through it. A moment later the door opened.

She walked inside. Garrett was rummaging through a cabinet in the tiny kitchen. He found some matches and lit a propane lantern. It gave off a warm, yellow glow. He opened another cabinet, peered inside.

“I had some Doritos but the mice got ’em.” He pulled out some Tupperware and examined it. “Chewed right through. Shit. But I’ve got Farmer John macaroni. It’s good. I eat it all the time. And some beans too.” He started opening cans as Sachs looked around the trailer. A few chairs, a table. In the bedroom she could see a dingy mattress. There was a thick mat and a pillow on the living room floor. The trailer itself radiated poverty: broken doors and fixtures, bullet holes in the walls, windows broken, carpet stained beyond cleaning. In her days as a patrol officer for the NYPD she’d seen many sad places like this—but always from the outside; now this was her temporary home.

Thinking of Lucy’s words from that morning.

Normal rules don’t apply to anybody north of the Paquo. Us or them. You can see yourself shooting before you read anybody their rights and that’d be perfectly all right.

Remembering the stunning blasts of the shotgun, intended for her and Garrett.

The boy hung pieces of greasy cloth over the windows to keep anyone from seeing the light inside. He stepped outside for a moment then came back with a rusty cup, filled, presumably, with rainwater. He held it out to her. She shook her head. “Feel like I drank half the Paquenoke.”

“This’s better.”

“I’m sure it is. I’ll still pass.”

He drank the contents of the cup and then stirred the food as it heated on the small propane stove. In a soft voice he sang an eerie tune over and over, “Farmer John, Farmer John. Enjoy it fresh from Farmer John. …” It was nothing more than an advertising jingle but the chant was unsettling and she was glad when he stopped.