“Russ here gave me a tape of Butchery, and I have to say, I was very impressed.”

Rodman squinted against the sun. “Thanks.”

“Did you write the film?” Stormy asked.

“Wrote and directed it,” Rodman said proudly.

“Where’d you get the idea?”

The kid frowned. “It came to me in a dream.”

A dream.

Stormy tried to maintain the bland expression on his face. “I thought it might have been inspired by”—he motioned toward the land surrounding them—“everything that was happening.”

“Are you kidding? I wrote the original draft two years ago. It took me a year to film it.”

Two years. That was even more unsettling. He could not get the thought out of his mind that the movie had been made specifically for him, that an unknown power had inspired this kid, knowing he would make this film and that his friend would pass it to his friend and that that person would be working for Stormy’s company and would show him the video. It was a frighteningly comprehensive plan, hidden behind an apparent series of coincidences, and Stormy found himself intimidated by the sheer scope of it all, by the complex and concentrated linkages.

He didn’t know if he was being warned or threatened, but the idea that this kid was just a messenger, his film the message, and that it had been meant for him and him alone, remained strong in his mind.

He licked his lips. “Where’s the house?” he asked.

“Special effect,” the filmmaker said. “It’s a model. I based it on the house in my dream.”

Stormy was sweating. “How close is the film to your dream?”

“I thought you were interested in distributing my movie.”

“Humor me,” Stormy told him. “How close?”

“It’s almost the same.”

“Was there anything in your dream that you didn’t put in the movie? Any additional images you cut out because they’d interrupt the narrative flow?”

“What narrative flow?”

“Was there anything you cut out?”

“No.”

He continued questioning Rodman, but the kid was a blank, and Stormy understood that whatever meaning he was supposed to get from this, he was supposed to get from the film itself.

“Have you seen any of the dead?” he asked before they left.

Rodman snorted. “Who hasn’t?”

“What’s it mean?”

“You tell me.”

They left after that. Stormy was just as in the dark as he had been before the visit, and he felt both frightened and frustrated. He intended to watch the videotape again, but he had the distinct feeling that there was something else he was supposed to be doing. Should he return to the theater? Get the keys back from the real-estate agent and check the bathroom again?

What would that do? He’d seen the kachinas, seen talking dead men and a reappearing woman, and he hadn’t learned anything from that. Was there anything else that could be learned from the theater?