“We couldn’t have done nothing anyway. We were all coon hunting up at Sharp Top. That’s where we are right now, ten miles away.”

“What are we going to do?” Finn said.

“Well, that’s up to Otto here.”

“I’m going to use a blowtorch on his balls.” Otto picked up his fifth of Jim Beam, but it was empty. He flung the bottle at Magnus. “You damn thieving snake.”

“You watch my place, here,” Goldwin shouted.

Bennet pulled himself up out of the barber chair. “Sig, where they find him?”

“Had a camp up near Clyde’s place, right at the edge of the bluffs. Been there awhile, looked like.”

“Why he no run away?” Sal said.

“What you fucking saying?” Otto turned on him again.

“Not saying nothing. If is me, I woulda run away, that’s all.”

Otto pushed his face right up into Sal’s. “Woulda run away, would you? You’re not the one runs away, you greasy Eyetie sonofabitch, you’re the one gets hog-tied and shafted—every fucking day of your life.”

Bennet wedged his open hand between their faces and gently eased Otto’s head back. “Are we doing this or what?”

It took the men twenty minutes to get close to Clyde’s place, piled into Otto’s truck and Siggy’s cruiser. They parked a little way up a logging trail, out of sight of the road. The moon was close to full, which helped them through the woods toward the bluffs, where the hobo had previously set up camp. In just minutes they could make out the glow of a campfire.

“Jesus H, he’s still here,” Finn said. “If I was him I would’ve hopped the first freight car to Mexico.”

“That’s the criminal mind.” Siggy spoke with authority, as he thumbed in a cheekful of chaw. “They have their territory, like to stay near the site of a kill. Tell by his physiog he did it. Rapists have tapering fingers and deep-set eyes. In Europe that’s all they need to lock you up.”

“What’s ‘tapering’?” Goldwin was checking his own fingers.

“In their eyes”—Magnus forked his fingers dramatically toward his own eyes—“you can see the face of their last victim.”

“Or in this case, her ass,” Siggy mumbled through his chaw.

“What we going to do?” Sal asked. “I mean, we just going to tell him to get on his way?”

Otto slapped his shoulder. “He hog-tied and raped my daughter, you yellow-bellied peckerwood.”

“He’s going to hear us,” Goldwin hissed.