“I came here last night.”

“I figured you did.”

Hook slowed the Jeep. “You want to stop in now?”

“Why? What’s in there? He’s not in there.”

Having no answer to that, Hook drove on.

A mile farther he pulled onto the shoulder and parked at the point where the blacktop joined the county road, a flat and barren intersection in which a corncrib and equipment shed stood by themselves in the center of a neatly plowed field. Until that fall the buildings had been part of the farm of Emma Danker, an old widow who had lived there alone for almost thirty years, renting out her land and raising roses and stray dogs. Helpless finally, she had been committed to a state institution by her relatives, who then had sold the farm to the neighboring Olson brothers, a sale and takeover that impressed Hook as truly Carthaginian, for the brothers had not only razed Emma’s house and barn and garden and felled her trees but had plowed the ground where it all had stood, leaving just the distant corncrib and shed, in which they stored their combine and cornpicker.

Getting out of the Jeep, Hook checked the rifles he had picked up at the farm, both war surplus Mi’s.

“That’s where I saw him last week,” Bobby pointed. “Next to the shed, just lying out there in the sun. All that’s happened, I forgot about it.”

Hook shook his head thoughtfully. “Christ, when did they commit the old lady? October, wasn’t it?”

“Why? Don’t you believe I saw him there?”

“Sure. It’s just hard to figure, that’s all. It’s been a long time. And I thought the humane society had picked up all her dogs.”

“Not him.”

“Let’s hope he’s still here.”

The dog was one of the dozens Emma had taken in and cared for over the years. Only where most of her strays had been small mongrels, this one had been a spectacular crossbreed, German shepherd and great Dane, Hook had judged by the look and size of it.

He handed one of the rifles to Bobby. “You go around on that side. I’ll move in from here. And remember—keep each other in view. And aim low. These things carry.”

Bobby nodded impatiently. He was not a novice with a gun.

“When you’re near enough, start throwing clods on the roof. That ought to bring him out. If he’s in there.”

“He’s in there.” The boy started across the plowed field, heading toward a point to the right of the shed.