XVIII

This is one small story in an infinite number.

But it is mine.

Doyle got to the motel about ten minutes after the call. In the parking lot were two county patrol cars with lights circling. On the sidewalk lay broken glass. An officer was questioning a woman sitting in the open back door of an ambulance.

Midge found him. “Madison County sheriff called. It’s bad, Doyle. We got dead people all over the place.”

“You checked for ID?”

“I got nothin’.”

After he donned gloves he walked to the body lying by the truck and bent and brushed away the fine layer of snow. The man had been shot in the chest and neck, but his face was mostly intact. “You got casings?”

“Shotgun hulls and a couple nine millimeters.”

He looked up toward the motel balcony. Measuring the distance. The angle. A pink neon sign loomed above with the letter Os burned out. It read H T SH WERS.

“Up on the balcony you’ll find a second victim,” Midge said. “It ain’t pretty.”

“Shotgun?”

“Yup.”

“What does that woman say?”

“Saw a man doin’ jumpin’ jacks, and then he shot at somebody. That’s it.”

“You find anybody alive?”

“Not yet.”

He grimaced. “Where the hell’s the DEA?”

“An hour away,” she said. “There’s more, Doyle. Go up them motel stairs.”

They climbed the steps. Somebody had roped off what was left of the doorway. A trail of bootsteps led through the blood.

“It’s Armageddon,” Midge said. “Out-and-out carnage is what it is.”

He stooped under the tape. There was no good way around what was left of the body, so he just stepped over it as best he could. The first thing he saw was a juice box on the nightstand. Rumpled bedcovers. He stood there for a minute. Then he saw something lying on the floor and went over and picked it up. A toy car. He turned it over in his hand.

“Maybe we had those Dahl boys here,” Midge said. “Do you think?”

Doyle opened the dresser drawers. Box of cereal. Deck of UNO cards. He went to the bed and dropped down and looked underneath it. Wooden bed slats. Dust. A dark shape in the corner. Eyes.

An animal was there.

He pushed the bed away from the wall, and the dog shot out from beneath. Midge jumped.

“Don’t let it out.”

The dog was little. Hunkering by the television. Scared. Doyle walked over slowly and crouched. No collar. He put out his hand.

The dog didn’t move. Then it licked his fingers.

“Huh,” Midge said.

He picked up the dog, his arm under its ribs, holding it awkwardly. When they got downstairs, an EMT was taking the witness’s blood pressure. The witness looked pretty shook up.