Doyle took off his hat with one hand, still holding the dog in the other. “Ma’am, I wonder if I can ask you some questions?”

She nodded and blew her nose into a tissue.

“The man you saw doing jumping jacks—I wonder if there’s anythin’ you remember about him. How old would you say he was?”

“I think middle-aged. He was pretty far off.”

“Dark hair?”

“Maybe.”

Doyle shifted the dog on his hip. “Did he have a scar?”

“I think. Kinda across his face.”

He put on his hat. “All right. I appreciate you talkin’ to me.”

He and Midge walked to his truck. He put the dog on the passenger seat, and he thought about those boys. Maybe being hurt. Or maybe worse. He looked at Midge.

“He’s out there. Bardem. I wish he wasn’t, but he is.”

“So are those kids. They need us.”

“Get an APB on Bardem,” Doyle said, “and a story on the news for the kids.”

XVII

Sometimes you realize the things you thought you knew about the world might be a lie. You stop and see where you are, and everything’s confused, and you understand that it’s all chaos. The whole thing.

Snow covered the road and made humps over the dead crops on either side, and Jack let the humps guide him. Trudging the path before him. His steps hushed. The snow fluttering down. He didn’t know where he was going.

He walked for a while and then he left the path and waded uphill through deeper snow across the field and climbed a narrow draw. Trees here. Gunmetal sky. He saw a rabbit that didn’t try to run, and he stopped to watch it until the rabbit bounded off. He stood there looking at the tracks, and then he looked back the way he had come. He started to turn and go back, but then he didn’t. He put down the briefcase and sat on a stump to think.

Matty could be anywhere.

He needed coffee—that was what he needed. Matty could be anywhere, could be somewhere cold, somewhere getting colder. If he was going to find Matty … He swallowed and breathed roughly. There was only one person in the world who could tell him.

He put his head down in his hands and accepted this fact like a wound. Ava was probably gone now. There was no chance of reconciliation. The things he’d said. She’d never forgive him. She was gone. He spoke aloud:

“She lied to me.”

But she didn’t. He knew that, deep down.

Sitting on the stump, he felt a wave of dizziness and waited for it to pass. Eventually the snow, the white branches, the briefcase, and the stump refocused. How long could a person go without sleep? Blood ran down his shoulder. There was no Ava to patch him up. No Ava to talk to.