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  Flynn and Russ accepted an invitation to spend the night at our house. They somehow negotiated a way to share the double bed in the downstairs guest room.

  I admit I was curious about the details. But neither of them offered any clues.

  Our little convoy was on its way into the mountains by seven the next morning.

  We arrived in Steamboat at 10:05. Flynn and Russ drove straight to the police station to find Percy Smith. I continued on to the Sheraton to try to confirm my lunch with Dorothy Levin.

  The base-area village for the ski resort is a couple of miles from the town of Steamboat, and the Sheraton is the dominant structure in the village. Even I didn't get lost. I tried Dorothy's room from the house phone in the lobby. She didn't answer. As I left yet another message on her voice mail I noticed a freshly printed sign hung on a banner above the entrance to the bar off the lobby. It read, "Welcome home, Joey. Way to go in Augusta." I returned to my car, and made my way out of town to the Silky Road Ranch. Over the course of the drive I went back and forth a half dozen times about whether or not I should try to interview Joey Franklin while I was in town.

  Despite the fact that Welle was in temporary residence at the ranch, there was no visible change in appearance at the entry gate. I left the engine of my car running as I walked up to the microphone and identified myself. A voice told me to stand back five feet. I did. Thirty seconds later, the voice told me to get in my car and wait for the gate to open. I did that, too.

  My mind wandered as I slowly drove the dirt lane into the heart of the ranch.

  My only real context for this huge property had been through the lenses of the news cameras that had recorded the aftermath of the brutal deaths of Gloria Welle and Brian Sample years earlier. As I approached the big ranch house, my eye sought the landmarks that I associated with that day. I identified the spot where the sheriff's vehicles had circled together like pioneer wagons. I decided which window it was that Brian Sample had busted out in order to fire at the deputies.

  I spotted the cedar deck that led from the master bedroom to the woods. I knew which garage bay Gloria Welle had used to park her green Range Rover.

  Pork chop Phil Barrett was waiting for my arrival. He almost filled an Adirondack chair on the front porch. I didn't consider it auspicious that the mug of coffee in his hand was adorned with the smiling face of Rush Limbaugh.

  "Doctor" he boomed, calling to me as though I might have somehow missed the fact that he was sitting there.

  I waved.

  "You're early," he said.

  "Didn't know how long it would take me to find you," I said as I stepped up onto the porch.

  "That's a lie, Doctor." Phil smiled broadly as he accused me.

  "I think you've been out this way before. Matter of fact, I know you have."

  I immediately decided that I would neither confirm the earlier visit nor defend my untruth.

  "If I arrived at an inconvenient time, I'm happy to wait in the car.

  Or even go back out to the road."

  "No. No. Sit right down here next to me. I have some coffee coming for you. How do you take it?"

  "Black."

  "I guessed that right. Look at this day." He opened his arms to the expanse of the valley.

  "Now aren't you glad you decided to come up here and spend another day in all this beauty?"

  The horseshoe of peaks surrounding the ranch was stunning in its summer splendor. The green trees played off the distant granite, and the pastures and cultivated fields glistened in the light breeze.

  "It is beautiful," I acknowledged.

  "But the reason I came is because I had to. You know that. My being up here has inconvenienced a lot of people."

  He shrugged; he wasn't moved. Inconveniencing strangers cost Phil Barrett no sleep whatsoever.

  I sat next to him on a chair identical to his. An athletic young woman in jeans and a pale green polo shirt brought coffee. She smiled at me with a look that I interpreted as sympathy. I thanked her while trying to convey the same sentiment back to her. I was relieved that my mug wasn't adorned with Rush Limbaughs face.

  It was decorated with Dilbert's.

  I decided to try some small talk.

  "Until now, I've only seen this house on the news."

  Barrett immediately knew what I was referring to.

  "That was a day. Let me tell you. I was here, you know. I was the commanding officer who gave the order to fire on the rascal."

  The rascal?

  "Yes," I said.

  "I do recall that."

  "Only three rounds were fired by the guys in the white hats that morning. First two of them hit him. Either of the two would have been kill shots. My boys did good work. I only have one regret, one wish. Only wish we'd made it out here before he got to Gloria."

  "Yes." I paused.

  "He didn't really give you a chance though, did he? Didn't he shoot her before you got here?"

  "Actually, right after we pulled up is when we heard the three shots come from inside the house. Didn't know he was shooting Gloria right then, but the possibility certainly crossed my mind at the time." He turned his mug upside down and let the last few drops of his coffee drip onto the porch.

  "Been over that day a thousand times. I wouldn't play it any different if it happened here today. You know, I mean, now. All in all, though, quite a shame.

  Quite a shame."

  I couldn't think of a way to respond.

  "Yes, a tragedy."

  "Crazy men do crazy things."

  I nodded, but quickly decided that I didn't want to discuss Brian Sample's mental health with Phil Barrett. I asked, "Where's the original house, Phil?"

  He pointed down the hill.

  "Can't see if from here."

  "And the stable and bunkhouse? I understand Gloria built some truly special buildings. Where are they?"

  He'd been sliding his coffee mug on the wooden arm of the Adirondack chair. He stopped the motion and said, "Huh?"

  "I heard that Gloria had a pretty impressive bunkhouse. Nice digs for her ranch hands. That's not exactly true?"

  "Oh, oh. Those? Ray doesn't use them except for some storage. I don't think about them much." He stood and pointed toward the southeast. I had to stand, too, just to gaze past him to look where he was pointing.

  "Follow that dirt lane with your eyes. You can see the stable and part of the corral poking out from behind that stand of aspen. See it?"

  I did.

  "Ray's not fond of horses?"

  Phil laughed his response.

  "Nope. That was Gloria's thing. Ray isn't exactly here at the Silky Road very often, anyway. Most of our time we're in Washington or on the road in the district. This is a big district. Spend a lot of days taking the pulse of the constituents, you know. One good thing-I'm glad Gloria never had to see that stable empty. That would've broken her heart." "I'm sure that's true," I said, making conversation.

  "Tell you what, though, I think Ray has some plans for all that space after he retires from public life. I wouldn't be surprised if he sets up a recording studio out there, gets back into radio."

  "Really? Back into radio?"

  "Sure. He calls it the pulpit of the new millennium. Ray's a preacher at heart.

  Don't you think?"

  I hadn't thought about it, of course, but at first blush it didn't seem too far off the mark. I decided to consider the thought further. First I said, "This is all a major change for you, Phil. Do you miss what you were doing before? Miss. being in law enforcement, I mean."

  He sat back down before he answered.

  "You know, sometimes I do. But in a small town like this, being sheriff can get pretty routine. Which is something I can't say about being in Washington. I like my life now just fine, thanks."

  I nodded as though I were being agreeable though I wasn't feeling particularly agreeable.

  "I saw a sign in town that seemed to indicate that Joey Franklin is in Steamboat today. Do you know h
im? Do you ever get to play golf with him? I would think that would be a thrill."

  Phil stretched his neck and made a valiant effort to touch his chin to his chest. Wasn't going to happen.

  "Golf is not my game. But the congressman plays.

  As a matter of fact, he and Joey are playing nine as we speak."

  Hadn't Percy Smith told me he'd played golf with Phil? Why the lie? I glanced at my watch so that Phil couldn't see how perplexed I was. He saw me check the time.

  "Don't worry. They teed off at eight-thirty at the course at the Sheraton.

  He should be back out here any minute." "Good," I said. I was aware that Barrett hadn't answered my question about being acquainted with Joey Franklin. I decided that pressing the issue would be too obvious. Instead I asked, "Do you stay out here when the congressman is in town, Phil? On the ranch, I mean?"

  He nodded.

  "I still have my old place in town, rent it out. Good location, do pretty well with it actually. But it's more convenient for everybody if I'm out here close by trying to keep messes from oozing under the congressman's door.

  That's my job, protecting him from blind sides I think of him as the quarterback of the team. And I like to think of myself as the offensive line.

  Unheralded but essential. That's me. I keep Ray Welle from getting sacked."

  I thought, Well, you certainly have the size to play the position. I kept the thought to myself. What I said was, "It's ironic, don't you think, that you ended up living out here? After what happened?"

  He shrugged. Apparently he didn't see the irony.

  I snapped my fingers as though I'd just remembered something I wanted to ask him.

  "I knew there was something important I was meaning to talk to you about, Phil.

  The two girls-Mariko and Tami? I heard that they got into a little trouble with your office just a few months before they disappeared. Something about some skinny-dipping and some dope up at Strawberry Park?" "Let me think," he said.

  He thought for half a minute. I assumed he knew exactly what I was asking about, which meant that he required half a minute to choose and polish a falsehood to serve me on a dish.

  "You know, I do remember them coming in for something like that. My memory is that that's why the Oriental girl ended up seeing Ray for mental help. You know? Of course you know-you're here to see Ray about the mental help he provided for the Oriental girl, right?"

  I was trying hard not to be disagreeable. But I couldn't keep myself from giving the "Oriental" girl a name.

  "Mariko Hamamoto. Tami Franklin's friend. What's surprising is that there's nothing in the murder book that refers to the girls' being arrested at all.

  I've read the reports quite carefully. Does that, I don't know, concern or surprise you-that the incident wasn't part of the initial investigation?"

  He harrumphed.

  "No, can't say that it does."

  "Do you mind telling me why?"

  "Do I mind? Or will I tell you anyway?" He slapped his knee, thought his comeback was pretty amusing.

  "Will you tell me anyway?"

  "Sure. The reason there was no report is that they were never arrested. They were never charged. I met with the parents myself after the girls were brought in. Came to a reasonable disposition with the parents. I promised to throw the book at the two of them if it ever happened again. Didn't ever have any more trouble with those girls until… well, you know." I said, "I know."

  But I remained skeptical. Taro Hamamoto was certainly still under the impression that his daughter had been arrested and charged with a crime after the police had picked her up. I supposed that his cultural unfamiliarity with our legal system could have left him confused about what had actually happened.

  Or I supposed Phil Barrett could have been lying to my face at that very moment.

  "As sheriff I was, mostly, a compassionate man," Phil Barrett explained.

  "They were good kids who made a mistake. I decided not to make them pay for it for the rest of their lives. That's all." scene that began unfolding below the horizon in front of me felt a little like an old western movie. A plume of dust had kicked up down the trail, and over my shoulder the sun was riding high in the sky above the distant peaks.

  Pointing in the direction that the dust cloud was rising, Phil said, "I bet that's the congressman now."

  Distances on the ranch were deceiving. Although the gate to the Silky Road was visible from the porch, the dirt lane that ran from the entrance soon descended and meandered alongside a dry creek bed, where it temporarily disappeared from view from the house. The road curled around for quite a ways in a pattern that roughly followed the confusing path of the creek before climbing back up toward the house.

  Phil and I sat silently watching the progress of the cloud of dust that was Raymond Welle's vehicle as it tracked slowly through the dry bottoms near the creek bed and then through the wide expanse of high prairie that carpeted the dirt all the way up to the house.

  "He loves this ranch," Phil told me.

  "He was born and raised in Manitou Springs, of course, but he calls this place home."

  I sipped bitter coffee from my Dilbert mug. I hadn't known that Ray was from Manitou, but I didn't see that it was relevant to much. I said, "I think it would be pretty easy to love this ranch."

  Phil shot a glare my way. I guessed that he was wondering if I had been sarcastic with my comment about the ranch. To put him at ease I said, "Most of us can only dream of having a spread like this, right, Phil?"

  "Amen," he said. I suspected that it was a word that rarely crossed Phil Barrett's lips on any given Sunday.

  Raymond Welle's vehicle was finally pulling up to the house. The car, if you could call it that, was actually a snow-white Humvee. I should have been more surprised than I was. Welle was driving the huge thing himself. The young woman in the jeans and polo shirt who had delivered my coffee rushed out the front door to meet him. I wondered if that was part of her job description. Ray jumped out with the motor still running. A light breeze was to his back, and it carried his crisp radio voice to the porch. I heard him say, "My clubs are in the back, Sylvie. They'll need to come back to Washington with me this time.

  Pack 'em up careful, okay? I don't want to see any scratches on that new driver."

  I didn't hear him say "please."

  Phil Barrett stood, and I decided I should, too.

  Still twenty yards from the porch, Raymond said, "Joey let me beat him on a par three, Phil. The fourth, you know that one? The one with the green by the creek?

  After I got a lucky tee-shot that left me a three-footer for a birdie, I think he intentionally put his in the sand so that I could say I beat him on a hole.

  Had witnesses for it, too. Good kid. Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. Nice of him. Nice gesture. Only wished I had time to play eighteen with him. Who knows, I might have gotten lucky a second time." He reached into his pocket, pulled out a golf ball, and held it high in the air.

  "I kept the ball I used, too. He even initialed it for me. When Joey goes and finally wins one of the majors, this will be a sweet memory for me."

  He stuffed the ball back in his pocket.

  "Alan, Alan. Welcome to Gloria's Silky Road. I can't tell you how grateful I am to you for pulverizing your schedule to accommodate my need to return to Washington. So kind of you. So kind. Please offer my personal apologies to all of your patients for the inconvenience I've caused them." He hopped up the two steps to the porch and held out his hand to me.

  "I'll be sure to do that, Ray" Yeah, right after I distribute copies of my driving record and income tax returns to each of them.

  "The only good news for me is that its real likely that they're all living outside my district. Don't have to worry much about voter backlash." He laughed and moved toward the front door.

  "Come on inside, now. It's starting to get warm enough to cook oatmeal out here." We walked inside and stood in a bright entryway. The walls were papered in rich red pa
isley and the floor was made of octagonal limestone tiles. To my left I saw the huge post-and-beam space where Gloria Welle and Brian Sample had shared tea and Girl Scout Cookies. Ray said, "Phil, go find those files for me and bring them to us in the study."

  I followed Welle down a narrow hall to a pine-paneled study. The room was large, but warm. One wall was covered with bookcases. I've learned that my eyes are as magnetically attracted to a wall of books as they are to a woman's cleavage. I had to remind myself not to be distracted, and I tried to stay focused on my conversation with Welle.

  "Sit, sit."

  I did, in a leather club chair beside a low table that had been built on a frame fashioned from an old wagon wheel. The wheel caused me to recall the photograph that Kimber Lister had used to begin his film about the two dead girls. Tami and Miko against a background of an old wagon wheel.

  I expected Ray to take his place behind the monstrous desk halfway across the room. He didn't. He chose another one of the club chairs. As he sat down, his trousers rode up, and he spent a few moments trying to free his boxers or his briefs from the confines of his crotch. He yanked and tugged at his underwear as though I weren't even in the room.

  Finally he said, "I don't know about you and the way you practice. But I've never been comfortable just handing over case files. I actually like to review them, explain them."

  "Sometimes I feel the same way. Ray."

  "Good!" he said much too jubilantly.

  "Glad to know we're on the same page. Phil should be in here any second with those files. Phil! Hey!"

  Phil chose that second to waddle through the door shaking two manila folders.

  "Sylvie had these in the lockbox of papers that were packed to go back to the District. I had to dig them out." He handed the files to Raymond. I could tell he was dying to be invited to take a chair.

  Without looking up Ray said, "This will be one of those clinical talks you're not allowed to listen to, Phil. Sorry. We won't be long."

  Phil looked hurt.

  "Oh. Sure. Sure. I'll be, uh, following up with Senator Specter's office about that highway matter, Ray. I'd like to have that whole thing settled before we get on the plane." To me, Phil said, "The congressman is trying to get funding for two additional lanes on 1-25 south out of Denver."