The Web

Creedman stepped in front of me. "Stay back." The thin mustache was beaded with perspiration.

"Sure, Tom. But when this is over, share some gourmet recipes with me. How about girl bourguignon?"

Creedman's nostrils opened. From behind, Haygood cleared his throat and Creedman grabbed Moreland and cuffed him through the passage. Then he turned sideways and squeezed in himself. When he was several paces ahead of us, Haygood cupped Robin's buttock, squeezed, and shoved.

"Go, babe."

Then the heel of his hand hit me in the lower back.

We filed out. When the passage widened, Creedman stopped and Haygood herded us into the center. The dead eyes shifted as he heard something.

Music from the game room. The broken record removed. Something new asserting itself above the generator.

The wheels on the bus go round and round…

"What the…?" said Creedman.

The game room was less than thirty feet away, the door partially open.

Haygood said, "What's with the music?"

"I like music," said Moreland. "As I said, it's my refuge."

"Kiddie music?" said Creedman. "You are one buggy old fart." His eyes brightened: "Do you bring little girls down here to play?"

Moreland blinked. "Hardly."

"Hardly," Creedman imitated. "Maybe you bring kiddies down here to play doctor."

The doors on the bus go open and shut…

"Projection," said Moreland.

"What's that?"

"A Freudian term. Projecting one's own impulses onto someone else. That's what you just did, Tom."

"Oh, fuck off, you self-righteous bag of shit." To us: "Bet you didn't know Dr. Bill here was once the ace pussy-hound of the U.S. Navy. Big-time stud, chased everything in a skirt, the younger the better. Remember those days, Dr. Bill? Chasing and bagging, dark meat, light meat, any kind of meat? Just couldn't control your pecker, could you? Drove poor Mrs. Bill to one-way surfing."

Moreland said nothing, did nothing. That blank look…

"Turned herself to shark chum," said Creedman, "because Dr. Bill here couldn't stop playing doctor with the local pussy. Nice advantage, that M.D. Knock some little thing up, do your own abortion-"

"Unlike you," I said. "Assault with a dead weapon."

Creedman snarled. Haygood clicked his tongue and said, "Check out all these doors."

"Maybe you should," said Creedman. "You're the expert."

Haygood shrugged and pushed Robin, Moreland, and me close together. Backing away, he said, "Not the stomach, the head," and Creedman raised his gun till it was half a foot from Robin's right eye.

"Any problems," he said, "I want to see her brains on the wall."

He stepped back some more, pausing a few feet from the entrance to the latrine, then flattening himself against the wall the way cops do and inching toward the opening, gun first.

Waiting. Looking back at us. Waiting some more.

He peeked in. Took a long, slow look.

The broad face puzzled.

Moving to the next door, just as carefully.

"Wait," I said. "It's rigged- that door and the others. He's got it booby-trapped."

Haygood turned.

"He is nuts," I said. "Stockpiling food and clothes and survival gear, preparing for the end of the world. I'd let you blow yourself up, but he's rigged enough explosives to turn us all into soup."

"That so?" said Haygood.

"Tell him, Bill."

"Nonsense," said Moreland. "Utter nonsense."

Haygood thought a while. "What doors are you saying are rigged?"

"That one for sure," I said. "The room where the music's coming from has a package of dynamite hooked up to the record player. The cable runs into another room. Co

The drone.

"He's got it set up so if the record arm's lifted, boom. There are probably other traps, too, but that's the one he showed us."

"Ridiculous," said Moreland. "Go take a look, Anders."

"How about you go in there," Haygood told him. "Turn off the music while I watch you."

Moreland blinked. "I'd rather not."

"Why not?"

"Because it's silly," said Moreland.

"Come over here," said Haygood.

Moreland ignored him.

"Come over here, pissant."

Moreland closed his eyes and moved his lips silently.

Creedman took hold of his shirt and yanked him forward. "Move, you crazy asshole!"

Moreland passed within Haygood's reach and Haygood got behind him.

"Go," he said, shoving the old man.

Moreland stumbled and stopped. "I'd rather not."

"Go or I'll kill you, sir."

"I'd rather-"

"Okay," said Haygood, smiling at me. "Thanks for the tip, doc. What else should we know about?"

"I wish I knew."

The driver on the bus says, "Move on back…"

"Fucking maniac," said Creedman. "Let's shoot all of them right now and get the hell out of here, Anders."

"I don't think so," said Haygood.

Ordered by his bosses to keep Moreland alive. Till the insurance policy was found… Hoffman going along with the stalemate for thirty years, willing to wait a while longer.

Thirty years of silence from Moreland had convinced him the paradise needle had been forgotten. So he'd felt safe in refocusing his energies on Aruk. Wanting to destroy the island, depopulate it, rebuild it in his own image.

Moreland claimed it was simply greed, but I doubted it.

I visualized Hoffman at a D.C. power lunch with the brothers from Stasher-Layman. "Soft money" changing hands, a discussion of potential sites for a multibillion-dollar project, with Hoffman getting a chunk of the profits.

Storing human garbage along with plutonium and cobalt and strontium.

The need for an isolated spot. A remote place with no political constituency.

Hoffman smiling and coming up with one.

Finding out that Moreland still lived on Aruk, but that the doctor was unable or unwilling to reverse the island's economic problems. The population sliding, the welfare checks coming in regularly; what little commerce there was, dependent upon the Navy base.

Send in the advance team: Creedman, Haygood, the Pickers. Probably others. The goal: hasten the decline and isolate Moreland so that the old man would sell out cheap.

Then Moreland starts writing letters, and the team's told to speed things up.

Creedman and Haygood coming up with a grisly touch- perverse mastery over the case that had ruined their careers. A side benefit: slaking their own hatred for women.

The team… Lyman Picker's plane crash an accident or had his big mouth offended the higher-ups?

Haygood, living on Harry Amalfi's airfield, had been in a perfect position to mess with the plane.

Creedman… the crash had taken place just after Robin and I finished drinking with him outside the restaurant. Creedman and Jacqui had both gone inside, but after the explosion only Jacqui had come out.

Creedman not bothering because he'd known.

Someone else had known, too: Jo, opting out at the last minute. Opting out of the base di

"Okay, let's get out of here," said Haygood, pointing back to the rear ramp.

"Those boxes in the tu

"They could also be rigged. We'll check it out later."

"I opened a few boxes," I said. "All I saw was food and drugs and bottled water. Like I said, he's pla

"Stop being so helpful," said Creedman. "It won't do you any good."

Haygood said, "Come on, folks. Out." He might have been guiding a tour.

He turned his back on the music room and began to herd us forward.

"Actually," I said, "he does have some kids down here."

A strangled noise rose from Moreland's throat.