Bitterroot (Billy Bob Holland 3)

The talk-show host propped his chin on his thumb and smiled slightly.

"You sure you want to be saying all this?" he asked.

"Oh, Nicki's become one of the family, so to speak. He put up a big chunk of money for my wife's new picture."

"I hear you're separating," the host said.

"Yeah, who'd believe it?" Xavier said, and laughed and looked knowingly at the camera.

I went back to the table and sat down.

"I wonder if Molinari watches much television," I said.

Later, we went to a movie in the refurbished vaudeville theater by the river. When we came out the sun had gone down and the moon had risen like a yellow planet over the Bitterroots. We walked down an outside flight of iron stairs to a parking area under the Higgins Street Bridge. There was a supper club below the movie theater, and the wide glass doors were open and an orchestra was playing dance music.

"You want to go inside?" Temple said.

"No," I said.

"Why not?" she asked.

"Because right here is good enough."

I put one arm around her waist and lifted her right hand in mine, but she dropped my hand and put both arms around my neck and we danced in the parking lot, under the great dome of heaven itself, surrounded by mountains that had changed little since the Earth was new, in a breeze that smelled of the river and all the trees and flowers that grew along it, to music that had been composed sixty years ago by Benny Goodman. An audience of college kids watched us from the bridge overhead and applauded when the song ended.

Maybe the Earth is better or more beautiful and life more wonderful in another place than it was at that moment. But I seriously doubt it.

Lucas did not return that night from his job at the Milltown Bar. Just before dawn I heard a car out in the field and I looked out the back door and saw Lucas get out of the car and walk around the side of the house toward his tent. I slipped on my jeans and boots and a nylon vest and put on my hat and walked down in the grayness of the morning to the riverbank.

"Can I come in?" I said, pulling back the flap to his tent.

"Hope you didn't worry about where I was at," he said,

"Just because you're out all night? Not in the least. Who dropped you off?"

"An Indian guy."

"That clears it up. Do I smell perfume?"

"Lay off it, Billy Bob." He was sitting up on his sleeping bag, pulling off his boots.

"Where's Sue Lynn?" I asked.

"What are you gonna do if I tell you?"

"She's wanted for questioning in a double homicide. Use your brains, Lucas."

He threw one of his boots against the wall of the tent. "I knew you was gonna get on my case," he said.

"You want the ATF to find her first?" I said.

His face was fatigued, his hair in his eyes. He folded his arms around his knees and glowered into space.

"She says Carl Hinkel's people are looking for her. They think she knows stuff she don't," he said.

I didn't reply. I went out the flap and took his frying pan and coffeepot out of his grub box and built a fire and started breakfast. It was still cold and misty and the fire felt warm against my face. I heard Lucas behind me.

"Midway up Swan Lake," he said.