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was looking for just a tiny little bit of what that bastard owed me,” Delonie said.

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    “You mean like part of the money out of old man Handy’s safe?” Garcia asked.
    “That’d be just fine,” Delonie said, wiping his eyes again. “If I found all of it, it wouldn’t cover what he owes me.”
    “I don’t think there’d be enough money in the whole world to cover what he did to you,” Leaphorn said. “Not for the way he treated all of you at Handy’s.”
    “Well . . .” Delonie said, staring at Leaphorn. He nodded.
    “You know, if you do find a bunch of money,” Garcia said, “or anything valuable, you’d have to—”
    “Sure, sure,” Delonie said. “I know the law. I’d turn it all in. I know that. I was just curious.”
    “Any place in the store there where we can sit down and talk?” Garcia asked.
    Totter’s store had been pretty thoroughly stripped of furniture, but a table with bench seating had been shoved against a wall amid a jumble of fallen shelving. Delonie sat on the table bench. Garcia stood looking at him.
    Leaphorn wandered to the back door, noticing how lines of dust blown in through the vacant windows had formed across the floor, observing the piles of leaves in the corners, thinking how quickly nature moved to restore the damage done by man. He looked out at the burned remains of the gallery section, remembering how a typical torrential rain of the monsoon season had arrived in time to save this part of the Handy’s establishment. But not much left of the adjoining Indian artifacts gallery or its storage room where Shewnack had his sleeping space.
    Where Shewnack’s cigarette had ignited the fire. Where Shewnack was too drunk to awaken. Where Shewnack 72
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    had burned to bones and ashes. Behind him Garcia was asking Delonie what he had been doing lately, where he was working.
    Leaphorn walked out into the yard, around the building, toward Delonie’s vehicle. It was a dirty Jeep Cherokee, middle-aged, with the dents and crunches of hard use. A brown woolen blanket was folded on the front seat. Through the driver’s-side window he could see nothing interesting. Scanning through the rear side windows revealed only Delonie’s habit of tossing old hamburger wrappers and beer cans there instead of into garbage cans. He lifted the rear door, checked around, found nothing. On the passenger’s side, he opened the front door, felt under the seat, extracted an old New Mexico road map, put it back. Checked the glove box and found it locked. Checked the door pockets. Another New Mexico road map, newer version. Stared at the folded blanket, detecting the shape of something under it. He reached in and lifted the end of it. It was covering a rifle.
    Leaphorn folded the blanket back. The rifle was an old model Savage 30-30, a fairly typical type of deer rifle that had been popular when he was young. What was less typical was the telescopic sight mounted on it. That looked new. Leaphorn pulled the blanket back over the rifle, restored its folds, and walked back into the building.
    Delonie was shaking his head, looking grim.
    “So you didn’t just get out here today?” Garcia asked.
    “Yesterday,” Delonie said. “I’m about ready to give up.”
    “You just came looking for anything useful Shewnack might have had that didn’t get burned up with him?”
    “Like I said, I figured if he had any money with him, THE SHAPE SHIFTER
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    if he was planning to stay with Totter as a hired hand, he might have tucked it away someplace safe. Maybe buried it. Hid it under something.”
    “But you didn’t find anything?”
    “Not yet.”
    “You think you will?”
    Delonie thought a while. “I guess not. I think I’m ready to quit looking.” He sighed, took a deep breath, looked down. “Don’t know,” he said. “I guess maybe I found what I really wanted. I wanted to just see for myself that the bastard was really dead.” He looked up at Garcia, then