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glanced back at Henry before looking away. The man smiled, taking this acknowledgement as more than it was. He went back to searching for the right train.
    Inside the freight car, Bitch whined as she moved around the car. Every new scent bothered and repulsed her. Bones joined in, discovering even more blood. He soon identified the individual odors of six different people, the spilled blood belonging to two of them. The smell of death – feces and rot – was also in abundance.
    The train didn’t leave the yard for another half hour. When it finally did, it took about fifteen minutes to get up to speed and soon shot down the tracks like a rocket. Inside the car, without the sun heating the exterior, the floor, walls, and ceiling were soon as cold as a winter’s night. Bitch and Bones again huddled together for warmth, but this time in the corner farthest from the door.
    As the train pushed north and east, the exhaust fumes of the city melted into the distinct scent of pine. All at once, the odor of humans was commingled with that of deer, raccoon, possum, badger, and skunk.
    The dogs inhaled all of this, seeking out the familiar. For a long while, there was nothing. But when the train slowed as it neared the Bait-N-Booze, Bitch got to her feet and moved to the door. The train sounded its electronic horn the mandated four times, the sound echoing through the woods as if memorializing Ferris Aaron.
    The lights were still on in the shack, as two local deputies had been tasked with keeping looky-loos away. The press had gotten word of what went down just past noon. Bitch sniffed the air as the train rolled through the crossing as if trying to pick up any vestigial remnants of her old life. But as soon as any traces appeared, they were gone again. Another moment, and she returned to Bones’s side.
    It was forty-five minutes later when Bones smelled smoke. He clambered to his feet and moved unsteadily toward the door, the motion of the train wreaking havoc on his legs. Bitch was already at the open door, her nose bouncing up and down at the same scents. As the train neared the source, four large bonfires came into view just away from the tracks. In addition to the smoke, the dogs also smelled about three dozen people, the gasoline of several vehicles, a lake of booze, and a cornucopia of narcotics.
    Bones glanced down at Bitch, but she was already gone.
    “A quarter of a million dollars? That’s crazy! Who keeps that much cash?”
    “Somebody who went around the bend a long time ago and wasn’t never coming back.”
    The man who asked the question, clad in a black suit and tie, had an all-business haircut that matched his demeanor. He first scoffed, but then nodded, as if recognizing the veracity of the comment. The man who had spoken those words looked like the suited man’s idea of a necessary evil. His long gray hair flowed past his shoulders, and it looked like you could paint a barn with his thick, squared-off beard. He wore torn-up blue jeans, a black T-shirt, black handkerchief and slide, the leather cut with the sigils of the BCRA on the back, and black boots. Tattoos suggesting an aberrant personality crawled up and down his leathered arms.
    “Anything on the radio from the cops?” the suited man asked.
    “Worked out how it was supposed to.” The tattooed man shrugged, his voice a growl. “They think it was all inside the Cuno clan. Ferris fucked ’em somehow, so they came and knocked on his door. The handcuffs have them thinking Christopher was involved, as they don’t think Aaron could’ve delivered that kind of beating. They’ll spend the next few weeks chasing that angle.”
    “Just like you said they would.”
    The tattooed man, born Arthur Bigelow but who had gone by Monster for as long as anyone could remember, smiled. The suited man almost shuddered at how aptly the dangerous-looking mouthful of teeth matched the man’s nickname. Still, Monster and his boys had delivered. He nodded to a