Dark of the Moon

there…”
     
    V IRGIL LEFT J OAN ’ S and cruised the back of the newspaper building, in a mood, now.
    A mood going sour.
    He saw Williamson’s truck; so he was probably in. He parked in the Ace Hardware lot for twenty minutes, watched the front of the newspaper, two blocks away, saw nothing. Moved to the McDonald’s lot, parked behind the restaurant, and watched the newspaper by looking straight through the building’s windows, feeling somewhat invisible.
    Forty-five minutes after he began watching, Williamson came out of the newspaper, walking fast, crossed the street in the middle of the block, and went into Johnnie’s Pizza. Five minutes later he came out with a pizza box and soft-drink cup, crossed the street back to his office.
    So Williamson was working. Virgil called Stryker: “I need to get you and five deputies to work tonight. I’d like to get the Curlys, Jensen, Carr, couple more guys. Hook up tonight at eight o’clock. To whenever.”
    “What are we doing?”
    “Surveillance and maybe an arrest. I’ll brief everybody at eight, at the courthouse. Tell everybody to be on time and to keep their mouths shut—I don’t want any of the other deputies to know about it.”
    “You think…”
    “Something could happen. Or maybe not. Can’t take a chance.”
     
    W HEN HE GOT OFF the phone, Virgil spent another ten minutes watching the news. Five o’clock. The rest of the day would drag. He’d deliberately set the meeting between Williamson and Jesse Laymon for after dark, because he thought the killer would feel safer. Fewer people around; and if he trailed Jesse afterward, he’d be easier to tag.
    Still: a long time to wait. Maybe go back to Joan’s? Maybe not. He thought about it, fired up the truck, and headed back to Worthington.
     
    M ARGARET AND J ESSE were in their room, watching a movie about languid Englishmen and-women who lived in London at the beginning of the twentieth century.
    “We’re kinda into this movie. Could we do the planning thing afterward? There’s only twenty minutes left.”
    “We got time,” Virgil said. He left his sound kit next to the bed, and went out to the lounge. Had a beer, watched the end of a Twins–White Sox game, and walked back to the room at seven o’clock.
     
    T O J ESSE: “There is some small risk for you, but not as much as letting him go on. I don’t believe there’s any chance that he’ll attack you at the Dairy Queen. Just in case, we’re gonna have a deputy sitting outside eating an ice-cream cone. I’m thinking Margo Carr, with a gun.”
    Margaret said, “If Todd is a lunatic, how do we know he won’t just explode and start killing people?”
    “Because if he is a lunatic, he’s a special kind,” Virgil said. “He’s a planner. He’s meticulous. He’ll do it, but he’ll lower his odds of getting caught, however he can. He won’t just start blasting away.”
    Jesse asked, “Then what do you think he’ll do?”
    “He’ll meet you. He’ll bullshit you. He’ll find out what you’re planning to do. Then he’ll come after you. Might have a long gun, pull up beside you on the road home, after you get off the highway, take a shot. Might dump his car and walk to your house, and then come in after both of you. That’s what we’re hoping he’ll do…”
    “You’re hoping he’ll do that?” Margaret asked.
    “Jim Stryker and I and the Curlys and Larry Jensen will be staking him out. Margo will be at the Dairy Queen. Two more will actually be inside your house—we’ll drop them off early. I’ll need a key from you. So Jesse goes and talks to Todd, then she gets in her truck and she takes off—and when she gets out on the highway, she really rolls.” He looked at Jesse. “You move just as fast as you’re comfortable with.”
    “I’m pretty comfortable with ninety,” she said.
    “That’s good. You’ve only got a few miles down to your exit, if you get even a small jump on him, he won’t be able to catch you before you get home. We’ll have two guys on the highway in front of you. When you get home, you go in the back door and right down the basement. The two guys who are in front of you will keep going, two blocks down the way, and then out on their feet. Then we’ve got two guys inside if he goes in after Jesse, and two outside, and two more right behind him.”
     
    “W HAT AM I doing during all this?” Margaret asked.
    “I’d like you to stay here,” Virgil asked. “Or wait in my room down in