Lightning

solemnly. "It's for you."
    Ignoring the box, she said, "Tell me."
    "Open your gift first."
    "Oh, God, is it
that
bad? Is it so bad you have to soften the blow with a gift? Tell me. I can take it. Wait! Let me sit down." She pulled out a chair from the table and dropped into it. "Hit me with your best, big guy. I'm a survivor."
    "You've got too strong a sense of drama, Laura."
    "What're you saying? The book's melodramatic?"
    "Not the book. You. Right now, anyway. Will you for God's sake stop being the shattered young artiste and open your gift?"
    "All right, all right, if I've got to open the gift before you'll talk, then I'll open the bloody gift."
    She put the box in her lap—it was heavy—and tore at the ribbon while Danny pulled up a chair and sat in front of her, watching.
    The box was from an expensive shop, but she was not prepared for the contents: a large, gorgeous Lalique bowl; it was clear except for two handles that were partly clear green and partly frosted crystal; each handle was formed by two leaping toads, four toads altogether.
    She looked up, wide-eyed. "Danny, I've never seen anything like this. It's the most beautiful piece ever."
    "Like it, then?"
    "Good God, how much was it?"
    "Three thousand."
    "Danny, we can't afford this!"
    "Oh, yes, we can."
    "No, we can't, really we can't. Just because I wrote a lousy book and you want to make me feel better—"
    "You didn't write a lousy book. You wrote a toad-worthy book.
A four-toad
book on a scale of one to four, four being the best. We can afford that bowl precisely because you wrote
Shadrach
. This book is beautiful, Laura, infinitely better than the last one, and it's beautiful because it's you. This book is what you
are
, and it shines."
    In her excitement and in her eagerness to hug him, she nearly dropped the three-thousand-dollar bowl.
6
    A skin of new snow covered the highway now. The Jeep wagon had four-wheel drive and was equipped with tire chains, so Stefan was able to make reasonably good time in spite of the road conditions.
    But not good enough.
    He estimated that the tavern, where he had stolen the Jeep, was about eleven miles from the Packard house, which was just off state route 330 a few miles south of Big Bear. The mountain roads were narrow, twisty, full of dramatic rises and falls, and blowing snow ensured poor visibility, so his average speed was about forty miles an hour. He could not risk driving faster or more recklessly, for he would be of no use at all to Laura, Danny, and Chris if he lost control of the Jeep and plunged over an embankment to his death. At his current speed, however, he would arrive at their place at least ten minutes after they had left.
    His intention had been to delay them at their house until the danger had passed. That plan was no longer viable.
    The January sky seemed to have sunk so low under the weight of the storm that it was no higher than the tops of the serried ranks of massive evergreens that flanked both sides of the roadway. Wind shook the trees and hammered the Jeep. Snow stuck to the windshield wipers and became ice, so he turned up the defroster and hunched over the wheel, squinting through the inadequately cleaned glass.
    When he next glanced at his watch, he saw that he had less than fifteen minutes. Laura, Danny, and Chris would be getting into their Chevy Blazer. They might even be pulling out of their driveway already.
    He would have to intercept them on the highway, scant seconds ahead of Death.
    He tried to squeeze slightly more speed out of the Jeep without shooting wide of a turn and into an abyss.
7
    Five weeks after the day that Danny bought her the Lalique bowl, on August 15, 1979, a few minutes after noon, Laura was in the kitchen, heating a can of chicken soup for lunch, when she got a call from Spencer Keene, her literary agent in New York. Viking loved
Shadrach
and were offering a hundred thousand.
    "
Dollars
?" she asked.
    "Of course, dollars," Spencer said. "What do you think, Russian rubles? What would that buy you—a hat maybe?"
    "Oh, God." She had to lean against the kitchen counter because suddenly her legs were weak.
    Spencer said, "Laura, honey, only you can know what's best for you, but unless they're willing to let the hundred grand stand for a floor bid in an auction, I want you to consider turning this down."
    "Turn down a hundred thousand dollars?" she asked in disbelief.
    "I want to send this out to maybe six or eight houses, set an auction date, see what