Niceville

care.”
    “I will.”
    Merle stood up, moved forward to the end of the hall, reached a flat brick wall. The place had no windows. No glass inside either. No mirrors.It really was a kind of blockhouse. From outside, you could see the building was in the shape of a T.
    He reached the end of the main hall.
    The T went right and left, although he couldn’t see a thing and might as well have been blind. Whoever lived here didn’t like bright lights, didn’t like windows, didn’t like glass. He looked into the dark on his left, saw nothing, looked around to his right and saw a thin sliver of flickering light at the far end of the passage.
    A doorway, closed, with something beyond it, flickering. A familiar flickering blue light.
    A television.
    They may have cut the power out here, but it was still on in that room. He reached up and felt his left temple, touched raw flesh and warm wet liquid. He flexed his cheek and regretted it.
    He touched his left ear, or tried to.
    He didn’t have one anymore.
    But he was still on his feet and still moving.
    Sliding his hand along the wall, stepping carefully, he counted off a hundred paces down to the closed door at the other end of the hall.
    There was more light down here, coming from under the door, and as his eyes adjusted he saw that he was coming up on a gurney, parked outside a room. Something was lying on the gurney, covered by a sheet. He reached it, keeping the Colt on the shape, put out a hand, and lifted the cover.
    A dough-faced old man, cheeks blown out, eyes wide open, glazed in death. He reached down, felt for the wrist, and lifted it into the light coming from under the door, read the wristband:
    Zabriskie, Gunther (Plug) DEMENTIA—DNR
    Not Abel Teague, anyway.
    They had emptied out the whole place, except for the dead. He let the wrist fall, which it did slowly, rigor setting in, covered the old man again, and came to stand in front of the last door. He could hear voices, tinny and brittle, clearly coming from the television.
    He reached out, tried the handle.
    The door wasn’t locked.
    He steadied the Colt and used his left foot to ease the door open. A dark cell-like room, completely windowless, four tiled walls, the room about fifteen by twenty, almost completely empty, tile floors, a flat painted ceiling.
    There were only a few pieces of furniture in the room, a small flat-screen television set sitting on a card table, its glow lighting up the room, tuned to a cable news station, a large green leather armchair placed in front of the television, its back to the door.
    Over the top of the chair back Merle could see a dome of age-spotted skin surrounded by a halo of light from the television. On the television, two very blond females were having a heated argument over something to do with Israel.
    Merle came forward into the room, looking around carefully, stepped around the chair, and looked down at the man in the chair. A very old man, but not a ruin, still erect, completely bald, his skin spotted and withered, his cheeks sagging down in folds, his eyes nearly shut, glinting in the light from the television. The man was wearing an ornate silk bathrobe over blue silk pajamas. He had leather slippers on his feet, lined with lamb’s wool. His large bony hands were resting on his lap, one hand holding a television remote, the other a heavy glass with something pale in it, the liquid also luminous with the light from the television.
    A crystal decanter full of a clear liquid was sitting on the card table beside the television, next to a silver bucket full of ice.
    The man lifted the remote, turned off the sound, looked up at Merle, his wide-set gray eyes empty and cold. His thin blue lips moved.
    “I heard shooting,” he said. “I guess you’ve shot all my people, or we wouldn’t be talking.”
    “I guess I did.”
    Abel Teague studied him.
    “You could
see
them?”
    “I shot them, didn’t I?”
    He blinked at Merle.
    “If you could see
them
, son, and they could see
you
, then you’re in more trouble than I am. You’re more than halfway gone already.”
    “What were they?”
    The man shrugged, waved a bony hand in dismissal, took a sip of his drink, smiled up at Merle. His teeth were strong and white.
    “My people. I found out how to call them. Like she figured out how to call you, I guess.”
    “And now here I am. Get up.”
    “You know about her?” he asked.
    He had a soft Virginia accent and his voice, although weak, was clear.
    “I know