recede, and her nervousness would begin again, and Julian would fold inward again.

Life was life, and the facts of life were simple and unyielding. First there was Howard, who was to be obeyed, with his sarcasm, his cruelty, and the long bitter battles that drove Ruth away again and again. Above his father was a uniformed unknown, the Army, which was powerful and treacherous. His modier, when she came into his life at all, brought warmth and happiness and love. But then she was gone again, without warning, and he was alone with Howard.

He hated it. His rebellion was total, and oblivious to consequences. There were the schoolyard fights, the petty larceny, the bitter obsessive competition. His classmates hated him because he hurled back their overtures of friendship with sarcastic bitter words from Howard's mouth. His teachers hated him, and he returned this with interest. And as the reports sifted home, into Howard's hands, he knew that Howard hated him, and was disgusted with him, and despised him, and for this there was no answer, no way to fight back.

He found himself one day pointing a rifle at his father's back. He could not remember the circumstances; he could remember clearly the long, glinting barrel of the rifle, the sight at the end, his father's back through the open window clearly outlined. The gun was loaded, and he could see the exact spot where die bullet would hit; he could visualize excitedly the exact action of his father falling forward against the desk, collapsing to the floor, writhing and spurting blood and dying. He saw it coldly, clinically, without the slightest flicker of concern or affection. He could do it, and then Ruth would come home and stay home. His finger was tightening on the trigger when it occurred to him that Ruth would probably be upset, so he lowered the gun and returned it carefully to the gun rack. The next day he took the rifle out to a quarry and threw it into thirty feet of water.

Then, incredibly, the crash, and the storming of the Rocket Project. He was thirteen when the mobs smashed into the compound at White Sands, murdering, sacking and burning their way to the hated spaceships and all who had worked on them. The rumors of the "gasoline day" gauntlet spread with the growing national riot, where scientists and engineers and technicians were wrapped in gasoline-soaked rags, set aflame, and forced to race each other a hundred yards to a single waterfilled drum, as the mob lined up screaming on either side.

The mob came to their part of the compound, and Julian's father did not hesitate a second. He snatched up a box of shells, and opened the gun rack as the shouting, angry, blood-hungry gang reached the front door. But the rifle was not in the gun rack.

Three of the men were killed and two others beaten senseless before they broke Howard Bahr's arm and knocked him down and dragged him out into the street. They caught Julian and Ruth and hauled them out to watch the beating and mutilation, and finally the inferno, all of which Howard endured with stubborn, scornful silence. That day Julian realized something very surprising about his father, yet even as he watched the orange flames consuming the dead body he felt a strange excitement and release.

He wrung free of the man holding him, picked up a gasoline can and sloshed it in the face of the bully who had led the execution. The man roared and lunged at him, but Julian jumped back over the fire. The flames caught the man, and while he thrashed and screamed and rolled on the ground Julian broke and ran through the compound, dodging into the flickering shadows thrown by the fires, running until there were no more footsteps, until he was gasping for air choking with exhaustion and fear. In the distance he heard the shrill tortured screams, but they did not interest him. He had killed a man, but that was not enough. There was more to do before the job was complete. He had to kill them all.

He found Ruth standing in the shadows waiting for him in the smoking ruins of the houses when he returned, after the men had gone. She had not gotten away, and she had not been killed. Her mouth was drawn into a thin line, and she moved very slowly and painfully, and she would not look into his eyes.

A confusion of nightmare days and nights, then. There was violence, and more violence, as everyone connected with the space projects fled for their lives. Julian lived with Ruth in part of an abandoned church, and he begged, and stole, and foraged, like everyone else in the early days of the crash, seizing anything to live on or trade with. Ruth was changed, she never seemed to be herself. She was always talking and laughing without making sense, talking about her school days in Vermont and her father's pipe, and acting as though there hadn't been any crash.

One night she had shown Julian a small bottle, and he had been afraid it was poison until she explained. "I've kept it for weeks. A very expensive fragrance." She held it to his nose, her eyes bright, and his flesh crawled on his spine as he realized it was nothing but perfume. "Of course it's worthless now," she said. "All fine beautiful things are worthless now. I'll have to go home soon." She had held his hand against her cheek, kneeling beside him in the darkness as if she expected him to say something reassuring, but there was nothing to say. He couldn't steal enough to feed both of them. He had pulled his hand away.

And the next night, when he came home from scavenging, Ruth was gone. All the food, clothes and cigarettes he had been hoarding were also gone. He searched for two days, but he could not find her. Then he made an impossible decision, crept through the guarded double-fence of the Military Police compound and headed toward the well-lit barracks in die officer's quarters.

There were many women there, with hungry pinched faces. Someone was playing a piano, and through the partly opened door he could see Ruth dancing while everybody watched. Her face was flushed, her eyes were sharp and hard with a vision of death and hatred. The men laughed and shouted to her, and she smiled, and sang something in French, and went on with her dance.

Julian had turned and walked away, then, and never looked back. Until now, as he walked through Libby's empty apartment, staring at the empty drawers, the empty closet, the empty crib.

He drove his fist down on the table, snapping a leg and splintering the top. Pain surged through his wrist, and rage boiled out of control. He moved about the room, half-blind, smashing, kicking, destroying until the rage had burned down to a hard red coal. Then he opened the door and went out into the hall.

Libby had walked out. After all he had done for her, even after what had happened tonight, she had walked out, left him flat, turned her back on him.

But this time he wouldn't walk away.

This time he wasn't hungry, frightened, helpless. This time he was in command, and he would see her burn in hell before he was through with her. This time she would suffer, the way he had suffered.

And then, when he was through with her, there was the boy.

He turned to his men, and swiftly, carefully, he began giving his orders.