Metzger's Dog

that.”

“She’s really my wife. About thirty years, and I love her very much.”

“What a cold-blooded bastard you are to bring her here.”

She could see Porterfield shake his head, but his face was obscured. He said, “She’s safer here than she’d be at our hotel. We both enjoyed your wedding.”

“How did you know who we are?”

“Now and then some people I know take pictures in airports. It’s usually international flights, but not always, so I thought I’d ask. There were three very good pictures of you and me. I have other friends who can call up the records of the Department of Motor Vehicles, including pictures on licenses, and others who can lift a fingerprint from a used airline ticket. It’s a long story.”

“You must be exhausted. What are you going to do now?”

“Drink champagne, meet your parents, maybe dance a little if Alice is willing to put up with me.”

“You said to burn the papers, but we didn’t. We still have them.”

Porterfield touched her arm. “Of course you do. Hang onto them. Your job is to protect them for us. Stay healthy, live a long life. Have lots of kids so there will always be somebody around to take care of those papers. As long as there is, we’re not going to worry, because you’re never going to reveal them.”

“Because you know who we are.”

Porterfield let the implications settle into Margaret’s consciousness, then said, “Now let me join Alice and celebrate your wedding. I doubt that there’s anybody here who more sincerely wishes you a long and happy life.”

“Thanks,” said a male voice behind him.

Porterfield didn’t move his head. “Is that you, Chinese? After all I’ve read about you in the past few days I’m glad to finally meet you.”

“Thick file?”

Porterfield shrugged. “You and your friends have done a lot of soldiering in a lot of places. American ex- sergeants who turn up as majors and colonels in Africa or Asia make the people at the regional desks curious. But you’re too rich now for anything but early retirement.” He shook Chinese Gordon’s hand. “Congratulations. She’s a beautiful girl.”

37                   It was four o’clock in the morning when Chinese Gordon climbed out of bed in the bungalow in the garden of the Biltmore Hotel. Margaret stirred in her sleep and then tugged the extra covers up over her bare shoulder. Chinese Gordon studied her as he pulled on his pants. The sight of her made his breath catch in his throat. She seemed so tiny and vulnerable, and yet there was something about the way her lips turned up slightly at the corners in a serene smile that made him want to touch her.

He had to go out now, though, before the hotel gardeners arrived, or it would be too late. He tiptoed to the door and pulled the key quietly from the lock. He opened the door and held it until the dog passed out into the garden.

Chinese Gordon and the huge black dog walked across the wet grass in the darkness, then down the stone steps to the cool, damp sand. Every few seconds there was a crash of surf and then a hissing as the wave subsided, boiling and bubbling, back into the ocean. Then there was a long lull, and he could hear the loud, excited panting of the great black dog beside him as they walked down the beach.

Chinese Gordon said, “You can run now, boy.”

The dog stood still, and he could feel its eyes looking up at him in the moonlight.

Chinese Gordon knelt on the sand beside the looming shape of the dog. “You’re not locked in a hotel anymore, you big vicious bastard. Enjoy yourself.” Chinese Gordon patted the dog’s back and stood up. He began to trot, and the dog trotted with him. They loped down onto the smooth, hard sand at the edge of the surf. Sometimes the water would wash up to Chinese Gordon’s ankles, and he would splash through it. It seemed to excite the dog, and he would run out into the surf and run back, circling Chinese Gordon easily. When they passed the first jutting point they were out of sight of the hotel. Before them a mile of empty beach stretched into the darkness. Chinese Gordon’s heart was pounding in his chest. He shouted to the dog, “Now run. Go get ’em.”

The great black dog galloped ahead of him down the beach, his long legs taking leaping strides, his paws kicking up little sprays of sand behind him. Chinese Gordon sat down and watched. In the moonlight he could see the dog diminish in the distance, a small black shape on the white sand streaking off in a meandering pattern as though he were trying to cover the whole beach, step on every spot.

Chinese Gordon lay on his back and looked up at the stars, letting his wind come back to him. In another hour the sun would come up. He rested, feeling his breathing deepen and the pulse in his temples slow. At last, above the sound of the ocean, he heard the thumping of the dog’s paws and the huffing of his breath as he approached.

Chinese Gordon sat up and looked into the dog’s broad face. “I guess it’s time we started back.” He raised himself to his feet and began to jog back up the beach. The dog seemed to hesitate until he called, “Come on, boy. Come on, Porterfield,” and then he heard the sound of the big animal’s heavy paws as it moved up beside him in the darkness.

THE EDGAR AWARD-WINNING FIRST NOVEL FROM THOMAS PERRY

“Thomas Perry makes a stunning

debut with The Butcher’s Boy,

a brilliantly plotted thriller.”

–The Washington Post

Available now from

Random House

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THOMAS PERRY graduated from Cornell University with honors in English in 1969 and received a Ph.D. in English from the University of Rochester in 1974. He has been a university administrator and teacher, a writer- producer of prime-time network television series, and a writer of fiction. He is the author of fourteen critically acclaimed novels, including the Edgar Award winner The Butcher’s Boy and its sequel, Sleeping Dogs, the five-volume Jane Whitefield series, the national bestsellers Death Benefits and Pursuit, and the New York Times bestseller Nightlife.