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Three point six million,' Sayles says slowly, and the discussion goes round and round again. Sayles begins to understand something. These men court clients and patients and chief executive officers who routinely write them checks often twenty a hundred thousand dollars. They live with streaked-haired, face-lifted wives and are limoed to art museums and restaurants and offices. Aside from semiyearly meetings at Auden, Palm Springs and Aspen, they are never seen west of Amish country. He decides their interest in their alma mater is just that - an interest, nothing more. He is sickened by their suggestions, which are paltry and, worse, obvious; they are student responses to the assignment 'How to Save Auden University.'

By the time the last dots of syrup have been sucked out of the fruit cups, Randy Sayles senses with a feeling of terrible waste that he is alone in this struggle to keep the school afloat. The school. And his own career. And perhaps his freedom.

The Easterners promise to keep their thinking caps on. They promise to increase their personal pledges. They promise to mount a campaign among their peers in the East. Then they shake Sayles's hand and climb into the limo (university-financed, fifty-six dollars an hour) for the ride to Harrison County Airport.

Sayles is in terrible despair. He returns to his office and, with the help of one of the school's lawyers, fills out a Section 34 form requesting emergency state aid for private educational institutions. Too little. At best, Auden might receive six hundred thousand. But Sayles urges the lawyer to file the application anyway and to do so by fax. In a daze he watches the gray-suited lawyer leave his office and he has a vivid image from one of his own lectures - not of George H. Thomas rallying his troops to a bloody defiant stand but rather of Union General Irvin McDowell at Manassas Junction, watching in confused despair the spirits of his many men fly to heaven under the shocking clatter of Jackson's guns.

Special to the Register - The carcass of a recently killed and skinned goat was found in a fourth-grade classroom in the New Lebanon Grade School yesterday.

The carcass was discovered by a janitor at six a.m. and had apparently been left after the school was closed at midnight. The vandal gained access to the school by breaking through a ground-floor washroom window. No one was in the building at the time.

A large quantity of blood - believed to have come from the animal - was smeared on the walls of the classroom.

The room will be closed for cleaning for several days. Fourth-grade students will attend class in the school's recreation room.

Investigators feel this incident may be related to the rape and murder ofanAuden University coed by the so-called 'Moon Killer' on the night of April 20. School officials reported that the vandal wrote the word 'Lunatic'on the classroom wall in blood.

This word comes from the Latin 'Luna,'meaning moon.

Board of Education officials approved emergency funds to hire a security guard who will be at the school during school hours through the end of the term.

Meanwhile, the teachers' union and officials of-the PTA have contacted the office of John Treadle, Harrison County Supervisor, with a request for a town curfew and for additional police to help investigate the crime. OnePTAofficial, who insisted on anonymity, said that if the killer is not found within the next few days, parents should consider keeping children home from school.

The next full moon will occur five days from now, on the night of Wednesday, April 28.

This is getting out of hand,' Bill Corde said.

Steve Ribbon brushed the newspaper delicately. He seemed to decide not to reply to Corde's tight-lipped comment. The sheriff instead asked, 'A goat?

This kind of stuff...' Corde shook his head. 'I mean, people read this. People believe it..."

We can't control the press, Bill. You know that. What was the handwriting like? On the classroom wall?'

'What was it like? I don't know. You want to get a graphoanalyst-'

'"Lunatic." It's Latin for-'

This moon thing is making people crazy,' Corde protested. There's some no-fooling hysteria out there.'

'Can't deny the facts.'

'Steve, it was kids.'

'Kids?'

'A prank or something. High school kids.'

'I don't know, Bill.'

'Even if it was Jennie's killer, all he did was leave some showy clues making it look like this was related to the moon somehow.'

'Well, if the shoe fits...'

'Naw,' Corde said. 'He'd do it to throw us off. I mean, why kill a goat? Why not another victim?'

'Not killing anybody don't mean anything. Maybe the strike window was narrower than I guessed.'

Corde debated for a moment. 'Well, Steve, isn't it possible that this wouldn't've happened if the guy hadn't read that story in the Register about cults?'

'My interview the other day, you're saying.'

Corde could think of no response. He shrugged. 'We didn't find any evidence of cult or Satanic stuff around Jennie's body.'

The knife. You're forgetting the knife.'

Corde pulled at his lip for a moment. 'I don't know what to make of the knife, that's true.'

He could see no reason to pursue this line of talk with Ribbon. He said, 'Another thing I want to do -I want to take out an ad and ask for witnesses. Tell them everything'll be confidential.'

The sheriff said, 'What'll it cost?

The Beacon won't be much but well have to do it in the Register too, I think. It'll be about four hundred for the week. We get a discount.'

"We haven't got that in our budget. It's already dented from you taking that flight to St Louis.'

Corde said, 'I think we've got to. Nobody's come forward. We need some help.'

'Do the Beacon but I can't afford the Register,' Ribbon said. 'I've got another idea though. You ought to ask all the county shrinks about their patients. And all releases for the past month from Gunderson. That's an approach a lot of investigators take in serial killings.'

'A low-security mental hospital, two hundred miles away?' Corde asked.

'A lot of crazies go through Gunderson.'

'And every one of them shrinks is going to plead privilege.'

'I don't much care about that. At least it'd be on record that we asked and we'd keep ourselves covered pretty damn good.'

"We don't have the manpower to do what we're doing now let alone send somebody around to every therapist in the county.'

The men looked at each other for a lengthy moment and finally Corde said firmly, 'I'll take responsibility for the way I'm handling the case.'

Ribbon stroked his bulbous red cheek with a raw knuckle. 'No need to have words over it, Bill.' He smiled. "You're absolutely right. It's your case. And your responsibility. You do what you think you ought.'

The low late afternoon sun fell on her desk and onto the piece of paper she had in front of her. Sarah reached forward and the square beam of light seemed to warm her hand. Specks of dust floated along the beam and Sarah had this image: If she were no bigger than a bit of dust she could float away, sail right through the open window and outside. Nobody would see her. Nobody would know.

She hunched over and smoothed the paper, which was all crinkly and limp. She felt some slight disappointment; it looked just like red ink on typewriter paper. She was hoping that he'd leave messages in stone or on a big sheet of brown burnt paper.

A comma of tongue touched the dimple in her upper lip and she leaned forward in concentration. Sarah found reading harder than writing because even though she had a terrible time remembering spelling and how the letters were supposed to go, at least she decided which words to use.

Reading was the opposite. You had to look at words somebody else had picked and then figure out what they were.

This was torture.

She sighed, lost her place and started over. Finally after twenty minutes she finished. A wave of happiness swept over her - not just because she managed to complete the note but at what the words themselves said.

Sarah:

I got your note. I was real glad to get it. Don't worry about your spelling. It doesn't matter to me how well you spell. I'm watching you, I'll come visit very soon. I'll leave a surprise for you in the garage.

And yes I am -

The Sunshine Man

Happy, yes, although she felt a bit of disappointment - he had left the note while her mother had been out, Tom the deputy had been reading on the front porch and Sarah herself had been watching an afternoon movie.

Why, she wondered, hadn't the Sunshine Man waited for her and given her this message in person, instead of leaving the note where she found it - under the pillow of her bed?

Whoa...

Diane Corde paced through the kitchen.

'She was a four-star, flaming you know what.'

"Whoa," Corde said. 'Hold on here.' He opened his first of two after-work beers. This one was his favorite and he really enjoyed the sound of the tab cracking. Today the ritual wasn't giving him any pleasure.

Diane tore open the freezer door, pulled out a four-pound pack of ground round and tossed it loud into the sink. Frost flew like shrapnel. Corde stepped back. He said, 'I just asked how it went.'

'How it went is it cost us a hundred and ten dollars -one hundred and ten! - for this woman, you should've seen, a doctor wearing a pink dress, no you shouldn't've seen, for this woman to tell me about my own daughter. Honestly!'

'Simmer down now and tell me what she said.'

'I was perfectly civil with her. I was polite. I tried to make a few friendly jokes.' Diane turned to her husband. 'I think she's from the East.'

Tell me what she said,' Corde repeated patiently.

'She insulted Dr Sieving and she talked to me like I was keeping Sarrie from getting help because I was afraid people'd say she was crazy.'

Corde squinted, trying to work this out.

'I mean, what she wants to do is for us to pay her a hundred and ten dollars - my word, a hundred and ten dollars - an hour just-'

'I got my insurance.'

'... to give Sarah some tests...' She crossed her arms and paced some more. 'I mean, she was practically looking me in the eye and saying she's got learning disabilities.'

'Does she?' Corde asked. Diane stared at him. He added, 'Have learning disabilities, I mean?'

'Oh, okay!' Diane thundered. "You're taking her side? Fine.'

Corde sighed. 'I'm not taking sides.' He retreated. 'You'd think a hundred ten dollars'd buy you more than that.'

"I'd say you would.' Two potatoes crashed into the sink.

Sarah appeared in the doorway and Diane's pacing slowed. The little girl watched her and said cautiously. 'Mommy, it's time for my pill.'

Two more potato hand grenades were lobbed into the sink. 'No,' Diane said. 'You're not taking them anymore. Give me the bottle.'

'I'm not?'

Corde asked, 'She's not?'

'No.'

'Good, I don't like them. They taste pukey and they give me tummy squabbles.'

'Now you and your father are going to work on your spelling for the test next week and-'

'I'm not going to take-'

"You'll do as you're told, young lady!' Diane pulled onions out of the refrigerator. Thunk, into the sink. 'And on Saturday I'm taking you to see Dr Parker. She's a nice lady and she's going to help you in school.'

'Okay.' Sarah caved, fear of tests having a heavier specific gravity than fear of an angry mother.

'Honey,' Corde told her, 'you run into the den. I'll be there in a minute.' When she left, Corde cocked his head and said to his wife, 'Excuse me?'

Diane looked exasperated. 'Excuse me what?'

'I thought. I mean, what you just said. I thought you weren't going to take Sarah to see her.'

'Meat loaf?' Diane asked.

'Uhm, sure.'

'Of course I'm taking her.' Diane aimed a bunch of carrots at him and whispered harshly, "That woman is a bitch and she's a fashion plate and if she doesn't help my daughter then heaven help her.'

Philip Halpern nervously carried the paper bag as he wound through the cluttered backyard to a greasy stone barbecue pit piled high with cinders and burnt steak and chicken bones. The boy set the bag in a cone of ashes and dug through pockets compressed by his fat body. Finally he took a book of matches from his shirt pocket. He did this with the reverence of someone who's afraid not of the fire itself but of unguessed risks that he's been warned fire holds. The match ignited with a burst of pungent sulfur. He lit the bag. It began to burn. Philip wondered if the smoke would be poisonous. He wished he had asked his friend Jano to do this-

Oh no...

Philip heard the footsteps. He looked up and in the dusk he saw the vague form of his father, a heavy man with a crew cut, wearing blue jeans and a T-shirt. The only distinct thing about the lumbering shape was the red dot of his cigarette held between his fingers at his side. Philip felt his heart freeze.

Whatcha doing, son?' asked the benign voice.

'Nothing.'

"You ask me if you could burn something?'

'No, sir.'

"You lit the matches yourself?'

'I was just fooling around.'

'Fooling around with matches?'

'It's in the barbecue,' Philip said, trying to keep his voice steady.

'I can see it's in the barbecue. Did you ask me if you could light a match?1

'No, sir.'

'What'd it be?

'Huh?'

'What'd I say about answering me that way? You forget the rules?'

'I'm sorry,' Philip said quickly.

'So what is it? That you're burning?'

'Just some paper I found.'