He shoveled and mopped until the H-house sparkled.

“You’re such a girl,” said Dodge.

“And you’re a first-class frigging idiot,” said Nate. “A lazy idiot.”

“You hear that wind out there, man? We could hitch a sail to the boat and fly!”

Nate managed a tired smile and squeezed out the last of the mop’s wetness into the sink. Done. Now to take the battle outside.

He had to leave through the front door, which was sheltered from the blast. He looked back at his handiwork before he left. The chair was holding its own against the storm, just barely. Snow was still sifting in around the edges. He’d deal with the broken door when he had tools. Right now, he had only one thing on his mind.

It was Saturday, four o’clock in the afternoon. He had been at camp almost exactly forty-eight hours, and yet here he was, standing in his own camp for the very first time. He had gotten here via the shutter shuttle. He had taken the six shutters he’d removed from the Hoebeeks’ windows and marched them across the yard, making himself a bridge over the snow. Stepping-stones. It took him a while, and it wasn’t a method of transportation that was going to get him out to the track, but all he could think about right at this very moment was what was lying before his eyes on the shelf of the little fridge on the sunporch.

Steaks.

Three T-bones. Obviously, the men had been planning on staying longer. So the biggest problem Nate really had at that precise moment was whether he was going to eat all three steaks right now or save a couple for another time. He wasn’t sure how long he was going to be stuck here. He could probably do the shutter shuttle out to the work shed. There might be an old pair of snowshoes there. But that would have to wait. He was exhausted — more exhausted than he had ever been in his life, both physically and emotionally. Drained. He didn’t know whether he’d be able to get out to the track by one o’clock tomorrow, but then again, the way the snow was coming down, he wasn’t sure the Budd would be there, either.

He remembered times when he was younger and his father would go up for the weekend, alone, in the winter and not get home until three or four Monday morning. That was on the old timetable, when the train south was supposed to arrive at Mile 39 around four in the afternoon. His father had spent upward of eight hours waiting by the track, in the freezing cold, in the pitchblack. He’d get home with just enough time to shower and change and head off to work.

When Nate was old enough to keep up with him on snowshoes, Burl took him along. He showed him the old forty-gallon oil drum he kept in the bush off to the side of the trail out by the track. In the wintertime, it was turned upside down to keep the inside dry. And in it he kept a plastic trash bag filled with kindling, paper and dry firewood. Turn the drum upright, remove the plastic bag, and — voilà! — central heating. Then you just keep feeding it with whatever you can find.

They’d been prepared for a long wait last March: Dodge and Paul, Dad and Nate. It was a big part of the test. Surviving at camp was easy enough. Surviving the trip out was a whole other matter, since you were at the mercy of the weather and the Budd, with nowhere to hole up in. On that occasion, the Budd had come within an hour of when it was supposed to — almost a miracle. “We were lucky,” Burl had said as the four of them boarded the train.

“Because I was here, Mr. Crow,” said Dodge. “Mr. Lucky.”

Nate didn’t see the Samsung at first. Someone had left it in the fruit bowl that sat dead center on the table that took up the middle of the Crow cabin. There was no fruit in the bowl, only an assortment of flashlights and batteries, plastic bottles of Tylenol, twist tops, and such. There was an empty tub of Rolaids. Nate hoped it was Shaker who ’d been having indigestion problems.

He pressed the home key of his cell phone. Nothing. But it wasn’t physically broken, as far as he could see. He found his charger and plugged it in. The old AM/FM radio worked, so there was obviously enough juice stored up from the solar panels. Had Operation Drone worked? Was that why the hombres had jumped ship? He watched the phone’s face, waited, and then his stomach claimed his attention and he set to work peeling potatoes and slicing up onions. A feast was in order.

The news came on the radio and he listened for anything about escaped convicts being rounded up and taken off to some real, honest-to-God jail very far away. Nothing. The weather was big news, the last big storm of the year. They were expecting another night of it. He switched the radio off. Who knew how much power there was left; he’d better preserve it.

He boiled up the potatoes and mashed them, slathered with margarine. He fried up a can of mushrooms with onion, grilled one of the steaks, medium rare.

He hadn’t eaten that entire day, so as far as he was concerned the meal he sat down to at 5:00 p.m. was breakfast. Maybe he’d eat one of the other steaks for lunch. The third for dinner . . .

Outside, the snow was cascading down, an avalanche from the heavens. Behind the veil of white, the sun was lost. It was the middle of March — spring! — and the sun wouldn’t officially set until close to seven-thirty, but there wasn’t a lot of light to work with. Feeling revived but sleepy at the same time, he decided he’d better find himself some snowshoes while he could — if he could. The idea of getting out to the track in time for the train Sunday now seemed possible again on a full stomach, assuming he got a good night’s sleep. He suited up, put a headlamp on, and set out into the white. It was like making your way through an endless series of billowing curtains. Then when he rounded the corner of the camp, that analogy failed: it was more like a series of curtains with a heavyweight boxer behind each of them, punching invisibly at you.

He had gathered together the shutter boards and laid them out, one after the other, until he’d made it to the shed.

No snowshoes, but an old pair of his mother’s cross-country skis, lying across the rafters above his head along with rakes, shovels, oars, and paddles. Some ski poles, too. He looked at the bindings on the skis. They were the old three-pronged kind. Were there any boots in the cabin that would fit them? Then again, would he be able to fit into ski boots meant for his mother? Beggars can’t be choosers, he thought, and, locking up the shed, he headed back to the camp. It was dark before he closed the door — not nighttime dark, but a luminescent invisibility cloak. He closed the door on the silver-edged darkness and settled in for the night.

In a big cardboard box in the cupboard over his bed, he found an array of shoes and slippers, aqua socks, and boots of all kinds, including the ski boots meant for the three-pronged binding. Ta-da! He tried them on. Wearing winter socks, there was no way he could force his foot into the boot. With no socks on at all, he could just barely squeeze a foot in.

“Crap!”

That was not going to work. With the coming of the snow, the temperature had climbed a bit, but if he planned on trekking out to the train in these, he’d probably lose a toe or two.

So back to the drawing board.

He checked the phone again. Nothing. It had died out there, he guessed. But then why had the bad guys taken off so fast? Maybe Operation Drone had worked after all, at least in getting rid of the unwanted houseguests. They couldn’t assume he hadn’t gotten through. Whether his folks knew what was up . . . well, only time would tell. He wondered if his cell phone plan covered flying your phone in a drone and then leaving it buried in the snow overnight.

Problems for later. Meanwhile, he could breathe again. He told himself that this was all that mattered. Right now. Tried to convince himself. Tried to slough off Shaker’s threat.

He stoked up the old Ashley, felt the blast of heat radiate out into the cozy room as he opened the top of the stove to lower in another piece of birch. The Ashley wasn’t pretty like the shiny green Vermont Castings over at the Hoebeeks’. No windows to watch the dancing flames. But it worked gangbusters. Hah! he thought. Gangbusters.

The gang was gone. And it was going to be all right. Whether he could get out tomorrow or not, help would come eventually. He’d be down to spaghetti and rice, but he wouldn’t die. As soon as he failed to show on the Budd Sunday evening, his father would be on the case. Then again, once Nate was home and safe and the world could return to something like normal, his father would be on his case. He had lied to him about Paul coming. He wasn’t sure how much difference it would have made if Paul had been here. Couldn’t say. If Dodge had been here, it would have made a big difference. For one thing, the Remington would have definitely come into play. They’d have all probably ended up dead.

I’ll be angry with you for the rest of your death.

His father’s words made him shudder. Dying itself didn’t seem nearly so bad as having that curse hanging over your head.

He had to face the fact that he had seriously thought about using the shotgun as a last resort — thought enough to locate the two keys to unlock it as well as a box of shells. Thought enough to take it upstairs to Dodge’s room with him. Thought enough to load it. And that was as far as he got. If things had gone down differently: if Shaker had come at him and the trunk didn’t stop him and Cal didn’t come . . . Well, it was there, the Remington, lying on the lower bunk, ready to go. Nate imagined himself backed up against the wall in the cramped little bedroom, willing the big man not to come any closer. Shuddered at the thought that he wouldn’t be able to pull the trigger. Shuddered at the thought that he would.

But now, here, he was in familiar territory. No-gun territory. He stared at the books on the shelf: camp reading. He pulled down a Jack Reacher, Worth Dying For. Jack Reacher always found painful and satisfying ways to make the bad guys pay for their trespasses. And that’s how Dodge would have wanted to play it. But would it have been worth dying for? Nate had read a couple of the books — liked them, too. Reacher was huge, a force of nature. Should have been played by Dwayne Johnson in the movies, not Tom Cruise! But tonight, the thought of the violence in the novels put him off. There had been nothing satisfying about watching Shaker fall again and again; well, okay . . . a little. But it was the kind of satisfaction that left a bad taste in your mouth. He put the book back on the shelf. He imagined some other snowy night up here, with Dad and Mom when the world was put right and all of this was ancient history. Maybe then a hard-nosed good guy beating up on some sadistic killer and his twelve closest psychotic friends would appeal to him as a good evening’s entertainment. For now, it all seemed too close to home.

And if he allowed himself the luxury of relaxing, he had to think that he, Nathaniel Crow, had done a pretty good job all by himself. Done it his way.

Then he thought again of Shaker’s little visit before takeoff.

I’m going to have to mess you up so bad that your dear mama won’t recognize her little boy. Maybe he hadn’t done as good a job as he could have.