RUTHIE HAD NO choice but to pass the Belfry; it was on the main road, right before the causeway. She tried not to look, but how could she not, when there was a giant inflatable hyena bobbing in the breeze on the front lawn? She pulled over.
Off in the distance she could see Dodge directing his crew. Various piles of plasticky material were laid out on the lawn. She could see Lark Mantis, in shorts and a T-shirt and boots (Boots? It was ninety-two degrees), pointing and suggesting, placing the inflatable sculptures. Ruthie had heard about them, of course. In the back courtyard a bouncy castle looked like a giant, cheerful prison.
Lark was crowding the sculptures. She wasn’t allowing for the right sight lines. Ruthie watched as Dodge walked over, talked to her with one hand on her shoulder. She could tell from here that he was frustrated.
She was about to drive away when she glimpsed a vivid flash of familiar blue.
She slid out of the car. She walked up the lawn unnoticed. She climbed over the knee-high wall.
One small painting in the gallery, blazing clear blue.
It seemed impossible, but there it was.
Lucas. That bastard. That spoiled, careless idiot.
What the fuck was he thinking?
She walked back to her car, feeling weightless and doomed, a passenger in a plane in a long stall.