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Show 123 a laugh as punctuation. "What do you think?" she added. "Well," Hunt said and shrugged, "Well - sure,. Sure: I could probably let that one go for . . ." A flash lit the absurdity of Hunt's response, but he finished nevertheless: ". . . oh, for . . . nine, eight hundred." The smile slipped from Andi Pierson's face. "He has a temper," she said. "It's just his temper. He flares up. That's Lane. That's his personality. He flares up, gets it out of his system, then's just fine again. You should see him play golf." Still images ran like slides through Hunt's interior. "Well, anyway . . ." The smile was back. "Anyway, he won't be burning your house down this morning. He drove off somewhere -- early. Probably to a meeting. He takes a lot of meetings. He'll cool down. Hunt nodded. He bent and picked the paper from his flagstone walk only to find it heavy, damp, thick with penetrating odor. It had been soaked in gasoline. He noticed, too, that the Schoefield's blinds had been drawn. "Hey? Mr. Hunt?" Andi Pierson signaled him again. "Yes?" Hunt said, smelling the fuel, fearing faintly that the morning's news might spontaneously combust in his hands. Andi Pierson craned her neck forward, strained to mouth the words secretively over the patter of her garden hose, "You . . . if you like . . . you -- I mean, only if you wanted to -- you could, like, paint me. I modeled once in college. In an art class." She tugged at a knot in the middle of her bathing top. "I'd keep it from Lane." So many of the gains that Hunt, that he and Leah, had made over the past six months beaan to shimmer like heat phantoms in the morning air. "Right," |