The team is going through entry cards. They are quite somber. Joey and Rose have been promised a winning ticket, which is supposed to be in this batch. As the last ones are opened, it becomes obvious, the winner ain't here.

Signs announcing the swindle go up all along the awning of the storefront of the contest sponsor. They are hand-lettered, by Joey and Rose.

Then, they aren't there. I am sitting in a parlor with a caller to the residence of Joey and Rose. This is the boss of the shop where the contest was held. We wait for Joey and Rose. He does not admit to removing the signs. He does not appear to be angry.

--

She thinks, they have faith in me, because they allow me to hold their baby. She is loving and cooing to the infant. They have confidence I am all right.

But she must go away, after all, it was said. Nerves, it was said. She would be away for a time. Her roles were seeping into her regular life, it was said. She had no regular life, it was answered.

I don't know who she was.
--
I am mounted on my old buckskin pony. I'm dressed in pink woven mini chaps and vest. I carry the means by which the upper reservoir will be joined to the lower lake. Some are dead set against the project, which is why I must be stealthy...in my hot pink cowboy gear.

My podnah in this act of eco-terrorism is in a class, like a sitting tour given by a park ranger where they pass around antique rocks. I must pass a key to him. I have to go. I lodge the message, semi-camouflaged, in a crevice at the end of a rock railing at the rim of the canyon. There is no reason the podnah will find the hidden clue instead of anyone else, but I'm satisfied I've made the effort. I ride off down the canyon.

I roll out of the saddle and down a row of hedges to descend the last fifty feet. It's magical, rolling suspended on soft vegetation over hard rock.