NEAL STEPHENSON

features a blazing trinity: Jesus, Elvis, and the Reverend Wayne. Jesus gets top billing. The worshipper is not half a dozen steps into the place before she thuds down on her knees in the middle of the aisle and begins to speak in tongues: “ar ía an ar isa ye na amiriaisa,venaamiriaasaria…”

The doors swing shut again.

‘7ust a see,” the girl says, looking at Y.T. a little nervously. She goes around the corner and stands in the middle of the toy area, inadvertently getting the hem of her robe caught up in a Ninja Raft Warriors battle module, and knocks on the door to the potty.

“Busy!” says a man’s voice from the other side of the door.

“The Kourier’s here,” the girt says.

ddlfld be right out,” the man says, more quietly.

And he really is right out. Y.T. does not perceive any waiting tune, no zipping up of the fly or washing of the hands. He is wearing a black suit with a clerical collar, pulling a lightweight black robe on over that as he emerges into the toy area, crushing little action figures and fighter aircraft beneath his black shoes. His hair is black and well greased, with individual strands of gray, and he wears wire-rimmed bifocals with a subtle brownish tint. He has very large pores.

And by the time he gets close enough that Y.T. can see all of these details, she can also smell him. She smells Old Spice, plus a strong whiff of vomit on his breath. But it’s not boozy vomit.

“Gimme that,” he says, and yanks the aluminum briefcase from her hand.

Y.T. riever lets people do that.

“You have to sign for it,’ she says. But she knows it’s too late. If you don’t get them to sign first, you’re screwed. You have no power, no leverage. You’re just a brat on a skateboard.

Which is why Y.T. never lets people yank deliveries out of her hand. But this guy is a minister, for God’s sake. She just didn’t reckon on it. He yanked it out of her hand-and now he runs with it back to his office.

“I can sign for it,” the girl says. She looks scared. More than that, she looks sick.

“It has to be him personally,” Y.T. says. “Reverend Dale T. Thorpe.”