This road ran through country that, for sparseness of population, rivaled the Himalayas. The pecan trees now surrounding them were the only vegetation they’d seen all day more than about the height of a man’s knee. So it seemed like they’d crashed with some degree of privacy. The pecan trees were planted in a grid. The driver had aimed down a lane between rows. Their foliage was thick; someone must have put a lot of money into irrigation. When Laks opened the door and climbed out, he saw no lights except for the stars. The only witnesses to the crash of the truck would have been the men they had passed about three seconds before the driver had swerved. They’d been standing next to a van parked on the shoulder of the road. A very old van, like something from the 1960s. One of the men had, in retrospect, been using a flashlight to cue the driver.