`` i can keep you separate from the business . she did not fight as cold , claw-tipped fingers stroked at her cheeks , at her brow , at her shoulders . they followed him along the cold beach until he reached a bare area between the dunes , where he stopped and , still moving with all the grace of a clothes horse , dropped the rock . the recent events were clearly the work of a cleaner . i must do it away from this house . but that will teach him to go wandering off to dangerous places . 