We didn't see any tails, but I was confident they were there. Monroe struck me as the kind who didn't give up quickly.

It was an all day drive to Adlersville, the little mountain town closest to Harmony Springs. Adlersville itself wasn't much. It was well off the main highways, the narrow, twisting and turning, little blacktop road that led through it obviously couldn't bear much traffic, and the population was probably no more than eight thousand or so, counting the livestock. There were a couple of gas stations, a sheriff's office, a general store, two small groceries, and, to my amazement, a motel right next to a diner. I wouldn't have thought a town that small could have enough visitors to support a motel.

Bo and I checked in and stashed our things, keeping the weapons well out of sight, then went out to the diner for a quick dinner.

The good old girl who took our order was the kind of woman they write country songs about. She was a petite blond, pretty in a girl-next-door sort of way, and spoke with a Southern drawl as thick as molasses. She called everybody "Sugar," was quick with a laugh and a wisecrack, but clearly wasn't going to take any nonsense from anybody. The two truck drivers she was waiting on teased and flirted outrageously, but there was clearly some invisible line she'd never let them cross. Her name tag said only "Rachel."

We sat at the counter, and as soon as the waitress finished refilling the truckers' coffee cups, she hurried over with pen and pad in hand. I ordered pork chops, mashed potatoes and green beans while Bo had a cheeseburger and fries. The truckers finished up and left before our food arrived.

"Where 'bout you folks headed?" Rachel asked as she placed our meals on the counter. I couldn't see any good reason not to tell her. Maybe she could answer a question or two.

"Up to Harmony Springs." I tossed a forkful of green beans into my mouth.

Rachel grinned. "That ol' place. Nothin' but a bunch of ol' rundown buildings. All the windows done been broke a long time ago, but I reckon you all could shoot rats or somethin'."

From almost anybody else, it would have been impertinent. From her, it was friendly teasing. I grinned back at her. "Well, my friend here is doing a story on ghost towns for a travel magazine."

"Any particular reason you picked Harmony Springs, sugar?" Rachel asked Bo.

Bo went along with my little hoax. "Yeah. I understand there's a local character by the name of Harper Coleman still living up there."

"Ol' Goblin, he ain't never hurt nobody, don't you go botherin' him, now." Rachel¹s voice was full of  mock exasperation.

"You know him?" Bo asked.

"Sugar, everybody here in Adlersville either knows him or knows of him. I've met him a few times 'cause he used to do odd jobs on my daddy's farm once in while."

"Can we still find him up there?" I asked.

"Not if he don't want you to."

I raised my eyebrows questioningly.

"Ol' Goblin, he likes his privacy. Once he helped the state patrol find a couple of hikers who got lost just as some bad weather was settin' in, and a reporter from some TV station down in Atlanta came up to do a story on him. Never did find him."

"Well," Bo said, "he must live somewhere around here."

"Sure, sugar. He's got him a cabin on a trail just a little bit north of Harmony Springs. You ain't gettin' no car up there, not even a four-wheeler. Been there once."

"How'd that happen, if I'm not being nosy?"

"Not at all, hon. I was a little girl when my daddy took me with him and the doctor up there. Nobody had seen Goblin for a while, and folks was gettin' worried that he might be lying sick or somethin' up there without anyone to take care of him. Turns out he had a touch of the flu and was takin' it easy."

"What was his place like?"

"Like somethin' out of a picture book. No electricity, no plumbin', just a little log cabin sittin' there in the woods. It was like one of those old settler's cabins you see in school books. He had a bunch of really old books in there, a couple of old Civil War rifles, and some kerosene lamps. I wouldn't be surprised if it was still exactly the same way today."

Bo nodded thoughtfully. "Well, even if I don't get to meet Harper, at least I can still do a story on the town."

"If that's what floats your boat, sugar. There's maybe three or four backpackers who come pokin' around the place every year, otherwise there ain't nobody got any use for it. Gotta go." Rachel hurried to a table where a couple of new customers had just settled down.

Bo and I finished our meal, paid our tab and left. The sun was almost gone when we stepped out the door to the sidewalk.

Bo looked over at my jeep parked in front our motel room and froze. I could almost hear her teeth gritting with anger.

Two men dressed in cammies with brightly polished boots stood lounging around Sheba. Another lounged in the driver's seat of a huge, dark blue suvvie, the door open. These guys had a thing for suvvies, it looked like.

The man in the suvvie was no mystery. There was no mistaking Seth Monroe's tall figure, the delicately coifed hair, the too-bright, pimpy-looking smile. I already knew I didn't like him, so there were no surprises.

The other two gave me bad vibes as well. One of them was a blond, crewcut guy maybe a little shorter than average with ox-like muscles under his sleeveless cammy T-shirt. Even at a distance he didn't look too bright. The second guy was blond and crew-cut as well and dressed the same as his buddy, but he was thin and hard and tall enough to come up to Monroe's shoulders. He leaned against Sheba with his thumbs hooked in his pockets, chewing gum with his mouth open as he stared dully at us. Apparently Monroe didn't want to surround himself with men who might get ideas.

I looked down the street. The sheriff's office was barely a hundred feet away, and his car was parked right out front. I didn't know if that was good or bad.

"Well," I said to Bo, "let's not keep our guests waiting."

We walked towards the jeep.

Monroe dropped out of the suvvie to the pavement as we approached, and he and his goons never took their eyes off us as we walked over to Sheba. We didn't pretend to ignore them, and we didn't pretend not to care. Stupid Blondie looked straight into my eyes as I looked straight back into his. My face hardened for a fraction of second, and a flicker of doubt sweep across his face.

A few feet away, we stopped.

Monroe gave us a little nod. "Howdy."

I gave him a little nod back. "Is there something you want?"

Stupid Blondie and Stupider Blondie grinned at each other, then snickered a little.

Monroe ignored his companions and smiled at Bo and me as if we were all just good friends having drinks before dinner in Atlanta's finest restaurant. It would almost have been reassuring if not for the cold, hard eyes. "Now, Mr. Nolan, my friends and I were just wondering if possibly we could persuade you and Miz Hunter here to return my rightful property. That's all. Won't be no trouble."

"I didn't think there would be, what with the sheriff's office being right down there and all."

"Funny thing about that." Monroe smiled as if at some secret joke. "When we realized you were heading for Adlersville, we called our headquarters in Tempora. And guess what?"

He paused expectantly as if waiting for one of us to speak. We didn't. We stood there in stony silence, our faces cold and expressionless.

The bright smile didn't change, but the eyes showed a slight trace of puzzlement. We weren't responding as he'd expected.

Monroe hesitated another half a beat, and then plunged ahead. "It seems the sheriff here is one of our regular contributors. Gets our magazine and our tapes, too."

"Education is a wonderful thing." I shrugged.

Monroe started to say something, then hesitated. He'd been thrown off rhythm by our refusal to be intimidated. Even Stupid Blondie and Stupider Blondie seemed to sense that something was wrong with the situation. We just weren't acting the way we were supposed to. Stupider Blondie stood up and took his hands away from his pockets, still snapping his gum with his mouth hanging open.

"Mr. Nolan, I really do think it's time you and the girl returned my property." The voice was quiet, smooth and warm, but there was an unmistakable threat in it.

I shook my head slightly, as if I couldn't believe what I was hearing. Then I smiled back at him with a grin just as phony as his. "Tell you what, Mr. Monroe. We'll give you those papers on one condition."

Monroe's eyes brightened a bit, but it was plain that he didn't quite believe me. "What condition would that be?"

"That you tell us what's in 'em." I gave him another grin, but this time it was a nasty one.

His slick smile froze and then vanished. I could tell he was struggling to keep his anger out of his voice and off his face. He succeeded. Almost. "Well, now. Before you make that your final answer, there's something you ought to know. If there's trouble, you won't get much help from the local law around here. I've seen to that already."

I cocked my head and raised an eyebrow. "If there's trouble, we won't need any help from the local law. And anyway, to make some real trouble you'd need more than this pair of slackjawed apes."

For about a half a second, nobody spoke and nobody moved.

Stupid Blondie's mouth dropped open and his face clouded with raw hatred.

I snickered.

Stupid Blondie launched a fist at my face, leaning into it and driving with his legs to throw his full weight into the punch. At the same time, Stupider Blondie threw himself at Bo. Before he came anywhere close to touching her, Bo spun sideways on one foot and kicked him squarely in the face with the other. He dropped like a rock. I dodged Stupid Blondie's punch, shot my knee into his stomach, and as he doubled up I brought the side of my hand down hard on the back of his neck. He gave a sharp yelp of pain as he hit the ground. Before he could recover, I planted my foot on his back and put all my weight on it.

"You," I said firmly, "stay down."

Monroe hadn't twitched a muscle. He tried to keep control of his face, but he was clearly startled, disgusted, angry and appalled all at the same time. He swallowed hard a couple of times and then opened his mouth to speak. But suddenly his eyes focused on a point behind me, and his mouth snapped shut.

"Now what we got here?" came a deep voice behind my back.

I started to turn.

"Slow, son," the voice said sternly. "Very, very slow. And keep your hands where I can see 'em."

I did as told. Behind me stood a stout man in a brown sheriff's uniform, a revolver in his hand. He was heavy, but not much of the weight was fat--he looked like he could knock out a mule with one punch. His short, thinning hair was swept back in a futile attempt to cover a bald spot. His brow was furrowed, and he had a thoughtful frown on his face. A deputy who could have been his little brother stood off to his right about a foot behind him, also holding a drawn pistol.

The sheriff shoved his hat a little higher on his forehead. "Now that I've got your attention, would someone care to explain what's going on here?"

Bo nodded. "Sure, Sheriff. What's going on here is that these creepazoids don't want to let us into our motel room."

"Let me see your room key," the sheriff said. Bo rummaged in her handbag for a second and then tossed him the room key. He grabbed it out of the air, examined it for a second, then tossed the key back to her. He turned to Monroe, "Okay, now what's this about you not wantin' to let them in their motel room?"

Monroe turned on his smile again. I was getting tired of that oily grin. "I can explain, Sheriff. You see, these people have some very important papers of mine which they refuse to return--"

"And why," interrupted the law man, "didn't you come to me about the problem? You think I like breaking up fights on our main street? You got any idea what kind of hell I'm going to catch from every shopkeeper here for lettin' public order break down?"

The law man stared back at Monroe with hard and unsympathetic eyes.

I got a hunch.

"Well, Sheriff," I said, my voice a little too innocent, "we would have come to you about the problem, but Mr. Monroe here says you support his organization--you know, you send contributions and get his videos and magazines and such."

The sheriff turned to me. "Did he, now? And what organization would that be?"

"The American Patriot Foundation."

The sheriff regarded me with thoughtful suspicion for a moment, and then his eyes swung back to Monroe. "I never sent no money to no such place. You wouldn't be tellin' these folks lies, now, would you?"

Monroe's face was red and twisted with barely suppressed rage. I almost laughed. The gamble had paid off.

"Don't go gettin' an attitude on me, boy. It's clowns like you that give patriotism a bad name." The sheriff turned back to me and gestured at Stupid Blondie lying on the ground under my foot. "You want to let him up?"

I took my foot off Stupid Blondie. Stupid Blondie got slowly to his feet, glaring at me the whole time. At the same time, Stupider Blondie slowly picked himself up off the ground. His lip was split and blood was flowing down his jaw. From the look on his face, his brains were still scrambled from the kick in the mouth he'd gotten.

"I ought to press charges," he snarled, wiping his hands on his pants.

"Well, now, you have that right." The sheriff hooked his thumbs in his belt in a much too casual manner. "You surely do have that right. Of course, if you decide to do any such thing, I just may have to check on everybody's arrest record, son. Including yours."

Stupid Blondie fell silent, but still glared at me sullenly.

"I thought not." The sheriff waved his hand at Monroe and his goons. "You three go on about your business and leave these folks alone." He pointed at Stupider Blondie. "Better get that lip attended to."

Clearly unhappy, Monroe and his goons piled into the suvvie, cranked it up, and drove off. Perhaps as a small gesture of defiance, Monroe gave the machine just enough gas to make the tires squeal a little as they pulled out and roared away.

I started to smile and thank the sheriff. He cut me off with a wave of his hand and a cold look on his face. "Maybe I don't like them, but that doesn't mean that I have to like you. I'll be watching all of you real close. No more trouble in my town, you hear?"

I nodded, keeping my face as free of expression as possible. Bo nodded as well.

The sheriff looked us over one more time with those icy cold eyes, then turned and stalked off back to his office, the deputy following him like a faithful dog.

We went back to our motel room. There wasn't any romance, though a few X-rated thoughts did drift through my mind. Instead, we took turns standing guard until sunrise.
 

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