He selected a white cargo van with tinted windows which would make it easier for him to scope out the neighborhood without being observed. He also took the precaution of slapping magnetic logo signs on the side doors advertising that the van belonged to a building contractor. Quiet suburban neighborhoods might notice a strange car parked on the street. They tended to ignore tradespeople in vans.
It was a long drive from the airport to the address out in the boondocks, so he didn’t arrive until mid-afternoon. He found the place as soon as he turned down the street. It stuck out like a sore thumb among the identical suburban prefabs. A blue stucco two-story farmhouse with a fenced backyard that sat on an acre of land. The street itself was quiet. Nobody was outside walking around. Leroy knew he couldn’t dawdle on this stakeout because cars that weren’t parked in driveways were an oddity.
He took out a laser microphone with a built-in spy glass and got down to work. For starters, there was an old station wagon parked in the farmhouse driveway. Hunt made a note of the license plate number. There was no way of telling how many people were inside, but the lone car was a good indicator. Then Leroy noticed the front door swing open. An old woman came out and stood on the porch.
For a minute Leroy thought this was a carbon copy of his first fake lead in Phoenix. Maybe this little old lady was another of Mr. Big’s flunkies. For all he knew, she might be setting this place up as the next fake address he’d be sent to. Leroy ducked low in the front seat but kept his spy glass trained on her. She had white hair and was wearing a cotton dress with giant flowers splattered all over it—the kind women wore when his grandma was still in pigtails. She ambled down the front walk to the mailbox by the curb and took out some letters. She didn’t look in his direction. Just sorted through the envelopes and went back inside the house. His microphone wasn’t picking up the sound of any other voices inside, so she was obviously alone.
Hunt felt a sinking sensation. Maybe all the trouble he’d taken to find a paper trail had been useless. This place was going to prove to be just another dead end. He was on the point of starting up his engine and leaving when he saw a sight that changed his mind.
A school bus turned onto the street where he was parked. Again, he ducked low in the seat to watch. The bus stopped in front of the farmhouse, its flashers blinking red. A girl got out, and the bus drove away. Leroy glued his spyglass to his eye, so he could catch every detail of her appearance. He got a good look because she turned around to check the mailbox before going inside. He pulled the dog-eared photo of Metcalf’s scared bride out of his pocket and compared it to the girl by the mailbox. Her hair was cut short, and she was wearing makeup, but she seemed to be about the right height and age. He glanced at the photo again. Yup, it was Hannah alright. Not scared anymore. She walked with her head up like she belonged here. When she reached the front door, she let herself in with a key.
Leroy used his laser microphone and listened in to the conversation that followed. It amounted to nothing more than “How was school?” Unless that was some kind of secret code for “the doodads are stashed in the basement” there was nothing fishy going on in that house.
The cowboy sat back to mull over what all of these facts meant. For starters, Hannah wasn’t being held hostage as he’d originally thought. It seemed like she wanted to be right where she was—even had her own key to the place. It didn’t sound like she had any notion that she was being sheltered by a band of thieves and their boss. And who was the old lady? She was probably another patsy who was even more in the dark about the real nature of Mr. Big’s operation than little Hannah was.
Hunt sat there for another half hour waiting to spot any other activity around the farmhouse. At the end of that time, he concluded that unless there was a giant secret vault underneath the building, nobody else was using the place for any shady business. It clearly wasn’t a base of operations for Mr. Big or his trio of artifact thieves. More likely it was a safe house for the little gal. That made good sense. A willing hostage was a lot easier to handle than an unwilling one. Hannah could still be used as a bargaining chip if need be, but for now she was just a normal kid going to high school.
The sound of a bad muffler cut into Hunt’s thoughts. He craned his neck to see where the noise was coming from. An old junker had just turned the corner and was making straight for the farmhouse. Its driver pulled up into the driveway with no hesitation. Apparently, he was already familiar with the place. The engine died, and a runty kid with spikey hair climbed out of the driver’s seat. Hunt put his spy glass to his eye, so he could get the kid’s license plate number.
