stand, framed by cheerful and intricately carved jack-o'-lanterns, was staffed by two young men and a woman, all of whom I judged to be in their early or mid twenties. Except for a common unisex uniform comprised of pale green overalls and matching turtleneck sweater, the three young people could have stepped off the pages of a Norman Rockwell calendar; in Nebraska they would have been described as clean-cut and fresh-faced. The men wore their hair cut very short, and the girl wore hers in a style that nicely framed a face that was every parent's-and lover's- dream. With her firm body, sensual mouth, and flashing brown eyes, she looked like the Ultimate Cheerleader, promising paradise to some lucky member of the right team.
Here, if the information given to us by a real estate agent was accurate, the team consisted of stone fundamentalists-although the woman had not been sure exactly what it was they considered fundamental. Their theology and politics were reportedly somewhere to the right of a Philadelphia television evangelist's. They were Born-Again Christians with a few twists nobody in the region had been able to describe with any accuracy.
The three smiled in unison as Garth stepped out of the car.
'Father love you,' the girl said brightly. 'May we serve you, sir?'
'Father love you,' Garth replied easily.
Suddenly a shudder ran through Garth's body, and he staggered backward, came up hard against the car. I tensed, put my fingers on the door handle. It seemed a poor time for a seizure; if Garth did his Hulk number, the entire stand as well as the small warming hut behind it were likely to disappear, and I didn't feel this would start us off on the right foot with the commune. But the tremors passed, and I sank back down into the seat with a sigh of relief.
One of the young men started to come around from behind the stand. 'Are you all right, sir?'
'Just a dizzy spell,' Garth said as he pushed off the car and walked over to the stand. 'Everything you have here looks absolutely beautiful.'
The Ultimate Cheerleader beamed. 'And everything is delicious, sir. We make all the cheeses ourselves, and the fruit pies were baked only a few hours ago. Also, you get a free jack-o'-lantern with anything you buy.'
'It isn't food for my body that I need,' Garth said. Nice. 'I'd like to join your community.'
The three young people exchanged uncertain glances. It was the girl who spoke.
'Do you have anything to say to us?'
Shit, I thought with something approaching religious fervor. It sounded like an invitation to play Password.
'I seek Father's peace.' That only brought more uncertain, uneasy glances. Garth folded his hands in front of him, bowed his head. I had to strain to hear his voice. 'Please. I've been so troubled-and I've come so far. There were words, but in my fear that you'd reject me I've forgotten them. Please allow me to serve Jesus and Father.'
The girl came around from behind the stand, walked up to Garth and tentatively touched his hand. 'You're one of the hundred and forty-four thousand?'
A beat. 'Yes,' Garth said.
A dozen beats. 'I believe you,' the girl said at last. Then she wrapped her arms around Garth's waist and pressed her cheek against his chest. 'I hear the words in your heart,' she continued as she put her head up and covered my brother's mouth with her own. The two young men gave little yelps of joy, ran around from behind the stand and began to dance in a circle around Garth, patting him on the head, back, and shoulders as the girl continued to kiss him.
That would have been enough to give me a seizure. However, when the girl removed her mouth from his, he turned his head slightly in my direction-winked.
Even my choked-off laugh felt good; it had been some time since Garth and I had even smiled.
The mood didn't last long. Garth was beginning to untangle himself, and I assumed he was getting ready to introduce me. Then the girl unwrapped herself from around his waist, whispered something in his ear, and skipped off into the warming hut behind the stand. Garth made a small warning gesture with his hand behind his back, and I stayed put.
The girl returned from the hut, and the four of them engaged in conversation conducted in voices too low for me to hear. After about five minutes something with a broken muffler could be heard approaching on the dirt road that ran through the apple orchards behind the stand; a trail of dust rose over a sea of trees with leaves the color of blood.
A battered, brown Willys Jeep roared out of the orchards, skidded into a turn that took it all the way around the stand, and stopped with its nose almost touching our car's. The driver got out, and I released the safety catch on my gun.
The man was as tall as my brother, a little over six feet, and burly, with a fair complexion and a shock of sand-colored hair visible under a brown beret. His matching brown jumpsuit was definitely paramilitary in style, with the cuffs stuck into shiny black leather boots. He wore black leather gloves. On one sleeve of the jumpsuit was a shoulder patch with what looked like an anemic Olympic symbol-four interlocking black rings, stacked two on two, on a gold background; it was virtually identical to the logo I had seen inside the Volsung Corporation building. He also wore a shoulder holster filled to overflowing with a.38. The man had not come to kiss and dance.
The man moved off a few yards with the three young people, and I had to shift position slightly to keep track of what was going on. I didn't like what I saw. The man in the jumpsuit listened in silence as the three spoke, didn't change expression when Garth meekly approached and said something to him. Suddenly he turned his head slightly and looked at the car. I sank back into the seat, heart pounding, and stared straight ahead through my smoked glasses.
In the middle of something Garth was saying, the man abruptly turned and marched toward the car. Garth, his face impassive, followed behind. The man studied me from outside the car, but I waited for a rap on the window before rolling it down.
'This is my brother, Boris,' Garth said quietly. 'As I told you, he's blind.'
'Who are the hundred and forty-four thousand, Brother Boris?' the man snapped at me.
Now I turned toward him, cocked my head at an angle, and smiled benignly. His eyes, cold and appraising as he gazed at me, were set wide apart on either side of a nose that looked as if it had been broken at least once, and he had a lantern jaw that was too big for the rest of his features. 'Father love you, brother. We seek Father's peace.'
'Who sent you? Who's your sponsor?'
'Father's spirit is our guide.'
The muscles in the man's lantern jaw clenched and his eyes narrowed to slits as he stared at me. Then he appeared to reach a decision. 'Follow me,' he said curtly to Garth, then turned and walked quickly to the Willys.
Garth started up the car, followed the Willys around the stand and up the dirt road through the orchards. 'We seem to be missing a password,' I said.
'Yeah. Incidentally, we're the Jamisons-I'm Billy, you're Boris.'
'I heard. I really don't feel like a Boris, Billy.'
'Well, Billy's already said you're Boris, so Boris you shall be.'
I leaned on the back of the front seat, looked at my brother. The pale, late-afternoon light did not flatter his profile; in the three months that we had been searching for this commune, his nose had inexorably broadened and flattened. 'It looks like we go to Plan B,' I said.
Garth shook his head. 'Not yet.'
'I'm going to shoot Captain Midnight the first chance I get.'
'No,' Garth said firmly. The Willys had disappeared around a bend fifty yards ahead of us. Garth had to grip the wheel firmly to maintain control on the deeply rutted road, and now he accelerated in an attempt to catch up with the speeding Jeep. 'This commune is our only link to Siegmund Loge, and we may never find another-not in time, anyway.'
'You think that's news to me, Garth?' I asked irritably.
'Just a reminder.'
'I don't need a reminder.'
'Plan B will never work. We have no idea how big this place is. We don't know how many members there are, and we don't even know what we're looking for. Shooting this guy isn't going to solve the problem. They have to let
