Darrell Bain - A Strange Valley

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First published by DDP, May 2004

ISBN 1-55404-141-4

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ISBN: 1-55404-141-4

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Dedication: To the grand kids: Doug, David, Cheryl, Jason, Bridgette, Robyn and Amy.

Author's note: Thanks to Jon Anderson and Craig Becker for stimulating my thinking while researching

the science for this novel. Any mistakes are my own, of course.

CHAPTER ONE

The small city of Masterville is located in extreme northern Arkansas, near the border of Missouri in the

heart of the Ozark mountain range. It sits at the bottom of a valley which is surrounded by rather large

foothills. The hills grow even larger in the distance, rising finally to heights of several thousand feet before

turning into rounded mountains, worn down by time. The valley, and the city it enclosed, might never

have been noticed, or at least come into public awareness, had it not been for an obscure government

clerk who worked as a statistical analyst for the Census Bureau. He was a career civil servant and

conscientious to a fault. His name was Harry Beales and he had spent most of twenty years in the same

office, sifting data from census figures as if the fate of the nation depended on what he wrought from his

tables and graphs and rows of numbers appended to obscure facts. However, the fate of the nation paid

Harry no mind until after the census of the year 2010, when the Census Bureau computers became

sophisticated enough to sift out some anomalies, which Harry then noticed.

Other, more modern computers might have picked up on the figures earlier but Harry had no access to

them, and he was the only person in the bureau whose job description specifically directed him to search

for unexplainable blips. Even after the new computers were installed, it was several years after the census

had been completed before the amoeba-like distribution of data was completed and found its way to

Harry's desk. He could then begin the plodding search for unusual facts and figures from the last census

that he was responsible for finding.

Give Harry his due. He recognized the first little oddity buried in the wealth of newly updated files and he

followed up on it relentlessly. What he saw first was that in the small little city of Masterville, high up in

the Ozarks, the national divorce rate didn't seem to apply. There were very few divorces in Masterville.

Not only that, as his curiosity was piqued and he looked further, he saw that there weren't that many

marriages, either. Both facts were anomalies and Harry was very good at anomalies. That was his job,

after all. He searched some more.

Harry thought that the low divorce and marriage rate would indicate a greater percentage of people with

different last names living together and that turned out to be the case. He knew from previous census data

that as a rule, those households where couples lived together without benefit of marriage should have

fewer children in residence, regardless of which parent they belonged to, or whether the offspring

belonged to both. That turned out not to be the case; there were more, not less. Apparently the citizens

of Masterville cared little for marriage but lots for children. About this time, he noticed that it was near

five o'clock, and stolid bureaucrat that he was, he called it a day. The next morning he plodded back to

his figures.

During the course of that day, Harry discovered several other disconcerting facts. Following up on family

statistics, he keyed into Department of Human Resources files and found that, contrary to his

expectations, very few of the unwed mothers in Masterville were on Welfare or Medicaid, or ever had

been; in fact, most of them lived with the father of their children. This led him back to educational levels,

an indication of income. These women had an average of three years of college and an average income

even higher than that bit of data should indicate. He thought then that the racial balance in Masterville

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would be skewed toward a lower percentage of minority groups than average, but again the facts were

contrary; the racial classification was about average for that area of the country. By this time Harry began

developing a personal rather than a professional interest in the cluster of statistical aberrations. His

curiosity was highly aroused, even though he was only doing what he was paid to do. It was simply that

his work had finally become interesting rather than routine. He became so involved in his study that he

actually put in more than two hours of overtime that day before remembering he was working for nothing.

Overtime wasn't authorized in his department. He hastily shut off his computer terminal and locked his

little cubbyhole of an office and went home to his statistically normal wife and two children, a boy and a

girl.

Usually, being a considerate husband and father, Harry tried to spend some time after work with Bertha,

his wife, and John and Mary, their two children. After that, he watched TV, scanning over the several

hundred channels his receiver would accept while looking for an interesting program.

This evening though, Harry was distracted. Right after dinner he zapped into a bland, uninteresting movie

and left the channel selector alone while his mind wandered. Later, in bed, he found that he couldn't

sleep; the problem from work kept intruding. In all his years as a statistical analyst, rising slowly but

surely from GS-6 to GS-13, he had never seen anything like the data he had pulled from the computer

files over the last two days, and he really didn't know what to do with it. The figures kept turning over in

his mind like a school of fish slowly breaking the surface of a tranquil lake, rising and falling back into the

depths, leaving only ripples behind. He finally slept, but badly.

The next day being Saturday, Harry was off work, of course. He rose, red-eyed and irritable at his

inability to sleep during the night. He showered, shaved, had his usual breakfast of bacon and eggs and

toast then went out into his garage and began tuning up the lawnmower. Winter was over and tufts of St.

Augustine grass were beginning to send out green tendrils in the front yard.

The mower wouldn't start, perhaps because Harry wasn't paying much attention to what he was doing

and didn't tighten the sparkplug securely enough after replacing it. A little later he came back into the

house, washed up and informed Bertha that he was going back to the office to catch up on a little work.

Bertha stared at him. Harry had never gone to work on a Saturday as long as she had known him.

“Harry, dear, is anything wrong?” She asked.

“No, honey,” Harry said. “Just a little problem at work. I'll be back soon.”

Before Bertha could question him further, Harry departed in their new Suburban, purchased after his last

promotion. Once on the way, he drove faster than normal, anxious to get to work for the first time he

could remember, notwithstanding that it was his day off and that he certainly couldn't expect to get paid

for his time. Nevertheless, he entered his little office and booted up his computer terminal with all the

enthusiasm of a four year old turning on Saturday morning cartoons.

Harry did not return home soon. Once ensconced at his desk he forgot all about what time it was.

Following up on the facts he had already gathered, he flung his net wider and discovered that his data

applied not only to Masterville, but to surrounding towns and villages, spilling out into the broad valley for

miles around before beginning to taper off to more normal findings.

Once he had the anomalous area pretty well mapped, Harry began a search for other statistical

aberrations within the plat. They were not hard to find, once he began looking, and knew what he was

looking for. Crime seemed to be almost nonexistent in the valley and the surrounding area. Masterville

had never accepted any government grants for parks or sewer systems, no government money to

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maintain or develop historical sights or any of the other programs congressmen were so fond of grabbing

for their districts to help them get reelected. Federal and state Welfare programs were being utilized

hardly at all. Masterville College, a private school, had never accepted a government grant. Both of the

Masterville hospitals, and its single nursing home, operated entirely without government funds, not even

Medicare reimbursement. Indeed, neither would have been reimbursed by the government because they

had never applied for Medicare nor Joint Commission accreditation, a prerequisite for government help.

Harry checked and found that both hospital and nursing home were inspected by the state, but that was

all, as if the directors did only the minimum required by law.

This fact led Harry to check on the public schools. None of them were registered with the federal

nutrition program or for school lunch funding or any other federal or state program other than those

specifically prescribed by law. This induced Harry to search out income distribution for the whole

population, not just the plethora of unwed mothers. He found that income followed a normal bell-shaped

curve, but the curve itself was shifted somewhat to the right when compared with national figures. Valley

residents earned more, on average, than would be expected for that area of the country and its industries.

Home ownership also turned out to be much higher than in other parts of the nation, though he was hard

put to find much financing by Freddie Mac, Freddie Mae, the VA and other government programs. The

local banks appeared to hold most of the mortgages on homes in the valley. These facts made him

wonder whether he had misread the minority population statistics. He went back to them.

No, they were about normal for that area of the country, but the minorities in Masterville seemed to get

along unusually well in life, as if no one there cared about their color or origin or religion. That didn't seem

right, given the contrariness of human nature, but when he delved into other files he was accumulating at

an astounding rate, he could find very few instances of discrimination suits or racial unrest, not as far back

as he could check. In fact, he could find very few lawsuits of any kind when he decided to check into that

area of Masterville's business and sent out electronic feelers for the data. Stranger and stranger, he said

to himself, as intrigued as a small boy who has just discovered tadpoles or garden snakes.

The next thing Harry delved into was religious affiliation, and there he soon found another glaring blip.

The most common religious preference of the inhabitants appeared to be “none,” although that was

implied data rather than hard figures, determined by the fact that there was a dearth of churches in

Masterville. There were far fewer than usual for a city squarely in the middle of the “Bible Belt” of

America, an area stretching from the Appalachian Mountains to the Midwest, where religion played a

great role in most communities and the lives of their citizens.

By the time Harry had pulled all these bits from the files he had gathered, he was becoming excited.

There seemed to be no end to the phenomena. At this point, impelled to action by all the statistical

abnormalities, Harry did something which was specifically forbidden to government employees: he began

delving into political affiliations. In order to get into this area, he had to use a few techniques which were

generally known but never publicized by the computer operators of the department. Ordinarily, he

wouldn't have thought of doing such a thing, but by this time he was far gone in his research. He hooked

into the voting rolls of Masterville County and discovered that a very high percentage of registered voters

listed themselves as independent rather than giving a party affiliation. Feeling guilty, he began checking

local, state and national election results from Masterville. He found that most of them, and most especially

the local elections, had all been very one-sided, almost as if the citizens had agreed beforehand on what

the results should be or whom they should vote for.

Harry worked most of the day. He turned up other peculiarities, none of which would have caused alarm

taken alone, but added to all the other oddities about the valley, were disconcerting to a degree. Average

life span was several years longer than in the rest of the state or nation. Illegal drug use was very low.

Enlistment in the armed services was high, though there appeared to be few military retirees from

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Masterville on government rolls. Interracial marriages, where there were marriages, were high. Most

residents had been born in the valley, and apparently intended to die there. It took a while to ferret out

the data from obscure sources, but Harry found that Masterville apparently did not cater to the tourist

trade. There were few motels or hotels in the area, unusual for being so near other highly rated vacation

spots.

This last datum made Harry wonder how the residents of Masterville supported themselves. It took a

while but eventually he discovered that the little city supported many cottage industries specializing in

products which were usually imported from overseas. Masterville charged higher prices but produced

such quality goods and niche items that they found a ready market. He smiled to himself when he found

that one little factory employing a dozen or so persons was making a good profit by hand sewing shirts in

the old sizes of neck and arm length rather than the three standards from overseas, small, medium and

large. Harry remembered gritching to Bertha about how he could never find a shirt that fit right anymore.

He happily book marked that data for his personal use later. Someone in Masterville was making a good

living supplying that want, it seemed, and he intended to add his business to their list of customers.

There were more book stores per capita in Masterville than would be expected, and fewer Movie

theaters and game rooms. The city supported a publishing house which specialized in books of fiction and

nonfiction which didn't quite fit the mold of the big New York Houses, and checking their web site, Harry

saw that they were making no attempt to imitate the giants; they simply looked for good literature to

publish, and were doing so at a profit, though few best sellers had come from their presses. There were

also a couple of ebook publishers with hundreds of titles in each of their catalogs.

It went on and on, but finally Harry had to call a halt. He had skipped lunch entirely and it was already

past time for dinner. Reluctantly, he shut down his computer then locked up and went home.

Bertha insisted that Harry stay home and attend church with her Sunday morning and mow the lawn that

afternoon. Harry would much rather have been in his office sitting at his work station, but he did as she

asked. Besides, he needed time to think about what to do with his findings, and the monotonous rounds

of the mower (which he had fixed) gave him leeway to consider the problem. Masterville and the valley in

which it sat was a strange place indeed if his data was accurate, and he had no reason to doubt that it

wasn't. By the time the yard was mowed level and Harry came in for dinner he thought he could sum up

his thoughts in one short sentence: Masterville was just too good to be true. There must be something

wrong there, though for the life of him, he couldn't figure out what it might be. He just knew that such

serene, peaceful prosperity as the valley seemed to typify was as out of place in present day America as

an oil derrick on the white house lawn. He made up his mind to see someone about it, which he did on

Monday morning.

* * * *

Harry Beales should have had a place in the history books, or at least a footnote for being the first to

uncover the gentle mantle of peace and prosperity hovering over Masterville Valley, but he was after all

only a GS-13 clerk and his role in the subsequent investigation was soon forgotten by those higher in the

hierarchy of government service. Perhaps Harry would have wanted it that way. Once he turned his

findings over to others, he went back to working his normal hours and channel surfing from his easy chair

and mowing the lawn on Saturday mornings. Eventually he put the whole episode out of his mind and

didn't think of it again until it became national news. Others did no such thing.

CHAPTER TWO

“I don't get it,” Daniel Stenning said as he finished reading the condensed version of the Masterville data.

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He tapped an impatient finger on top of the stack of papers. He looked around the table to see if anyone

else agreed with him. Besides himself, there were three other persons in the NSA briefing room located

in the bowels of the headquarters building in Washington. Opposite him, the FBI liaison shrugged, but

said nothing. To his right was a woman, an NSA field agent like himself, but one whom he had never met.

She ignored him and continued perusing the report.

“What is it you don't get, Daniel?” his boss, Mandel Crafton asked. Crafton had hard flinty eyes and

used them like a weapon.

“First of all, I don't see what this business has to do with national security. And second, why is it

stamped secret?” He tapped the papers again. “Most of the data here is available to anyone who cares

to sift through the census statistics or look it up on the web.”

Crafton's eyes focused on Daniel like an invisible laser, hunting for a hint of insubordination. He hadn't

wanted him on this case; the mild-mannered agent was far too successful at his work for him to think of

him as anything other than a potential competitor. Better to use someone like Shirley there, whose loyalty

to him was unquestionable. She had already pinned her career to his rising star. However, he hadn't had

a say in Stenning's presence. His own superior had specifically ordered him to assign him to the case.

Given Stenning's previous history of successful operations, it made him believe his boss already thought

there were wider implications to the assignment than he had voiced, and wanted one of the best field

agents on it right from the start.

“It's not up to field agents to question an operation, Daniel. And as far as the secrecy goes, no one else

other than that little stat clerk and his superior has made all these connections. They have been ordered to

stay silent until we determine what's going on here.”

“But why? I don't see anything about Masterville that's really earthshaking. So what if the population is a

little different? From what I've heard, some of those communities up in the Ozarks and Appalachians

have been inbred for generations. Maybe that's the reason. Besides, they seem to be getting along fine as

they are and not hurting anyone. Why go in and start them wondering about it?”

“Maybe too fine,” Shirley Rostervik said from beside him. She turned to him and smiled to take the sting

out of the contradiction before addressing Crafton directly. Daniel sensed a layer of incipient sexuality

beneath the smile, but it did little for him, even as attractively blond and slim as the other field agent was.

Sometimes he wondered about himself.

Crafton allowed himself to return Shirley's smile as she continued. “There's something strange about that

place. Just look at the gradient map.” She pulled a sheet of paper from the bottom of her stack and

pushed it to the center of the table. It contained a map of northern Arkansas and southern Missouri, the

heart of the Ozark mountain range. “See here, the anomalies begin tapering off the further away from

Masterville you go. After thirty or forty miles, you can't tell any difference from the normal population. It's

almost as if that city and valley are the center of an epidemic.”

“If it's an epidemic, it's been going on for a hell of a long time,” Daniel said. “Previous censuses show the

same pattern once you begin looking for it.”

“That's the point,” Crafton interjected. “Whatever those people are up to, it's part of a long range plan.

Perhaps a conspiracy.”

“I really can't see where they're up to anything, much less having a plan,” Daniel said, dropping his copy

of the report onto the table in front of him. He reached for the coffee pot and poured himself a refill.

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Crafton might be a bastard, but his coffee was always excellent.

“That's enough, Dan. Our superiors think there's some phenomenon there worth looking into and that's

all we need to know. You and Shirley have been assigned to the case. You're to go in there, posing as

tourists and find out what's going on.”

“It seems to me we already know what's going on.”

“Enough, I said.”

Daniel shrugged. He had said what he thought and was willing to let it go at that. If the powers that be

wanted him to go undercover into a happy, prosperous little valley and unobtrusively question its

inhabitants, then he would do it, and do a thorough job while he was there. He looked across the table at

the FBI liaison agent. “Is the FBI going in, too?”

Crafton answered, looking smug. “No, it was just the first agency notified. When the Attorney General

refused them a writ, the problem was passed along to us.”

No wonder the Federal agent looked so glum, Daniel thought. All he was there for was as a hanger-on,

just in case something illegal turned up that fell under his agency's jurisdiction. That government clerk,

Harry something or other, must have gone to the FBI first, or his superior had. But then the problem had

been passed on to the National Security Agency, and given the paranoia of President Smith, it was no

wonder an investigation had been ordered. Well, whatever else, the operation would get him out of

stifling weather of Washington and up into the mountains where it was cool. And perhaps there was a

phenomenon in that valley not as benign as he imagined, though he couldn't begin to think of what it might

be.

“We're going to need some more information,” Shirley said, “Like the names of all the prominent

citizens, addresses and workplaces and so forth.”

“I'll have it for you tomorrow morning, along with your orders,” Crafton said. “In the meantime, let's

move on. As Daniel said, this business has been going on as far back as census figures go.” He looked

down at a sheaf of papers in front of him, thumbed through the stack, then glanced back up. “For

instance, in the Civil War Arkansas was a slave state, yet records show that most of the men from

around Masterville served on the Union side. Not only that, very few slave owners lived in the area at the

time. Doesn't that strike anyone as strange?”

Daniel thought about it. “Not really. The valley is located up in the mountains, not a good place for large

plantations. That's where most slave labor was used.”

Crafton tossed it back at him. “Records show a normal proportion of slave owners outside the valley.

Besides, according to news accounts of the day, sentiment in the valley was overwhelmingly pro-union.”

Daniel shrugged. He didn't think that meant much, especially if the valley people shared a common

heritage, something yet to be determined.

Shirley spoke up again while brushing a strand of fine blond hair away from her forehead. “Here's the

anomaly I think is the most significant: the valley is smack in the middle of the Bible Belt, yet most of the

population apparently has no religious preference. Now why should that be? It doesn't compute.”

“That's one of the things you're going to find out,” Crafton said.

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“Why?” Daniel asked. “Or rather, let me put it this way: Wouldn't nosing into people's religious beliefs

get us into constitutional questions?” He didn't bother mentioning that while he had no opinion one way or

another on the existence of God, he thought all religions were rather silly and had never understood why

anyone would believe in them.

Crafton stared at him, then answered, “We've already gotten a legal opinion on that. There's no conflict

so long no attempt is made to change or influence beliefs. Mr. Phillips is very interested in thewhy,

though.”

Daniel had never met Murray Phillips, the NSC director, but he knew of him. Like many of the current

cabinet members subject to congressional confirmation, he was an avowed, born again Christian. With

congress edging ever further toward the philosophy of the religious right, and President Smith already

there, it was hard for any other type candidate to pass muster. Worse, in Daniel's opinion, four new

Supreme Court justices of the same ilk had been appointed over the last several years and the court was

now delicately balanced on the issue of separation of church and state. Daniel thought that something like

the present investigation, especially with Phillips in charge, might well tip the balance if the proclivities of

the valley residents became public. He couldn't help wondering, though, why such a high proportion of

nonreligious folks should be concentrated in that one area. Perhaps there really was something wrong

there, but he decided not to comment any further and simply wait and see what turned up. After that he

would decide. Over the years he had rarely prejudged a case. Sometimes he thought he had been born a

natural skeptic.

Crafton gazed at Daniel as if his eyes could bore holes into him, then dropped his scrutiny back to the

stack of forms in front of him. He shuffled the papers for a moment then looked back up. “I think that's

about it for now. Daniel, you and Shirley get together this afternoon and get your stories together so you

won't contradict each other. Probably it would be best to pose as a married couple.”

Daniel caught the beginning of a smile from Shirley. It irritated him for no reason he could discern. He

thought of telling Crafton that he preferred to work alone, then abandoned the idea. The cover would be

reasonable in the situation, a married couple on vacation. He just hoped the investigation wouldn't take

that long. He began picking up his copies of the background analysis.

Shirley smiled brightly at him. “Shall we have lunch and get started while we eat?”

Daniel glanced at his watch and saw that it was nearly noon. He shrugged. “May as well. Any

preference?”

“I know a place.”

“Let's go, then.” He was already thinking of a reason why, as a married couple on vacation, they would

be lingering in the unobtrusive little city of Masterville.

Just as they were about to leave, a briefing officer called them back. They spent an impatient hour with

him, including ten minutes when Daniel joined him outside for a cigarette break. Afterwards, they were

presented with some facts and figures about Masterville not mentioned in the initial brief, and were given

Credit cards for the Operation.

* * * *

Daniel left his car in the parking garage and let Shirley drive. He raised his brows at her when she

stopped by a Lucullan Deluxe and popped the two front doors open.

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“I picked the right parents,” she said, sliding into the driver's seat.

Daniel went around to the open passenger's door and seated himself. The new car smell of leather and

plastic, oil and paint, upholstery and polish were as pleasant as he remembered it from years ago, but the

distinctive odor was long gone from his little hybrid Ford Kitten, an aptly fuzzy name for its environmental

friendliness, although he had bought it for fuel economy rather than a deep concern over global warming

or ozone levels. Personally, he would much rather be driving a big, well-cushioned vehicle like Shirley's

Lucullan than his own, but they cost so much that he declined in favor of investing his money.

“Nice car,” he told Shirley as she drove away, heading east. Daniel hoped she didn't pick an inordinately

expensive place to eat. Once they received their orders and an expense sheet from Crafton, it wouldn't

matter, but right now he didn't feel like spending three times what the food was worth in one of the trendy

Washington restaurants.

“Thanks. This little dive we're going to doesn't look like much, but the burgers are good.”

“Burgers? Somehow that doesn't go with a Lucullan.”

“Not to worry; we're eating at Marvin's because I know it's just been swept for bugs. I finished up a

case there yesterday.”

“How come you're being reassigned so soon?”

Shirley shrugged. “Guess they thought I'd fit the Op, same as you. Crafton may act like an ass

sometimes, but he knows what he's doing.”

“That he does,” Daniel agreed, remembering a bust he had been in on with Crafton. It had gone down

bad but his boss never lost his cool, even with one of his agents down and another wounded. Daniel

couldn't even remember him raising his voice as he gave orders in a clear, concise voice devoid of even a

tinge of hysteria. Too bad he was so insecure that he worried about underlings upstaging him, he thought,

then wondered where he had learned that bit of data. He couldn't remember anyone saying anything like

that. He turned it over in his mind for a moment then dismissed the thought as something dredged up from

his subconscious, unprovable and therefore meaningless.

* * * *

Marvin's cafe did look like a dive from the outside, but once past the entrance it turned into a clean, neat

diner, with numerous alcoves set with tables and comfortable chairs with armrests. Daniel pulled a chair

back for Shirley and held it for her while she sat down.

“No one has done that for me in years. You must have been brought up in the south.”

“Guilty. Mostly Texas, as a matter of fact. Sometimes my attitude gets me in trouble, though. Not all

women like the little amenities.”

“I don't mind. I've been called a bitch before, but I can't find a thing wrong with good manners.”

Daniel seated himself, wondering again why he felt no attraction toward the agent. He felt as if he should

have, given her blond good looks and a figure which was slim but possessed perfectly adequate curves.

It was a puzzle he had run across before and still didn't know the answer to. He certainly wasn't gay; it

was just that some women turned him on and some didn't. Shirley apparently was one of the latter. Well,

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it would make working together much simpler, assuming she didn't get the hots for him.

He let Shirley do the ordering, a relatively simple affair since all Marvin's served were hamburgers in

various guises. He asked for a Coors draft beer to go with it. Shirley asked for white wine. The drinks

were there within a minute or two of ordering.

As soon as the waiter was out of hearing, Daniel leaned forward and asked a direct question. “What do

you think of all this?”

He got an enigmatic smile in return. “Actually, I don't have a clue. It should be damned interesting,

though. I can't wait to meet some of those people in Masterville. They seem too good to be true,

somehow.”

“There is that,” Daniel admitted, “but I still can't see where national security is being compromised.”

“Well, you know what the grapevine says about our leader: he sees a conspiracy against America under

every rock, and Phillips aids and abets the paranoia.”

“Yeah, I've heard that, but who knows, really?”

“It seems pretty obvious if you follow politics at all. Bobby Lee is a slick one; he lets congress do his

dirty work, then just signs the bills and gives them all the credit.”

“I don't follow politics much.”

“You should. The country is moving way too far toward the fundamentalist religious agenda. It's getting

scary. You didn't hear me say that, though.”

Daniel nodded and smiled mirthlessly. Shirley was going to stay on the good side of Crafton and Crafton

was staying on the good side of Murray Phillips, the NSA director who would prefer a theocracy rather

than a democracy, or so it was bandied about among lower echelon agents. As for himself, he simply

tried to do his job as well as possible and avoid politics, office and national both, just as he had done in

the Marines.

Daniel drew a finger across his lips in a zipping motion just as their food arrived. “He took a bite of his

burger and raised his brows in appreciation. As soon as he had the burger a few bites along, he asked,

“Does posing as a married couple in Masterville suit you?”

“So long as it's a pose. You?”

“Crafton had the right idea. A married couple on vacation is likely to arouse the least suspicion. We may

have problems finding a place to stay, though. There seems to be a dearth of motels around that city.”

“Terrell told me there's a bed and breakfast listed right in the city. Why don't we try there?” Terrell was

the briefing officer who had called them back before they left the agency.

“Suits me. Do you have a number for them?”

“Yup. Wrote it down while I was going over all the data sheets. Here, you call.” She handed him a slip

of paper with a phone number below the notation,Ruthanne's Bed and Breakfast.

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ThiseBookispublishedbyFictionwisePublicationswww.fictionwise.comExcellenceineBooksVisitwww.fictionwise.comtofindmoretitlesbythisandothertopauthorsinScienceFiction,Fantasy,Horror,Mystery,andothergenres.DoubleDragonPublicationwww.double-dragon-ebooks.comCopyright©2004byDarrellBainFirstpublishedbyDDP,M...

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Darrell Bain - A Strange Valley

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