“No secrets, pal,” Lou replied. “Next time I’m carrying carnivorous termites, you’ll be the first to know.”

“Oh, she’s the queen, all right,” Humphries was saying. “The queen of queens. My lab is next door. Let’s go there and have ourselves a closer inspection.”

Humphries took great care to maximize the limited space in his windowless lab. A Corian-covered counter extending out from the far wall provided enough surface area for three distinct workstations. There were microscopes, centrifuges, and other lab equipment resting on a table.

Glass-fronted cabinets contained shelving stocked with glass beakers, jars, flasks, and coils of plastic tubing. Dozens of scientific tomes were neatly arranged in a bookcase on one wall. At least three of them, Lou noted, were written or co-authored by Humphries himself. On the opposite wall stood several specimen cabinets, holding containers with various insects inside them, some living and some not.

Again, Darlene caught Lou’s eye and shivered.

Humphries crossed to the cabinets, where he retrieved a jar containing a small battalion of fairly large live ants. After slipping on a pair of latex gloves, he transferred the termites Lou had brought to a large flask and closed the opening with a rubber stopper. Next, he skillfully used a large dropper to remove half a dozen ants and deposited them into the flask. There was an instant rush of activity as the termites’ amber bodies swarmed the ants, which were nearly the size they were.

The attack was as ferocious as the one on the mouse in Joey’s bizarre terrarium.

Within seconds, there were no remnants of the ants whatsoever.

It took Lou most of a minute to realize he’d been holding his breath. He let the air out slowly. A glance at Darlene told him she had been doing the same thing.

Using a large magnifying glass, Humphries silently studied the termites with a child’s wide-eyed enthusiasm. “Just what I thought from the pictures you texted to me,” Humphries said. “Macrotermes bellicosus.”

“That’s their name?” Darlene asked. “It’s almost as scary as they are.”

“Macro means ‘large’ and bellicosus means—”

“Warlike,” Lou and Darlene said in unison.

“You got it. M. bellicosus is an African breed. But these were found in Virginia?”

“That’s right,” Lou said. “In a town named Kings Ridge.”