“where in Sam Hill?”) in the early twentieth century. He’d envisioned a Quaker paradisaical farm community and named the town after his wife, Mary Hill. She might have thought it was cooler, I suspect, if it weren’t out in the middle of the desert with about two inches of soil. There isn’t much left of the town—a few small orchards, a couple of nearby vineyards, and a state-run campground—none of which made Maryhill special.

But Sam Hill hadn’t stopped with the town. He built the very first WWI memorial, a full-sized replica of Stonehenge visible from the highway on the Oregon side of the river.

We turned west once we were over the bridge, though, away from Stonehenge and Maryhill. After ten or fifteen minutes of driving down a narrow highway that cut its way along the desert-steppe country of the Columbia Gorge, we came to a campground. Though it was groomed to within an inch of its life, there was no one inside. Adam pulled in the driveway, took a card off the map holder on his sunshade, and swiped it though the control box next to the gate. A green light flashed, and the gate slid open.

“We have it to ourselves,” he said. “I did some of the security here, and they told me we could stay even though it doesn’t officially open until next spring. I’m sure the shower in the trailer works, but the ones in the restrooms over there are a lot bigger.”

I looked around the campground, where tall oaks and maples gave shade to the graveled RV

spaces. The big trees weren’t natural for this part of the state, any more than the green, green grass

—someone had spent a lot of time tending them.

Adam pulled into a spot halfway between the gray stone restroom and the river. I found myself frowning at one of the trees. It must have been sixty feet tall, its roots buried deep in the earth where it wouldn’t disturb the groomed

campground.

“Ten days,” I said.

He knew how my mind worked. “Zee has the shop,” he said. “Darryl and his mate are watching Jesse, who told me before we left that she didn’t need a babysitter.”

“To which you answered that they were

bodyguards, not babysitters,” I said. “But she argued that bodyguards usually didn’t get to tell the people they are guarding what time they have to be home.”

“And you weren’t even there for the argument,” marveled Adam. “Darryl broke in, and said,

‘Family does.’ And that was the end of that. So what else are you worried about?”

“Stefan,” I said. “I asked Warren to look in on him, but ...”

“I had a talk with Stefan,” said Adam. “Unlike you, my conscience didn’t prevent me from telling him he needed to fill out his menagerie. One of his problems is that he doesn’t want to hunt in his backyard, and he can’t leave his menagerie alone.