Still, she knew that he was not going to give up tonight; she’d rattled his cage, and he was going to have to try to reassert his masculine superiority. He was either going to keep calling until he’d delivered his threats, or he was going to come over in person to deliver them. Probably on the front lawn at the top of his lungs if she wouldn’t let him in the house.

All right, you jerk, I’ll force your hand. If you’re going to play games, you’re going to do it on my turf.

She replaced the phone in its cradle, then dialed one of her clients quickly. This was a child-support case, and while she didn’t strictly have to call Angela with the information she’d gotten two days ago, since she’d already turned it over to the state’s attorney and to Angela’s own legal-eagle, it would make Angela feel better to hear it from the source.

Besides, Angela was a regular one-woman talk show. She was good for tying up the line for at least forty-five minutes.

“Hello, Angela?” she said as her client came on, after being pulled away from “The Golden Girls” by her daughter. “Listen, this is just a follow-up, but I thought I should let you know what I dug up on Harry so you can go bug your attorney and the state about this, okay? … Yeah, I sent the copies to them yesterday, so tomorrow or the next day at the latest they should have all the files—”

Just as she had figured, Angela was only too pleased to have someone to talk to; there were at least six “call waiting” beeps as someone—David—tried to ring through. She ignored them gleefully.

Finally, when there hadn’t been any more beeps for at least ten minutes, she exited the conversation gracefully, reminding Angela that they both had to work in the morning, and hung up.

She glanced over at the clock on the nightstand; it was 10:18. She watched the minute-hand move. At 10:22, the doorbell rang.

She got up, but only went as far as the living room. Grandfather gave her an inquiring look, and went to answer the door at her nod. They both knew who it was; David was being David so hard that the walls might just as well have not been there. So—first get him off-balance, by having Grandfather meet him. The bunch of activists he was working with at least had respect for the elders drummed into them three times a day by their leaders. Seeing Grandfather here would probably set him back a peg or two. He wouldn’t want to be rude around Mooncrow, and he wouldn’t know why Mooncrow was living with her, when he was obviously able-bodied enough to be on his own.