David Pierce sat in the Railway Cafe for a good long time, not moving much. The corner booth was enough for him, along with the occasional refills of coffee that the waitress brought (Angela was her name, as he saw by her name tag). He was doing some heavy thinking about the sudden move, his wife’s happy face during that snowball fight just a few short days ago, Jessie as she explored the magic of the castle in Quebec City, and his own feeling of relief when he began work again. These things mixed with thoughts of the first meeting with Flint and Thompson, and Jessie’s nightmares, and that tumor that slid about under the cat’s skin like a kneecap.

He felt an unexplained anxiety well up within him, and with it came a flood of nostalgia for the house in New York. The house on the dead-end street, with the little green park at one end, overlooking the highway. They had only lived there a few months, but it was there that he wanted to be right now; back there with the unemployment and the blessed ignorance of all this crap he had found himself buried in, back to the old life. He felt out of place here and in over his head.

And then someone spoke up in his head. Enough with this crap, Davey old boy, the voice said, and it sounded like Chuckie Howard again. You’ve got a chance to set things in the right direction here. Now go on and do it. Do whatever you can.

It was good advice, he decided, even if it did come from a snot-nosed little brat like Chuckie. He laughed out loud. It was almost funny if you thought about it. Here it was, barely a week since they left the Château Frontenac, and already that place seemed years away. Meanwhile, some poor slob from the FERC was coming here today to ask him questions as if he actually knew something.

This was how Dan Flint found him when he finally arrived twenty minutes later, and dropped the bombshell that would change their lives forever.

“Mr. Pierce,” Flint said when he approached the table As David started to stand, he waved him back into his seat. “Listen, thanks for coming. I wasn’t sure you would, after our phone call. I hope I didn’t seem too forceful.”

“I try not to hold a grudge.”

“That’s a good policy. May I?” Flint gestured to the plastic seat across from him, and David nodded.

Angela sauntered over and Flint ordered some coffee, eggs and bacon and a side of toast. “What I have to tell you,” he said, when she had gone, “stays between us for now. I don’t know how long it’s going to take to get a team up here, and I don’t want to tip anyone off.”

“Tip them off to what? What the hell is going on?”