Mabel lingered, and I could tell she was troubled by something. I didn’t push it, since I noticed her checking to be sure no one was close enough to hear our conversation. She leaned on the counter and put her face close to mine. She still had that goofy look in her eyes that tends to make me uncomfortable.

She said, “Listen, Mitchum, I need to tell you something.”

I didn’t answer, just waited for it to come out.

“I’m worried. I’ve seen the same strangers here for the past few days. I didn’t think it meant anything, but with Bailey Mae missing and now the Wilkses dead, I feel like I need to tell someone.”

She had my attention. “I’m listening.”

“Two men and a woman came in right as we opened at about 5:30 yesterday and this morning. It reminded me that I’d seen them before, a few weeks ago. They’re not from around here.”

“What makes them suspicious?”

“Who in their right mind would hang around this town if they didn’t have to?”

“Me, for one. But tell me more about these strangers. What did they look like?”

That’s when she surprised me. Instead of describing the strangers, she pulled out her phone and showed me a photograph she’d snapped of them leaving the diner. Two guys in their thirties with good builds and short hair and a tall woman about the same age who wore her dark hair in a neat braid down her back. Nothing unusual about them except they were all in good shape.

I had Mabel text me the photo, and then I gave her a stern look.

She said, “What? What’s wrong?”

“I don’t want you risking yourself snapping photos of who-knows-what. You can tell me anything, but don’t do anything stupid. Let’s figure out what’s going on first. Don’t stick your neck out.”

That was my job.

Chapter 10

Chapter 10

I continued my search for Bailey Mae by looking around Marlboro and the surrounding area, and I showed the photo from Mabel to the people I came across. No one seemed to recognize the three strangers from the diner.

My family had blanketed the area well. There were now flyers up on virtually every telephone pole, and most people that I visited had already talked to one of my cousins or my mother.

I decided to try a new tack and headed down to Newburgh to talk to the cops there. Newburgh was a much larger city and had seen better times. It had a crime rate that bucked the national trend by rising every year, and it was now considered one of the most dangerous small towns in the country. The city had a dingy look to it that I was afraid would never clear up.