Tom and Alice and Nick moved up to their earlier vantage point, and now that there was less activity they had a better view of the small camp beyond. The barn was closed and the open-sided building looked deserted. The bunkhouse door was ajar and they could just hear what sounded like a radio inside, playing scratchy, indistinct music. The smoke they’d seen was rising up from a narrow metal chimney on the roof of the bunkhouse.

For the first time, Tom also noticed that there was a dog chained up at the side of the main building. Behind it was a low addition to the bunkhouse, perhaps housing a generator, and large jerry cans of what he guessed was gasoline stacked beyond it.

The dog was lying with its face flat on the ground but it sprang to its feet now and peered into the trees. It growled and let out an uncertain bark. Then it barked again.

A man appeared in the open door of the bunkhouse and stepped onto the small deck that ran along the front of it. He said something in Spanish to the dog, which wagged its tail in response and barked again, staring at the trees. The man turned to stare too.

He was heavyset with thinning hair and a mustache, wearing a grubby tank undershirt and what looked like green soccer shorts—Tom could buy Joel’s assertion that he might be a farmer, but he also didn’t look like the kind of person Tom would want to tangle with. There was a meanness about him, a dangerous edge to the way he held himself, alert but completely without fear.

The man saw or heard something now, and called a few inaudible words to the dark of the open door. A moment later, a couple more men came out, one younger, the other old with a thick mop of white hair. Both had guns, and the younger one handed a revolver to the first man.

Alice mumbled something under her breath in response to the sight of the guns and the looks of fierce uncertainty on the faces of the men. But there was no time to say anything else because Joel and Chris came crashing out of the undergrowth on the far side of the camp and into the clearing.

The dog barked again but the first man shouted and it cowered away to the side of the building.

Joel raised his hand in a wave and called out cheerily, “¡Hola! ¡Buenos dias! Can you help us?”

“Hello,” called Chris, also with a wave.

The younger guy laughed in apparent disbelief. The older man turned and walked back into the bunkhouse. The first man, the one with the mustache, continued to stare, his expression unflinching. Before Joel and Chris had reached them, three more men had emerged from the door, none of them armed, which at least suggested they didn’t see the newcomers as a threat.