Chapter 6

Ashley, Esther, and the twins were waiting in the SUV just out of range of the alarm system detectors on the entry road when we arrived there. Since there wasn’t room to pass them on the road, they preceded us to the house after I had turned off the alarm system. We all parked in front, before Ed and I got out to open up the house and check it out before the women got out of the vehicle. Everything checked out fine.

“How long had you been waiting?” I asked Ashley who had come into my arms as soon as we had cleared the house. She was shaking badly.

“Only ... only a few minutes,” she told me, but I could see that she was still upset.

“Did you locate him?” she asked after a long kiss.

“Yes, we found the house. I’ll need to return tonight or in the morning to bug it,” I told her. She seemed to have settled down some while I was holding her.

“We still need to get the girls out of the car,” I reminded her after that.

“Yes, give me a hand,” Ashley answered. When we opened the door on our side of the vehicle, Carry, or perhaps it was Chris, I still have trouble telling them apart, held out her arms to be picked up out of her child safety seat.

“Da!” she giggled on seeing me. Ed and Esther were on the other side of the vehicle getting her twin out. She wanted Grandpa to hold her. Ed and I carried the twins into the house, while Ashley and Esther got their purses out of the SUV, and Ashley retrieved her shotgun.

The twins went into their playpen and were soon asleep while Ed and I recounted the events of our trip to our wives, even the encounter with the cop.

“What vehicle are you going to take back there then,” Esther asked when we were finished.

“I was considering the SUV. Many of the women at the park with their children were driving one,” I told her.

“Tell her the rest,” Ed prompted then.

“I was considering taking Ashley and the twins with me as a cover when I am checking the recordings each day,” I told them, much to their shock.

“No, no! We couldn’t go every day. There is too much else to do, and you still have work to do. If you don’t complete the work on the jobs that you have now in a timely manner, you won’t get more work in the future,” Ashley reminded me.

“All right,” I agreed. “Every other day. The equipment will last two days without the need of new batteries, and I don’t want to drag this thing out too long anyway. I just want to see what I can learn about their organization, and what they are up to,” I reminded her.

“Do you want us to go with you?” Esther asked, as she held Ed’s hand.

“Maybe occasionally,” I told her.

“I don’t believe that tonight would be a good time to bug that place,” Ed told me right after that. “He will likely be home tonight. Tomorrow during the day would be better.”

“Yes, you’re right. I’ll need to get the equipment ready in any case, and probably will need new batteries for most of it” I told him.

“I’ll give you a hand. I want to see what you have. You’ve been out of the business for sometime now, and they have made a lot of progress in electronics in that time,” he told me.

Ed and I went down to the vault while our wives headed to the kitchen to feed the twins, who were cranky again, and to start dinner. After opening the vault, I got out the electronic bugs that I had. Some were more recent than others, as I had acquired some in various trades after I retired. Some I had gotten from people in payment for services, but all of that had been before I had met Ashley.

“Well, most of these aren’t too bad,” Ed said after looking at everything. “I was expecting to see some really archaic equipment.”

“No! I’ve kept up on things in the business, even though I’m retired,” I told him before getting down to the business of checking everything out. “We need to test all of this stuff to be sure it still works after we replace the batteries.”

“Do you have batteries for all of this stuff here?” Ed wanted to know.

“Only a few fresh ones. We’ll need to make a list of what we need, as some of this equipment takes specialized batteries,” I told him.

“There is a place that specializes in batteries, and battery replacement, in that traffic jam of a town up the road. They’re open late, too,” Ed told me. We got busy then and tested the equipment that still had functioning batteries, or that we had the replacements for. By the time we finished, we had quite a list of needed replacements.

“Okay! Now, how much of this equipment are you going to use?” Ed asked after we finished checking everything.

“I figure I’ll need five of the wireless mikes: two in the living room, one in the dining room, one in the kitchen, and one in the bedroom,” I told him.

“They have enough range to reach the basement. I’ll put the relay transmitter in there, but the digital recorder will be out under the trees in the park. That way I can check it and not have to get too near the house all of the time,” I told him.

“Couldn’t the mikes transmit directly to the recorder?” Ed asked.

“No, the mikes don’t have enough power for that distance. I can hide the retransmission equipment in the basement and plug it into the house power. That will eliminate the need to replace the batteries in it which will only be required for backup then. The batteries in the recorder can be changed when I check it and change the disk,” I told him.

“How long are the batteries in the wireless mikes good for?” Ed asked next.

“Seven to ten days depending on the use. They’re voice activated,” I told him.

“So we should have at least a week of listening before you have to go back in to change the batteries?” Ed asked.

“It will probably be closer to ten days or more if he is gone a lot,” I told him. We closed the vault after that and returned to the house.

“I need to go buy batteries,” I told Ashley, as we entered the kitchen.

“Where do you need to go to get them?” she asked.

“Up the road in traffic-jam-ville,” I told her.

“Can you stop at the store and pick up some food and things for us?” she asked.

“Sure,” I told her, and she handed me a list that she had already made out.

“Don’t be too long. Dinner will be ready shortly,” she reminded me.

“We won’t be long,” I told her.

“Is Ed going with you?” Esther asked, and turned to her husband.

“Yes,” he answered, and she gave him a list of things to get also.

“Do we need all of this?” Ed asked in surprise.

“Only if you want to eat breakfast in the morning, and then lunch and dinner,” Esther told him.

“Let’s go in your truck,” Ed suggested. “We’ll never get all of this in my truck.”

Even going the back way, we soon ran into a lot of traffic on the way to traffic-jam-ville. The battery specialty store was open; but, boy, were they expensive!! Following that we went to the all-in-one store for the items on our wives’ lists. It really frosted my ass when I saw some of the same batteries that we needed on sale there for a lot less than we paid at the battery store. I called it to Ed’s attention.

“We’ll know better the next time,” Ed said on seeing the prices.

“I’ll check here first from now on,” I assured him as we headed for the checkout line. Naturally, they were all crowded this time of day, and it took us much longer than we expected. Dinner had been ready for a while by the time we got back.

Ed and Esther left shortly after dinner, which had been fabulous as usual. They had agreed to return at around noon tomorrow in Esther’s blue car, and we would all visit the park. The women would watch the twins while Ed and I bugged Haskin’s house. I changed all of the needed batteries before going to bed. Ashley and I spent a very quiet night, but I held her all night.

The next morning we were all up early, and I got to work on the blacksmithing orders that I had been putting off while involved in this hunt for Mark Haskins. I managed to get a good bit of work done before Ed and Esther arrived just past noon time. When Ed came into the shop, I turned off the blower, and banked the forge fire after cooling the piece that I had been working, on in the water barrel.

I cleaned up behind the house and changed shoes before entering the kitchen, so I didn’t bring in any of the grit and trash from the floor of the forge building. Ed had gone in ahead of me.

“Lunch is ready,” Ashley told me before she got a good look at me. “After you shower and change clothes,” she quickly added. Ed was already at the table and eating. He refrained from saying anything. My mother-in-law, his wife Esther, only smiled. It was the twins, Chris and Carry, that actually paid any attention to me.

“DA!” they both cooed and held out their arms to be picked up.

“Don’t you dare to pick up either of the girls until AFTER you clean up. I don’t need to clean coal dust off of them in addition to everything else,” Ashley chided me. I smiled at the girls.

“Sorry - later,” I told them to frowns, as I went past them on my way upstairs. I heard a “WAH” that got louder as I went down the hall, and had reached jet engine volume by the time I approached the stairs.

“Bill!” Ashley called over the noise of the twins. “You’re going to have to pick them up and hold them. I’ll just have to clean them up. They want daddy,” Ashley told me in a perturbed voice. I returned to the kitchen, and smiled at my daughters, as I removed each one from her high chair and held both of them in my arms.

“Da!” they cooed and snuggled up against me on either side not caring at all that I was dirty and sweaty, at least not for a few minutes, before they decided that they really wanted to eat more of what Ashley had made them for lunch. Then it was wiggle and squirm time, as they tried to reach their food on the high chair trays but still stay in my arms. I quickly returned them to their seats, but did notice the dark smudges on them that Ashley had been so worried about. Our daughters weren’t worried about them at all and happily returned to eating, completely ignoring ‘Da’.

A good hot shower with a cold rinse at the end made me feel like a new man, and ready for the trip this afternoon. When I got downstairs after dressing, Ed reminded me of something that I had completely forgotten.

“You do remember that today is Saturday, don’t you?” he asked.

“Sat ... Saturday!?” I asked, and had to think back over the week. How could it be Saturday already, I wondered?

“You managed to miss most of Thursday,” he reminded me. “You were asleep. So was Ashley.”

“Shit!’ I said, as I realized that Haskins could be home all day today. I really needed to get that place bugged though in case they had a meeting, or get together over the weekend.

“We still need to do this. We’ll just have to be more careful. I’ll only go in if he isn’t at home. I want to be ready in case they have a meeting this weekend.”

“Have you considered that they could be having a meeting when we get there?” Ed asked.

“Yes, I know, but we’ll just have to chance it and hope that any meetings are held after we bug the place,” I told him. Ashley and Esther didn’t look happy that this trip could be a bust. We would just have to chance it.

“We’ll only take a minimal number of weapons, just in case,” I told all of them.

Following lunch and cleaning up the twins, we loaded in our vehicles and left for the park. I had brought the necessary equipment up to the house before starting work this morning and it was already in the SUV. Ed and Esther followed us in her blue car. The trip to the north side was fairly fast and uneventful this time. The traffic was light, and there weren’t any accidents or road repair crews on the roads.