Chapter 5: A Night Visit

"Percy what the hell are you doing?" I thought to myself. I was loading up a back pack with sandwiches, water, and various items designed to help me make it through the night in the deep woods. It was a 20 mile cross country hike, mostly in the old growth woods and definitely up and down some large hills. It would be a full day's walk and I was getting old. I'll be 55 at my next birthday!

I made sure my cell phone was fully charged and also took one of the fancy SAT (satellite) phones we kept on hand for serious emergencies, because if I needed to get in contact with the local law, I didn't want to climb a hill to get a cell phone signal.

I sent all my guides who were going into the deep woods, out with a SAT phones. If one of my hunters got hurt, the SAT phone was the surest way to get help for them. Even with the most experienced guides, something might happen out there. The guests were not really outdoor people. Most of them worked in offices and only got outdoors for one or two weeks a year. They were good people, but they were more prone to accidents than a person who spent 52 week a year in the great outdoors. While we didn't actually babysit them, we, in reality, did.

I figured it would take me between 8 – 10 hours to get across the valley to the farm. And I knew I'd be tired. It had only been a year since I had double bypass surgery on my heart. Judith had been on my back about my health ever since. While the guests were eating steak, I was served poached fish. Now don't get me wrong, I like fish. But I like steak better.

And let's not even talk about exercise, Judith and I walk and jog almost every day, and after that I'd spend at least an hour in the lodge gym with Judith supervising my exercise. That doesn't count the workout she gives me almost every night when we go to bed. They are my favorite exercises.

I asked her one night, after we had a particularly strenuous session, why so often as both of us were in our 50's. She replied, "I went a lot of years without after our divorce, and now I'm trying to make up for all those lost years."

Then she gave me "the look".

"I'm not complaining! Just curious." Was my answer. Let's face it, I liked the excess!

As I walked through the woods, my mind kept wandering back to Judith. We had been married for about two years before she and I divorced. She was a very aggressive lawyer, who wanted to make a name for herself. I was just a beat cop. What did she ever see in me?

That question kept my mind occupied as I trekked across the hills. It kept me from kicking myself for not taking an ATV.

When I finally arrived, I found a place on a hill side in deep cover where I could observe the farm and not be seen. I pulled my binoculars out of the back pack and started surveying the complex. It consisted of a large house, an even larger barn, some out buildings and a coral. One thing did strike me as strange. This operation appeared to have no animals on it and it was too clean. Working farms have a look about them that this place did not have. As I looked around I did not even see a dog. And every barn has cats. Hell they keep the mouse population in line, if that is the only reason to have them. Also if it wasn't for the one car parked behind the house, anyone visiting would have guessed the place was vacant.

If it wasn't for my previous visit, so would I have.

I noticed the guy I had talked to a couple of weeks ago. He was in and out of the barn. If there were animals, I would have guessed he was feeding them. I settled down to wait for dark., so I could sneak down and explore the barn.

As the sun was starting to set, two vans pulled up in front of the barn. I watched as the three men unloaded and set up some long tables and very up market folding chairs. It looked as if there was going to be a party in the barn. Well that's what Bill's wife was supposed to be serving. I was starting to get curious.

The sun was almost down when the trucks drove off and a small van pulled in and parked behind the barn. The sliding door on the side of it opened and out popped six women. They were all attractive women. They were laughing and hugging each other.