"I just hope he's not planning to turn us in," Flynn murmured. "This would be a rotten position to fight from.""We'd manage," Jensen assured him, peering upward. "I just hope his visitors don't ask to use the facilities." * * *

Foxleigh was sitting at the table, whittling industriously at a random stick he'd grabbed from the wood bin, when the two Security men arrived.

Typically, they didn't bother to knock. "Boulder Security," the younger of the two said brusquely, as if

their uniforms weren't enough of a clue. "Who are you?"

"Who wants to know?" Foxleigh countered, not looking up from his carving.

The man snorted and grabbed the end of Foxleigh's stick. "When I ask you a question-"

Foxleigh let go of the stick, shifted his grip to the man's wrist, and pulled it sharply downward toward

the tabletop. The other stumbled forward, off balance; and as he did so, Foxleigh twisted the knife

around to point toward him.

The man froze with shock and probably astonishment, the knife point no more than ten centimeters from his stomach. "Manners, sonny," Foxleigh said softly. "You'd be surprised how far they get you."

"Smith?" the kid demanded in a choked tone, his wide eyes staring at the knife.

"Easy, Griffs," the older man said soothingly. He had his paral-dart gun out, pointing it at Foxleigh.

"You, too, friend. We're just here to talk."

"Tell him that," Foxleigh suggested.

"Everyone just relax," Smith said. "Griffs, apologize to the man."

"Me?" Griffs demanded. "Smith-"

"Apologize to the man," Smith said more firmly.

Griffs glared at Foxleigh, his throat working. "Sorry I grabbed your stick," he said through clenched teeth.

"There we go," Smith said encouragingly. "Now let him go, okay?"

"It's all about manners," Foxleigh said, releasing Griffs's wrist.

Breathing hard, the other took a step back from the table and yanked out his own paral-dart pistol. "Drop it," he snarled.

"It's dropped," Foxleigh said, laying the knife on the table and folding his arms across his chest. "Now ask your questions and get out."

"Let's start with your name," Smith said, lowering his gun to point at the floor.

"I'm called Toby," Foxleigh said.

"Toby what?" Griffs demanded. His gun, not surprisingly, was still pointed at Foxleigh's face.

"Just Toby."

"Look-"

He broke off at a gesture from Smith. "What do you do up here, Mr. Toby?" the older man asked in a more reasonable tone.

Foxleigh shrugged. "I live," he said. "Pretty much the same thing you do in the city."

"I meant, how do you survive?" Smith said. "Food and clothing and all?"

"There's plenty of game about," Foxleigh said. "I do some hunting and trapping, and I've got a small vegetable plot around the side of the cliff face over there."

"And the people in Shelter Valley help you out, too, I suppose?"

Foxleigh grimaced. "Sometimes," he admitted. "Some of them. Only when I can't do for myself."

"And that's not very often, I imagine," Smith said, glancing around the cabin. "You seem the self- sufficient sort. Tell me, how long have you been up here?"

Foxleigh shrugged as casually as he could. Here was where things were going to get dicey. "Don't remember exactly," he said vaguely.

"Since before the war?"

"Some, I guess," Foxleigh conceded.

"And you were, what, sixty or so when it began?" Smith persisted.

It would have been nice to be able to bring that number down to somewhere around thirty, Foxleigh knew. It would line up with his actual age and eliminate a lot of potentially unpleasant questions.

Unfortunately, there were people in Shelter Valley who might remember the real Toby being in his upper fifties when he turned his back on humanity and moved out on them. "Closer to fifty," he said, fudging the number as far as he could.

"Which would make you about eighty years old," Smith concluded, peering closely at Foxleigh's face.

"You're in mighty good shape for a man that age. Especially given the kind of life you lead."

"Life like this keeps a man healthy," Foxleigh countered. "You soft city folk ought to try it sometime."

He lifted his eyebrows at Griffs. "Especially you."Griffs bristled, but another gesture from Smith kept him quiet. "I'm sure it does," Smith said. "But it doesn't keep you that healthy." His eyes hardened. "You've been getting Idunine, haven't you?"

That was, of course, the obvious first assumption for them to make. Trouble was, it had the potential to get all of Shelter Valley into nearly as much trouble as the truth would. "What if I have?" Foxleigh growled. "Is that a crime?"

Smith shrugged. "Depends on how you've been getting it."Foxleigh lowered his eyes. "Don't want to get anyone in trouble," he muttered."You won't," Smith assured him.Foxleigh knew how much that promise was worth. But he had little choice in the matter. "It was the doc in town," he admitted. "Doc Adamson. He gave me a little once when my leg was acting up so badly I couldn't walk."

"When was that?"

"Ten years ago," Foxleigh said grudgingly. "Maybe twelve."

"Did it work?"

"Good enough," Foxleigh said, watching the other's face out of the corner of his down-turned eyes. So far he seemed to be buying it. "I still have some trouble, especially in the cold. But at least I can get by."

"So what other illegal drugs does Doc Adamson have?" Griffs asked.

"Who says Idunine is illegal?" Foxleigh demanded, glaring up at him. "Used to be you could get it all the time before the war.""Before the war," Griffs repeated tersely. "This is after the war, and Idunine is strongly regulated.

Somehow, I don't see a backwoods witch doctor having legal access to it."

"Maybe he had some left over from before," Foxleigh said, looking accusingly at Smith. "You said he wouldn't get in trouble."

"If he was just using up an old supply, he won't," Smith assured him. "But if he's black-marketing it ...

well, we'll see."

Foxleigh grimaced. That was, in fact, the story he and Adamson had worked out all those years ago in

case someone started asking these very questions. He just hoped the doc hadn't forgotten the details. "So is that it?" he muttered.

"Just about," Smith said. "You said you did some hunting. That mean you have a gun?"

"No, I brain the deer with rocks," Foxleigh bit out sarcastically. "Of course I have a gun. It's over there

beside the bed."

"Guns are regulated, too, of course," Smith pointed out as Griffs strode over for a look.

"Yeah, why am I not surprised?" Foxleigh said with a sniff, watching Griffs closely as he took the old

scattergun off the rack. "Careful with it-careful.""He is," Smith said soothingly. "Well?""It's within the limits," Griffs said, a note of disappointment in his voice. Clearly, he'd been hoping he could find an excuse to confiscate it. Setting it back into its rack, he pulled up the thin mattress and looked beneath it. "Any other weapons?"

"Just the knife, and it's mostly for eating with," Foxleigh said. "What are you doing?"

"I'm looking around," Griffs said, dropping the mattress and running his hands through the books and other odds and ends in the crate that served as a nightstand. "That all right with you?"

"Not really, no," Foxleigh said, looking back at Smith. "If he wrecks anything, it's coming out of his

hide."

"He'll be careful," Smith said, his voice suddenly a little too casual. "You have any visitors up here recently?"Foxleigh felt his stomach tighten. "Not unless the doc's visit way back when counts as recently," he said.

"Why?"

"The thermal reading we took from the town a little while ago seemed too high for one man," Smith said. "You have anything you'd like to tell us?""Aside from go to hell?" Foxleigh countered. "This is the cabin. You see anyone else here?""Don't get smart," Griffs warned as he sifted gingerly through the wood bin. "If you're covering for someone, you're going to be in serious trouble."

Foxleigh snorted. "I stopped covering for anyone forty years ago," he said. "You were probably just reading my stove-you can see for yourself it's still hot. That, or your equipment's no damn good.""We'll have it checked out," Smith said. "Griffs?""Seems clean," Griffs said, standing in the middle of the room for one final look. His eyes lingered a moment on the sink and toilet area, and Foxleigh held his breath. But the young Security man turned away without comment and nodded to his partner. "Let's get out of this pig hole."

"Good-bye, Mr. Toby," Smith said, giving Foxleigh an almost friendly smile as they left.

Foxleigh watched through the window as the two men picked their way down the path back toward town, his stomach settling into a hard knot. Smith's smile had been almost friendly, all right. But Foxleigh wasn't fooled, any more than Smith had been fooled by his hot-stove story. A good IR sensor could tell the difference between a stove and a human body, and even if the analyzers on their Birren-7 patrol boat weren't good enough to sort that out the ones in Athena certainly were.

And if he'd been reading Smith's face right, running the track through those analyzers was the first thing

he would do when he got back to base.