"I b-beg your pardon," he stammered.

"You heard me," I said. "You and the appropriate law enforcement agents don't have the slightest clue what you're dealing with here, okay?"

"Oh." Now Dr. Krantz sounded sarcastic, which was sort of amusing, considering the fact that he was such a geek. "And I suppose you do."

"Better than you," I said. "At least we've got a chance at infiltrating them from the inside, instead of going in there blasting away, and possibly getting Seth killed in the crossfire."

"Infiltration?" Dr. Krantz sounded appalled. "What are you talking about? You can't possibly think you have a better chance at—"

"Oh, yeah?" I narrowed my eyes at him. "What number comes after nine?"

He looked at me like I was crazy. "What? What does that have to do with—"

"Just answer the question, Dr. Krantz," I said. "What number comes after nine?"

"Why, ten, of course."

"Wrong," I said. "What are Coke cans made out of?"

"Aluminum, of course. Jessica, I—"

"Wrong again," I said. "The answer to both questions, Dr. Krantz, is tin. I've just administered a Grit test, and you failed miserably. There is no way you are going to be able to pass for a local. Now get out of here, before you ruin it for the rest of us."

"This," Dr. Krantz said, looking scandalized, "is ridiculous. Rob, surely you—"

But Rob straightened on the back of the snowmobile, his head turned in the direction of the lights from Jim Henderson's house.

"Bogey," he said, "at twelve o'clock. Krantz, if you don't get the hell out of sight, you're gonna find yourself with a belly full of buckshot."

"W-what?" Dr. Krantz looked around nervously. "What are you—"

Rob was off the snowmobile and shoving Cyrus Krantz behind a tree before the good doctor knew what was happening. At the same time, I saw what Rob had seen, a light coming toward us through the thick trees on Jim Henderson's side of the barbed wire. As the light came closer, I saw that it came from one of those old-fashioned kerosene lanterns. The lantern was held by a big man in red-plaid hunting gear, a rifle in his other hand, and a dog big enough to pass for a small pony at his side.

The dog, when it noticed us, began hurtling through the snow in our direction. For a second or two, as it came careening toward us, its long tongue lolling and its eyes blazing, I thought it was one of those hell dogs. . . . You know, from that Hound of the Baskervilles they made us read in ninth grade?

But as it got closer, I realized it was just your run of the mill German shepherd. You know, the kind that clamp down on your throat and won't let go, even if you hit them over the head with a socket wrench.

Fortunately, just as this particular German shepherd was preparing to leap over the barbed wire between us and do just that, the guy with the rifle went, "Chigger! Down!" and the dog collapsed into the snow not two feet away from Rob and me, growling menacingly, with its gaze never wavering from us.

The man with the rifle put the lantern down, reached into his pocket, and pulled something out. Handgun, I thought, my heart thudding so loudly in my chest, I thought it might cause an avalanche. If there'd been any cliffs around, anyway. The rifle's too messy. He's going to put a bullet through each of our skulls and let Chigger eat our frozen carcasses.

Sometimes it really did seem like the whole world was conspiring against me ever seeing Rob in a tux.

"Hey," Rob said, keeping his hands in the air and his gaze on Chigger. "Hey, don't shoot. We don't mean any harm. We just want to talk to Jim."

But it turned out the thing Chigger's owner had taken out of his pocket wasn't a gun. It was a Walkie-Talkie.

"Blue Leader, this is Red Leader," Red Plaid Jacket said into the Walkie-Talkie. "We got intruders over by the south fence. Repeat. Intruders by the south fence."

"We aren't intruders," I said. Then, remembering what our cover story was supposed to be—except of course that we weren't supposed to have let ourselves get caught until after Chick and his friends were safely hidden in the bushes and trees around the compound, ready to bust us on out as soon as we successfully found Seth—I quickly amended that claim. "I mean, we ain't intruders. We want to join you. We want to be True Americans, too."

Static burst over Red Plaid Jacket's Walkie-Talkie. Apparently, someone was replying to his intruder warning. He must have been speaking in code, though, because I couldn't understand what he was saying.

"Copy that, Red Leader," the voice said. "Tag and transport. Repeat, tag and transport."

Red Plaid Jacket put his Walkie-Talkie away, then signaled for Rob and me to climb over the barbed wire. The way he signaled this was, he pointed the rifle at us, and went, "Git on over here."

Climbing over barbed wire is never a pleasant experience. But it is an even less pleasant experience when you are doing it under the watchful gaze of a massive German shepherd named Chigger. Rob went first, and didn't seem to snag anything too vital while climbing. He very politely held as much of the barbed wire down for me as he was able, so that I could arrive uninjured on the other side, as well. I didn't succeed as nimbly as he had, being about a foot shorter than he was, but all that really suffered was the inside seam of my jeans.

Once we were safely on the True Americans' side of the fence, Red Plaid Jacket went, "Git on, then," and signaled, again with the mouth of his rifle, that we should start walking toward the house.

Rob looked back at the snowmobile.

"What about our ride?" he asked. "Is it safe to leave it there?"

Red Plaid Jacket let out a harsh laugh. That wasn't all he let out, either. He also let out a stream of tobacco juice from between his cheek and gum. It landed, in a steaming brown puddle, in the snow.

"Safe from what?" he wanted to know. "The coons? Or the possums?"

This was a comforting response, as it indicated that Red Plaid was as unaware of the presence of Dr. Krantz, hidden behind the thick pines, as he was of the many patrons of Chick's who had answered the call to arms by the owner of their favorite carousing spot … or who at least I was hoping would answer that call. And show up soon.

"Move," Red Plaid said to Rob and me.

And so we moved.

C H A P T E R

12

It would be wrong to say I enjoyed our long walk toward Jim Henderson's house. I relished any time I got to spend in the presence of Rob Wilkins, as our meetings, now that he had graduated but I remained trapped behind in high school hell, had grown all too infrequent.

No matter how nice the company one might be with, however, it is never pleasant to have a rifle pointed at one's back. While I didn't think Red Plaid Jacket would fire at us in cold blood, there was always the chance that he might trip over Chigger or a stump hidden in the snow, and accidentally pull the trigger.

And though this would solve my problem of how I was going to get Rob to invite me to a formal affair like his uncle's wedding (so I could impress him by now nice I look in a dress), it would not solve it in the right way. So it was with some trepidation that I made the long journey from the south fence to the heart of the True Americans' compound.

Once we got moving, though, I did start to feel a little less cold. Now that the blizzard had blown away, the sky was completely clear, and this far out from the lights of town, it was magically dusted with stars. I could even make out the Milky Way. It might almost have been romantic, a moonlit walk through the freshly fallen snow, the smell of wood smoke hanging tantalizingly in the air.

Except, of course, for the rifle. Oh, and the dangerous German shepherd slogging along beside us.

I am not afraid of dogs, and in general, they seem to like me. So during our walk, since we didn't dare talk to pass the time, I concentrated on trying to get Chigger to give up on the idea of tearing my throat out. I did this by thrusting my hand, whenever Red Plaid Jacket wasn't looking, and the dog came close enough, in front of Chigger's nose. Dogs operate by smell, and I figured if Chigger smelled that I really wasn't the lunchmeat type, he might hesitate about eating me.

Chigger, however, like most males I've encountered in my life, seemed remarkably uninterested in me. Maybe I should have taken Ruth's advice and invested in some perfume, instead of just splashing on some of Mike's Old English Leather now and then.

As we got closer to the buildings we were approaching, I have to admit, I wasn't too impressed. I mean, compared to Jim Henderson's place, David Koresh's compound over in Waco had looked like the freaking Taj Mahal. Henderson's entire operation seemed to consist of nothing more than a ranch-style house, a few trailers, and one rambling barn. Sure, the whole thing had that army barracks, ready-to-mobilize-at-any-minute kind of lack of permanency.

But hello, where was the bathroom? That was all I wanted to know.

To my dismay, Red Plaid Jacket, tailed by the ever faithful Chigger, led us not toward the ranch house, or either of the trailers, but directly to the barn. My chances of finding a working toilet were beginning to look dimmer than ever.

You can imagine my delight then when Red Plaid threw back the massive barn door to reveal what appeared to be the True Americans' command center, or bunker, if you will. Oh, it was no NORAD, don't get me wrong. There were no computers. There wasn't even a TV in sight.

Instead, the seat of Jim Henderson's white supremacist group resembled photos we'd seen in World Civ of Nazi headquarters, back in the forties. There were a lot of long tables, at which sat a good many fair-haired gentlemen. (Apparently, we had interrupted their supper.) And there was a giant flag hanging against the back wall. But instead of a swastika, the flag depicted the symbol that had been carved into Nate Thompkins's chest, and spray-painted onto the overpass and on the overturned headstones at the Jewish cemetery. It was the coiled snake Chick had described, with the words DON'T TREAD ON ME beneath it.