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    strangers, if any strangers showed up. Not three weeks later Carol Gerber had made her comment about wondering sometimes if Ted was on the run from something.
    â€œHow many guys are there?” he asked.
    â€œThree, five, perhaps more by now.” Ted shrugged. “You’ll know them by their long yellow coats and olive skin . . . although that darkish skin is just a disguise.”
    â€œWhat . . . you mean like Man-Tan, or something?”
    â€œI suppose, yes. If they’re driving, you’ll know them by their cars.”
    â€œWhat makes? What models?” Bobby felt like Darren McGavin on Mike Hammer and warned himself not to get carried away. This wasn’t TV. Still, it was exciting.
    Ted was shaking his head. “I have no idea. But you’ll know just the same, because their cars will be like their yellow coats and sharp shoes and the greasy perfumed stuff they use to slick back their hair: loud and vulgar.”
    â€œLow,” Bobby said—it was not quite a question.
    â€œLow,” Ted repeated, and nodded emphatically. He sipped rootbeer, looked away toward the sound of the eternally barking Bowser . . . and remained that way for several moments, like a toy with a broken spring or a machine that has run out of gas. “They sense me,” he said. “And I sense them, as well. Ah, what a world.”
    â€œWhat do they want?”
    Ted turned back to him, appearing startled. It was as if he had forgotten Bobby was there . . . or had forgotten for a moment just who Bobby was. Then he smiled and reached out and put his hand over Bobby’s. It was big and warm and comforting; a man’s hand. At the feel of it Bobby’s half-hearted reservations disappeared.
    â€œA certain something I happen to have,” Ted said. “Let’s leave it at that.”
    â€œThey’re not cops, are they? Or government guys? Or—”
    â€œAre you asking if I’m one of the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted, or a communist agent like on I Led Three Lives ? A bad guy?”
    â€œI know you’re not a bad guy,” Bobby said, but the flush mounting into his cheeks suggested otherwise. Not that what he thought changed much. You could like or even love a bad guy; even Hitler had a mother, his own mom liked to say.
    â€œI’m not a bad guy. Never robbed a bank or stole a military secret. I’ve spent too much of my life reading books and scamped on my share of fines—if there were Library Police, I’m afraid they’d be after me—but I’m not a bad guy like the ones you see on television.”
    â€œThe men in yellow coats are, though.”
    Ted nodded. “Bad through and through. And, as I say, dangerous.”
    â€œHave you seen them?”
    â€œMany times, but not here. And the chances are ninety-nine in a hundred that you won’t, either. All I ask is that you keep an eye out for them. Could you do that?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œBobby? Is there a problem?”
    â€œNo.” Yet something nagged at him for a moment—not a connection, only a momentary sense of groping toward one.
    â€œAre you sure?”
    â€œUh-huh.”
    â€œAll right. Now, here is the question: could you in good conscience—in fair conscience, at least—neglect to mention this part of your duty to your mother?”
    â€œYes,” Bobby said at once, although he understood doing such a thing would mark a large change in his life . . . and would be risky. He was more than a little afraid of his mom, and this fear was only partly caused by how angry she could get and how long she could bear a grudge. Mostly it grew from an unhappy sense of being loved only a little, and needing to protect what love there was. But he liked Ted . . . and he had loved the feeling of Ted’s hand lying over his own, the warm roughness of the big palm, the