“Well, if you want a prize of some sort,” he said slowly.
“No, no, I meant what sort of competition did you have in mind?”
He thought for a moment, then gestured at a group of somewhat stunted fir trees. They were about twelve feet tall, and clustered together tightly, too tightly to allow any one of them to grow to its proper size. Beyond them, I knew from rambles with Alden, was a rocky outcropping that dropped down into a small ravine ending in the pasture of a sheep farmer who was his neighbor. “What say we each take a turn playing your spy game? I’ll hide a target for you, and you can hide one for me, and whoever wins will buy the other a pint at the local.”
“All right,” I said, willing to do just about anything to finish up our hour and get back to the Hard Day’s Knights area. “Wh
