Chapter 9: Troll NatureOnce inside, the man handed me his card. I invited him to take a seat in the living room. Before I had seated myself, however, the card fell from my nerveless fingers. I stared down at it where it lay, but I didn’t bend down to pick it up. Instead, I looked at the man seated on my couch and—as if by automatic reflex, asked if he would like something, tea or coffee. I suppose I was simply too taken aback to think properly.
The man, for his part, was polite but silent; he merely shook his head at my offer and looked around—discretely but quite definitely. I suddenly wanted to shout at him, If you’re looking for Grendel, he’s in a cave in the backyard!
The blast of anger that accompanied this thought almost overwhelmed me, and I realized with a shock that my entire wo
