When he first heard the distant snapping of twigs, he crept behind the trunk of a large spruce and stood there, waiting to see who would show up. They couldn’t come out in the daytime, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t get people who could; giving them money was one way, but it wasn’t the only way. Mark had seen that guy Straker in town, and his eyes were like the eyes of a toad sunning itself on a rock. He looked like he could break a baby’s arm and smile while he did it.
He touched the heavy shape of his father’s target pistol in his jacket pocket. Bullets were no good against them—except maybe silver ones—but a shot between the eyes would punch that Straker’s ticket, all right.
His eyes shifted downward momentarily to the roughly cylindrical shape propped against the tree, wrapped in
