Okay, I'm the first to admit when I'm being stupid, if it's pointed out to me. Luckily I had had enough common sense to not tell Aahz and Tanda how worried I was about the dark ness, so they didn't get the chance to point any of my stupid ity when we ran into no problems at all after it turned dark.

The first part of the trip was fairly easy. It took me three more rest stops, and, it was well after the sun had set by the time we got to Baker. The town was buttoned up tighter than anything I had ever seen. In the moonlight the buildings looked haunted and strange, more like monster-boxes than structures. Very little light got past any of the shutters, but the almost-full moon was giving us enough light to see by to stay on the road.

Baker looked to be about twice the size of Evade, and was spread out over more than just a Main Street. It was tucked into a small valley, with flat farmland going off in both directions from it.

We walked into town, following the road and staying off the wooden sidewalks so that we wouldn't make any noise. The town was just flat empty. Not even a horse had been left outside. Nothing was moving, and as far as we could tell, nothing lived here, even though we knew better.

"This is very strange," Tanda said as we got near the cen­ ter of town. "How boring would it be to go to bed when the sun set every night? I'd go stark-raving crazy in a matter of days."

Tanda was the kind of person that always had to be doing something: going on adventures, shopping, or partying. I had no doubt that it wouldn't take her days to go crazy here.

"I just wonder what they are afraid of," Aahz said. He pointed to one building. "Those shutters look as if they could take a pretty good pounding and still hold."

"It was the same way in Evade," I said. "But I was awake all night and never heard a sound from outside."

"More than likely this is just an old custom," Tanda said, "and we're still so far out in the sticks, away from any larger cities, that the custom remains."

"Are there larger cities in this dimension?" I asked.

"Who knows?" Aahz said. "Just stay alert and watch for anything unusual."

He didn't have to tell me to do that, since I was already on full alert. And even though flying, combined with no sleep the night before, had me exhausted, I doubted I could sleep now even if I wanted to try.

Aahz found a sliver of light coming from the shutters of one store and stopped. He unfolded the map and we gathered around, trying to be as quiet as we could while we looked for our next destination.

"You were right, Skeeve," Aahz whispered, patting me on the back.

The map had changed.

Baker, the city we were standing in, was now the focal point of the map, and two roads led toward two other towns from Baker. The treasure was now marked in a town called Silver City. Dodge City wasn't even on the map. Glenda was going to be mad. I wished I could be there when she discovered how stupid she had been.

"So which way do we go?" Tanda asked.

The two towns next in line from Baker were named Bank and Keep. Both looked to be about the same distance from here, but Bank was to the right in the north and Keep was to the left in the south.

"Bank," I said, before I even realized the word was out of my mouth.

"Why?" Aahz asked, staring at me, his intense eyes scary in the semi-dark.

"I don't know," I said. "It just seems right, and starts with the same letter as Baker."

Tanda laughed, but had the decency to not say anything.

Aahz just shook his head, folded up the map and put it away.

"Bank it is," he said, moving out into the middle of the street and walking on toward the west end of town.

"I could be wrong," I said, walking between him and Tanda.

"More than likely," Aahz said.

"So why go with my suggestion?"

"Because I have none better to offer."

"Neither do I," Tanda said. "Besides, if you're wrong, we can blame you."

"Terrific!" I said. "As if I don't get in enough trouble as it is."

Both Aahz and Tanda chuckled, but said nothing the rest of the way to the edge of town.

It was easy to find the road to Bank. At a fork in the road a hundred paces outside of the main part of town there was a sign, clear and readable even in the moonlight, pointing to the right.

Aahz glanced around, then turned to me. "Ready?"

"Sure," I said.

"Keep it slower than before," Aahz said. "We don't want to run into anything out here."

I concentrated on the power coming into my body, easier here than back near Evade. When I had enough I lifted us slightly off the ground and headed down the road. Outside of town the road was straight, running between what looked like pastures, and even in the moonlight I could get us up to a pretty decent speed.

In the pastures along both sides of the road animals were grazing. When I finally had to stop to rest, a number of the grazing animals looked up at us, big eyes glowing in the moonlight. They almost looked surprised to see us.

"Cows," Tanda said, pointing at the large creatures staring at us from the field.

They looked fat and heavy, with white and dark areas over their bodies. In the half-darkness, they seemed almost sinister with their big eyes and long ears.

"So how come they aren't inside like everything else?" I asked as Tanda gave me more water and a little bit of a snack to eat.

"You're asking me?" she said. "Maybe they're not bothered by whatever worries the people around here."

That made sense, in an odd sort of way.

"Maybe they are what worries the residents," I said, star ing into the deep pits of eyes of the closest cow.

Both Aahz and Tanda laughed as if that was the funniest thing I had ever said.

I didn't see what was so funny. Cows looked nasty to me, and I couldn't imagine trying to get milk, golden or not, from any of the ones I could see.

By the time I was rested enough to get us farther down the road, a bunch of the nearby cows had sauntered over and were gathering near the road watching what we were doing. It was creepy, and I was glad to get on the way.

From that point onward there were cattle along the road watching us, as if something had told them we were coming. When I asked Aahz what made them do that, he said he didn't know. He'd never seen cattle act that way.

Tanda said she hadn't either.

That answer didn't comfort me at all.

I kept us going longer and longer, not wanting to rest and have all the cows gather close to us. By the time the sun came up I had flown us to the edge of Bank City. I was exhausted and was going to have to get a few hours sleep before we went on.

At first light, the moment the sun peeked over the edge of the nearby mountains, the cows stopped watching us and went back to grazing.

For some reason that bothered me a lot more than them staring at us.