“You better take off your costume,” Scarlett said, leaning over her to see what she was doing, “and bundle up good. It’s getting colder.”

Farrie had inserted a screwdriver into the interlocking plastic that covered the steering column. As she pried at it the two sections popped away and fell on the floorboard. She seized the metal rod running up inside the column and pulled on it.

The engine purred into life.

“Push down to shut it off,” Farrie said briskly as she sat up. “And pull it up to start. You just don’t have any keys, that’s all.” Her expression changed suddenly as she remembered what Scarlett had said. “I’m not going to take my Spirit of Mistletoe stuff off, Scarlett,” she wailed, “I’m going to sing tonight! I just know I am!”

“Good night, don’t screech.” Scarlett stood with one shotgun cradled in one arm, the other shotgun in the other, Farrie’s coat in her hand. “I only said that because I just don’t know if we’re going to get back in time.”

“Yes we are! Demon’s a good tracker, Scarlett,” she pleaded. “We just have to follow behind her and hope we don’t get into too much traffic. If we do, you can get out and go with her,” she cried, her voice rising again. “I can drive the Buick, you know I can!”

“Now, now,” Scarlett soothed her. She handed Farrie her cap, mittens, and down jacket. Her little sister had been driving since she was eight, but her feet didn’t quite reach the pedals.

“Well, we’ll see,” Scarlett said, as she got in behind the Buick’s wheel. Demon was already in the driveway, tail wagging impatiently. Scarlett set her jaw.

“I hope,” she said under her breath as she drove the Buick out of the garage, “you haven’t done anything to Buck, Devil Anse, I really do. ’Cause if you have, I’ll sure make you pay for it.”

A steady north wind bent the tops of the pine trees in the gully. It didn’t reach where Buck was sitting on the ground, tied to his pine, but another hour, he knew, and he was going to feel more than his numbing backside.

He’d been watching the men down where the pickups were parked. There’d been another round of beer and discussion, with the Scraggs uncle and the Potters turning to look at him from time to time. Only old Devil Anse kept his back turned.

Well, he sure as hell wasn’t giving them what they wanted, which was to have the Jackson County sheriff in their pocket so they’d have a free hand, even outright protection if that’s what it came down to, from the county police for what old Scraggs called their “business interests.” And if bribery failed, they planned to beat him until he gave in. Buck knew they were ready to come back and persuade him some more.

He looked up through the pines above him. The winter sun was in a bank of gray clouds and twilight was reaching into the gully. The hell of it was if they beat him into unconsciousness it wouldn’t do them any good; he was damned if he was going to give in to an old thug like Devil Anse. And in spite of the fact that the Living Christmas Tree was due to start after dusk with Junior Whitford, and the Atlanta television news.

I’m going to be an item in the media, he thought, one way or the other. Right now I think it’s going to be more like: “Jackson County’s Sheriff Mysteriously Missing When All Hell Breaks Loose at the Courthouse.”

And all hell would break loose when it was discovered that he’d spent the afternoon tied to a tree, being beaten by redneck hijackers, rather than policing the Living Christmas Tree concert. He might as well resign, Buck told himself. It was better than waiting to be kicked out of office.

He turned his face up to the sky and the soughing pine branches, and shut his eyes and said a small prayer.

Scarlett, he prayed silently, I sent your damned monster animal to you, and I hope you’ve contacted the department by now and have my deputies on their way while there’s still time. If you haven’t -

He couldn’t go any farther. Loud redneck voices interrupted. When he opened his eyes he saw the Scraggses and the Potters toss their beer cans into the trees and start up toward him.

At the junction of Route 19 and the feeder road leading to State 135 Demon stopped, confused, on the shoulder.

Scarlett slammed on the Buick’s brakes. Traffic was heavy with tractor-trailer rigs barreling down the slopes of the Blue Ridge from North Carolina. She saw Demon waver, then start to cross the road.

“Scarlett!” Farrie screamed.

Scarlett cut a sharp U-turn against traffic as an eighteen-wheeler bore down on them, horn blaring. She didn’t know whether they’d lost Demon or not until they turned onto the side road and could see her. But the dog had slowed. Not only slowed, she was limping.

Scarlett groaned.

“Now you get to drive,” she told Farrie as she pulled the Buick to the side of the road and got out. “From here on I’m going to have to follow Demon on foot. You keep a good ways behind us, and do what I say, Farrie, or I’ll take a stick to you!”

Scarlett never threatened her sister, but neither could they afford to let Demon get run over. Her mouth open in surprise, Farrie nodded.

Several cars sped by. Scarlett took Demon by the collar. The dog pulled against her, whimpering, dragging her along.

As they started down the road Demon finally broke free and ran ahead. At the curve, Scarlett stopped and shaded her eyes. It seemed as though she could see the baby-blue paint of a customized pickup through the pine trees.

Farrie pulled the Buick up behind her and stuck her head out the window. “Is it them?” she cried, excited. “Can you see Sheriff Buck?”

Scarlett put her finger to her lips. It would be like Devil Anse and the Potters to take Buck out into the woods. It all depended now on what they’d been doing to him, as to what she was going to do to them.

Working quietly, Scarlett got the shotguns and the shells out of the trunk and gave Farrie one. “Don’t do anything now, without I tell you to,” she warned. “I’m not fool enough to give you an unloaded gun so’s somebody can kill you, but that don’t mean I want you to kill somebody, either.”

They scrambled down into the gully that ran at a right angle to the road. Just when they thought they could hear voices ahead, a figure in a gray business suit popped up out of a tangle of persimmon bushes and creepers, right on top of them, nearly scaring them to death.

Scarlett jerked up the weapon she was carrying. Farrie choked back a scream.

“Wait!” the figure said.

It was too late. Demon had already launched herself into the air. She hit the Scraggses’ lookout and bore him to the ground.

As Demon stood on the man’s chest, his voice and breath blown out of him, Scarlett looked down into a totally strange face. But there was no time to ask questions. “Keep your mouth shut,” she hissed. “Or I’ll blow your head off.”

She left Farrie standing over the lookout with the shotgun pointed at his head, and lunged downward on the pine slopes, Demon following.

The gully ended and here the woods were more open. Scarlett stood hidden in some persimmon bushes where she could see Buck Grissom tied to a tree. Devil Anse and Loy Potter, Reese’s father, were punching him. All Scarlett could see was blood. After one particularly vicious blow, she heard him groan.

They were hurting Buck!

A sob tore out of Scarlett. Not a very Scraggs thing to do, but she couldn’t help it. Outrage propelled her out of the bushes, shotgun in hand.

“You get your hands off him!” The shriek burst out of her with a blast from the gun that sprayed into the dirt. “Oh, look at that blood!” she screeched. “You’ve busted his poor nose again!”

There was a moment’s silence as the men turned. Then a look of disbelief followed quickly by expressions of horror.

“Great God, it’s Scarlett!” her uncle Lyndon Baines shouted. “That girl doesn’t stop at nothin’!”

With a scream, Loy Potter made a running jump into the gully, followed by his son. Devil Anse stood where he was.

“Scarlett, honey -” he whined.

“Don’t call me honey, you old fiend!” Furious, tears running down her face, Scarlett lifted the 12 gauge and shot up the top of the pine tree Buck was tied to. Green needles showered down around them.

There were hoarse screams from the gully. “Run, Anse, she’ll shoot you, too!” the unseen voice that was her uncle Lyndon Baines yelled again. “You know how Scarlett is!”

Scarlett turned the shotgun in that direction and fired again. The two Potters hurtled out of the end of the gully and ran for their truck, her uncle Lyndon Baines not far behind.

Scarlett turned back to Devil Anse. “Give me the gun, Scarlett, honey,” he was wheedling.

“Demon, go get him!” Scarlett ordered. With a roar the dog threw itself on the old outlaw and bore him to the ground.

That done, Scarlett raced for Buck. She was weeping outright as she fell to her knees. “Oh, my darling love.” Gently, she touched his bloody face with her fingertips. “I can never make it up to you for what my kinfolk have done. I’m gonna let Demon chew Grandpa to rotten little pieces for doing this to you,” she vowed. Hiccoughs replaced the sobs as she bent to peer at him. “Oh lordy, now you really are going to have to get your nose fixed!”

“Scarlett,” Buck said indistinctly. He’d found what seemed to be a loose tooth. “Don’t do anything. Just get your little sister to come pick the lock and get me out of these handcuffs. Quick.”

“Right away, hon,” Scarlett whispered. She couldn’t help it, she bent over him and touched his mouth, his forehead with feather-light kisses. “Oh, I love you so much,” she moaned. “It’s all ruined now, I guess. But I wish you just loved me, too, even if I am a Scraggs.”

“I love you, Scarlett,” Buck said truthfully, “being a Scraggs has nothing to do with it. And we’re going to get married, too. But right now if we don’t get back to town and the Living Christmas Tree program, I’m going to lose my job.”

“You love me?” she whispered, her eyes like stars. “You really love me? Do you know what you just said?”

Buck tried to raise himself up, a difficult move because of his shoulder. “Is the dog killing Devil Anse?” he wanted to know.

Gently, Scarlett put both hands on the sides of his face. “No, it just sounds like Demon’s tearing his throat out. That’s just so he won’t try to get away.”

“Scarlett,” Buck said again, urgently.

“Yes, love,” she murmured, still gazing at him with adoration in her eyes. “Farrie’ll come and pick the lock on your handcuffs and we’ll get you out of here. Right after she ties up the lookout.”

“Lookout?” Buck said. “What lookout?”

A few minutes later Buck lifted Byron Turnipseed from the ground as best he could using his disabled arm, and set him on his feet.

“I’m sure sorry about this,” Buck said. “What we had was – ah, a case of mistaken identity. The dog had you tagged as the hijackers’ lookout.”

“Oh, not at all, Sheriff, not at all.” The Georgia criminal investigation department officer bent over to pick up his glasses and his gray fedora. “I should have let you know I was in the vicinity. That was tremendous K-Nine work, I didn’t even know you were training dogs up here in Jackson County. Your animal took me out very efficiently, without a scratch.” He examined the elbow of his gray suit, which was missing. “Well, my clothes sustained a little damage, but nothing to worry about.” He looked around, nodding approvingly. “Yes, really a commendable piece of work, your K-Nine holding me down like that until the handler took over.”

“I’m not the handler,” Farrie piped, “I’m a -”

“Witness,” Buck said loudly. He pushed Farrie, who was still carrying her sawed-off shotgun, behind him while his face told Scarlett to do something with her little sister. “It’s a little unusual using a juvenile, but it – ah, cracked the case.”

“No it didn’t,” Farrie shouted, “Scarlett did! Y’all aren’t listening to me, but I gotta get outta here. They’re already starting down at the courthouse!”

“And I’m glad to see you’ve got women on the force now,” Turnipseed said, turning to Scarlett. “Undercover, too. That’s fine affirmative action, Buck, considering the limited size of your department.”

“The child’s got a point, it’s getting late.” Buck tactfully herded them toward the Blazer, keeping the shotgun pointed at Devil Anse’s neck. “I believe I told you about the trouble with the injunction against religious scenes on courthouse property.”