(Note: You’ll have to suffer through this one and one more before I’m willing to let it go. Sorry.–jrs)

The trail of capers led them through some bad neighborhoods, places where optimism was a word only, with no meaning or place to root. After a turn down a particularly grimy street, they both stopped in their tracks, brought up short by a vision that belonged in a fairy tale.

The trail of capers led up a stained cement walk and stopped at the front door of a most remarkable house. It was a deep chocolate brown with frothy eaves and turrets. What looked like cherries graced the corners of each window. They moved in for a closer look.

“My god,” breathed Simplitt. “It’s a gingerbread house! Look, that must be whipped cream.

Liggnum, too, was taken aback until he shook himself free of illusion and closely inspected the outer walls and windows. He felt the child in him cry out in disappointment.

“No, Simplitt, not gingerbread and whipped cream,” he said sadly.

“No?”

“No. The dark stuff is bear shit, I believe, and the frothy white stuff is mayonnaise. But one thing really bothers me.”

“What’s that, Boss?”

“Those cherries. They’re real.”