Since Mary could use a little more time at home, we decided on the following Monday morning. The agreement was that I should show up somewhere around 10AM. I grudgingly gave Seymore my new cell number. If Mary would be in the local court unexpectedly, she could call. I could always meet her there. He especially wanted me with her in our courthouse, since it is where she was shot.

I had a feeling that if she had an early court call in Williams. I would be expected to be there as well.. He was going to find that I planned to walk regardless of the schedule. He might have to lock Mary in the clerk's vault, if she really demanded me to show up early for court. I didn't really like to walk but I would be damned if I wasn't going to stay with my new structured life.

With a long weekend before I had any commitments, I looked for something interesting to do with my time. Something interesting came in the form of a street festival a couple of hundred miles away. The festival was a two day event beginning on Saturday at 9AM and running through Sunday at 5PM. I had a pretty good idea that Saturday would be the day with the biggest crowds. Still I thought I might want to judge the whole scene.

On Saturday morning I packed my little Ford with a clean shirt and a change of underwear. I left the razor at home, since I had decided to try the beard I always wanted. Without a real plan other than to keep my daily structured life on coarse, I headed for the mountain town of Roaring Falls and the apple festival, but only after I stopped for my two mile walk.

The drive took about three hours putting me in front of a convenience store on the edge of Roaring Falls town limits around noon. I filled up the tank then went inside to pay.

The teenager behind the counter didn't look as though she would be much help, but I tried anyway. "So what is the deal with the Apple Festival."

She didn't even answer, she handed me a brochure instead. It was the same information I had found on line. "So are the downtown streets closed to traffic?"

"Yeah, have to take the side streets to get anywhere," she replied as she gave me my change.

"So what is downtown?"

"Bunch of people and tables full of junk." She did not seem the best spokesperson for the chamber of commerce.

"So is there a designated parking lot?"

"Mister all that is on the paper I gave you," She acted as though there was a line behind me. There were two people in the place me and her.

"Right," I said turning toward the door. Back in the car, I found the little map to the municipal parking lot on the last page of the brochure. I was able to follow it to the parking lot without getting lost. I hoped that someone at the festival would be a little more helpful than the clerk had been. If I decided to stay, I needed a motel room at the very least.

"Hi there," I said to a local cop on crowd control duty. "I'm looking for a local diner or cafe."

"Well the restaurant at the truck stop on the highway is pretty good." he said that like a man trying to get people out of town.

"Nothing local where you eat?"

"Yeah, but it's just a dingy little hole in the wall," he said.

"That sounds pretty good to me. I'm a retired cop from down east. I like dives."

"Then if you got a cast iron stomach, when you get to the stage, turn right on Center Street. Go down about three blocks and look for a hole it in the wall called City Diner. I expect they will be open for lunch at least. They usually close real early on Saturday, but I expect they will be open today."

"Thanks and have a good day."

"Gonna be a bitch on my back," he said.

"Spoken like a true lawman," I said that with a huge smile.

"Yeah too much time sitting in a car."

"I expect so, it's an occupational hazard."

I drifted through the downtown. As the brochure said the downtown area was closed to cars. The crowd drifted back and forth through town. Every walked in the middle of the street. It was hard to see anything with all those bodies milling about. I tried to see what kinds of venders there were and which ones were actually doing business.

It looked as thought, other than hot dogs and cokes, Tee Shirts and cheap jewelry were doing the best volume of sales. I had absolutely no desire to be involved in either trade. I damn sure didn't want to sell hot dogs or anything like them. But all those people wandering around seemed hard to pass up. Surely there was something I could sell them.

I found my way to the City Diner after an hour of battling the crowd on main street. The diner was full of mostly black men. I thought that the cop might have sent me over as a joke, I had never been one to be intimidated by humans. Furry animals were a different story, but not men.

I had to sit at the low counter, since the place was so full. I sat between a black man and a black woman. I wasn't the only non African American in the place, but I was the only snow white face at the counter.

"What can I get you," The overweight teenager asked.

"What your plate lunch today." I asked it because a hand written, but obviously well worn, sign read 'Ask about the plate lunch special.'

"Ain't no plate lunch today," she said softly. "We ain't supposed to be open after breakfast on Saturday."

"Ah Okay, how about a hamburger and eggs? I haven't had breakfast today."

"I can do that okay," she said. "Eggs scramble?"

"Sure," I replied

The food arrived in short order. I was surprised that it was a fried hamburger patty on a grill toasted bun. It was topped with the scrambled eggs. I sat about demolishing it with a cold can of coke. I really did enjoy it. I told the casher how much on the way out.

"Well thank your sir, you come back anytime you are in the area."

I walked back to the main street. If the place had such a good crowd on Saturday, Sunday could be good or bad. It was hard to judge. All the venders were far too busy to use for information, so I decided that I would try again later. In the meantime I went back to the car. I picked up my camera and began to wander around shooting pictures.

Things slowed down after 3PM so I tried to walk through the downtown again. I stumbled onto a vender who wasn't talking to anyone. I took a look at this merchandise and found it all to be music CDs. I'm no music fan by any means, so I wasn't all that surprised to find that I had never heard of anyone of the ten albums on his table.

"Ya'll had some pretty good crowds how was business?" I asked.

"Like all these things, some venders do, well some don't. Me, I'm the one who don't." He did smile when he said it.

"The people not music lovers huh?"

"Well not this music anyway. I shill for regional bands. This kind of festival usually is a waste of time. I do better at events like concerts. " He saw that I was interested. "There is a blue grass festival up in Reid valley in a couple of weeks. I well do a lot better up there."

"So what does sell at these things?"

"Well always food and tee shirts do well. Hand made jewelry does okay for some vendors others don't do well. A lot has to do with how well you talk."

"Ah okay." Just then a customer walked up, so I moved on. I noticed something on my own. The booths with the flashiest displays got the most traffic. It looked as though the glitz had more to do with drawing people, than the actual products. Before I invested any time or money into festivals I would have to find out a lot more.

I decided not to spend the night, so I drove home.