Disclaimer: I don't own the situations or characters portrayed herein. I'm just playing with them for a while.

Chapter Three: Point, Counterpoint

The doorbell rang. She straightened up, giving her head and shoulders that shake of annoyance she always did whenever something unexpected came up. Then she pulled her hands out of the meatloaf mixture, wiped them neatly on a paper towel, and washed them thoroughly for twenty seconds.

Mrs. Amanda Stetson opened the door, still drying her hands, and stopped short at the sight of a completely unfamiliar man on her doorstep. She thought that he must be nearer forty than thirty, with a pleasantly ugly face, a slightly crooked smile, and a decent amount of sandy hair without much character.

"Mrs. Stetson?" he asked, his voice polite and warm, with a trace of a midwestern accent. "My name is Leonard Baynes. I've been sent to speak with your husband."

It was worth noting that Amanda Stetson had perfected the "mother stare" over the years. It wasn't a stern, firm, or even intimidating expression. It was just a scrutinizing look that told you that you'd better start talking — and fast.

Mr. Leonard Baynes had never experienced the Mrs. Stetson Mother Stare before in his life, never having met her. He had been warned that she was a formidable woman, but he hadn't expected to feel so much pressure to tell her everything at once.

He bit his tongue.

"He's not here," Amanda replied, in answer to his tight-lipped and stubborn silence. "What should I tell him when he comes back?"

The man reached into his pocket, pulling out a badge and a card.

"Here are my credentials, ma'am," he said, showing her the badge. "And here is my card. Please have him call me as soon as he gets home."

She took the card gingerly, and studied it carefully.

If it was a faked card, it was very good. He worked at the agency, assistant to the director. His phone number was an IFF-adjacent one, and his email was properly formatted.

She swiped the card surreptitiously with the still-wet towel she held, and glanced at it again. The ink hadn't run or bled, which was a good sign.

All the indications seemed to point to legitimacy, but something about this man still didn't feel quite right to her.

"I'll tell him," she assured Mr. Baynes. He smiled and dipped his head in a gesture of thanks, but he didn't turn away or end the conversation. She didn't know whether it was over.

A blue sedan turned in at the end of the driveway, approaching the house slowly. It lurched a little over the gravel, kicking up dust against its dark-tinted windows. Mr. Baynes turned to watch its progress with a satisfied smile.

Amanda wasn't sure whether to relax or not. If Mr. Baynes was really who he said he was, then this was all right. On the other hand, if this were a trap, her entire family could be in trouble.

The sedan ground to a stop beside Mr. Baynes' red sports car, and a tall figure in a suit and dark glasses stepped out. His hair was whiter than it had been, but Lee Stetson was still a hale and hearty man. He stopped to remove his glasses, taking in the whole scene — his wife, towel in hand; between them an unknown man watching his approach; next to him a red Porsche that must have cost a pretty penny.

He met her eyes, and she widened them just a little and shrugged a tiny bit. Her hand shifted minutely. Just enough to tell him that she didn't know this man, but that she had checked his credentials and they seemed all right. Her eyebrows went up though, which meant she wasn't sure.

It was a system that had served them well over the years — a system that worked as well as it did because it was absolutely unconscious on his wife's part. He had studied her tiniest reflexes and emotions for almost three decades, attuning himself to her nonverbal communication until it became an art form.

Now, he sauntered up to the porch, radiating unconcern.

"Afternoon," he called, drawing the man's attention further away from his wife. "What can I do for ya?"

The cheery familiarity of the greeting, coupled with the formality of the suit and the somber sedan, seemed to throw the stranger off balance. This was precisely what Lee had meant to do.

"Ah, uh," Mr. Leonard Baynes stammered, "I was, uh, sent to talk to you."

Lee pursed his lips and tutted a little. It was an irritating, unconscious gesture he had done for most of his life. In this case, it was absolutely purposeful.

"Oh?" he asked, drawing the one syllable out until he sounded far more interested than the occasion warranted. It had the upside of also sounding sarcastic. "Well, come on in. I think I can spare you a few minutes. Ah, Amanda — " and here his voice changed completely from cowboy wannabe to a tender caress — "we'll be in the office."

She nodded crisply and said, "I'll bring you some cookies, then I'll need to go down to the McMasters' place and give Felicia back her crockpot. You know," she added, turning to Leonard Baynes, "how sometimes a neighbor will make you a meal and then you forget to return the crock pot until it's almost embarrassing how long you've kept it."

With that she stepped aside, watching as her husband led the stranger into the foyer. She noted, with no small amount of wifely satisfaction, that he toed off his wingtip shoes and placed them neatly into the spot designated for them, indicating as he did so that the stranger should do the same.

It was a bewildered and stocking-footed Leonard Baynes that followed Scarecrow down the hall and into a beautifully furnished home office. He had no way of knowing it, but the two desks, the couch, the chairs, and even the paintings had once decorated the old Q Bureau at the agency. Amanda had taken everything, except the odd-smelling refrigerator, when she had retired some three years before.

Lee motioned him into the chair that sat facing the desk. It was rather lower than the chair that Lee himself occupied a second later, leaving Mr. Baynes feeling at a definite disadvantage. It was very difficult to deliver orders to a senior agent while sitting with his knees at chest level. He would have crossed his ankle over his knee, but he was uncomfortably aware that one of his socks had a small hole on the bottom, and he didn't remember which one.

Lee didn't speak. He rested his elbows on his desk, leaned forward, and looked inquisitive.

"Ah." Leonard Baynes had never felt more awkward in his entire life. He was vaguely aware that he was purposefully being made uncomfortable and awkward, and he didn't like it. He liked being in control. He cleared his throat. "I have been sent to lay a proposition before you."

Lee held up a hand. "Whoa — hold it," he said. "Shouldn't Amanda be here, too?"

This was getting more and more uncomfortable by the minute. Leonard Baynes shook his head. "I'm sorry, Mr. Stetson, but this is for your ears only, I'm afraid. It needs the sort of clearance you have, and that's higher than Mrs. King's."

"Stetson's," Lee remarked.

"I — I'm sorry?"

"Stetson's," he repeated. "It's Mrs. Stetson's. She hasn't been Mrs. King for quite some time."

"Of course," Baynes rushed to agree. This was going so much worse than he had expected.

"Her clearance is quite high," Lee went on, and this time his light and conversational tone held just a hint of menace. "I fail to see why my clearance is adequate and hers is not."

They had told him that the Stetsons were devoted to each other, but they had not prepared him for the level of indignation he would face when he had orders for one and not the other.

"I'm afraid that's just how it is, sir," he answered, stammering a little and wondering wildly why no one else had been chosen for this particular part of the assignment. "I understand that it's a disappointment."

Lee waved his hand dismissively. "We usually do this kind of thing together, that's all," he said. "We're partners."

Leonard Baynes refrained from reminding Mr. Stetson that Scarecrow and Mrs. King had never been formally declared partners, and whatever partnership they had in diplomatic circles had dissolved when Mr. Stetson left the agency. He didn't think rehashing the information would do him or anyone else any good.

Mr. Stetson shrugged.

"Go on," he said. "I'm listening."

There was a knock on the door before Mr. Baynes could speak — a sharp, syncopated staccato that made Mr. Stetson's dimples spring to his face at once.

"Come in," he called. The door opened and Mrs. Stetson breezed in with a plate of cookies.

"Now," she said briskly, "I'll be back in twenty minutes. Enjoy yourselves."

She backed out of the office, blowing a quick kiss to her husband, who grinned and shook his head.

The front door banged shut. Out the window, Leonard Baynes saw Mrs. Stetson get into the blue sedan with a crock pot in her arms, then start to drive the big car away down the driveway.

Mr. Baynes waited until the car had left his sight out the window before he spoke again.

"It's like this, sir. You've been chosen to infiltrate a group with suspected ties to Russia and break their intelligence ring."