I pulled on my heavy canvas coat, picked up a flashlight off the kitchen counter, and headed out the back door toward the south tree line.

The grass at the edge of the field crunched under my boots at every step.

I got to the south gate, where the border of the eighty acres met the neighbor’s fence, just as the last of the light slipped behind the oak woods.

The yellow statutory posting sign I’d nailed to the corner oak post on Tuesday morning was gone.

I moved closer to the trunk and ran my flashlight beam over the rough bark.