Then, there were assumptions, beginning with Hampton. Hampton was a relatively common name. A quick Internet search turned up a lot of them. Counties and towns: South Carolina, Virginia, New Hampshire, Iowa, Nebraska. Georgia. Others, too. Lots of others. And, of course, a Hampton in Hampton County, North Carolina.

Though there'd been no obvious landmarks in the background- no picture of Monticello indicating Virginia, for instance, no welcome to Iowa! sign in the distance-there had been information. Not about the woman, but gleaned from the young men in the background, standing in line for tickets. Two of them had been wearing shirts with logos. One-an image of Homer Simpson- didn't help. The other, with the word Davidson written across the front, meant nothing at first, even when Thibault thought about it. He'd originally assumed the shirt was an abbreviated reference to Harley-Davidson, the motorcycle. Another Google search cleared that up. Davidson, he'd learned, was also the name of a reputable college located near Charlotte, North Carolina. Selective, challenging, with an emphasis on liberal arts. A review of their bookstore catalog showed a sample of the same shirt.

The shirt, he realized, was no guarantee that the photo had been taken in North Carolina. Maybe someone who'd gone to the college gave the guy the shirt; maybe he was an out-of-state student, maybe he just liked the colors, maybe he was an alum and had moved someplace new. But with nothing else to go on, Thibault had made a quick phone call to the Hampton Chamber of Commerce before he'd left Colorado and verified that they had a county fair every summer. Another good sign. He had a destination, but it wasn't yet a fact. He just assumed this was the right place. Still, for a reason he couldn’t explain, this place felt right.