Finally, forty feet in back of the cabin, just inside the tree line where they were still partially concealed by purple shadows, they crouched behind upthrusting blocks of granite that poked out of the earth like worn and slightly rotted teeth. Benny whispered, “Must be a lot of animals in these woods. That must've been what we heard.”
“What kind of animals?” she whispered.
In a voice so low that Rachael could barely hear it, Benny said, “Squirrels, foxes. This high up… maybe a wolf or two. Can't have been Eric. No way. He's not had the survival or combat training that'd make it possible to be that quiet or to stay hidden so well and so long. If it was Eric, we'd have spotted him. Besides, if it'd been Eric, and if he's as deranged as you think he might be, then he'd have tried to jump us somewhere along the way.”
“Animals,” she said doubtfully.
“Animals.”
With her back against the granite teeth, she looked at the woods through which they had come, studying every pocket of darkness and every peculiar shape.
Animals. Not a single, purposeful stalker. Just the sounds of several animals whose paths they had crossed. Animals.
Then why did she still feel as if something were back there in the woods, watching her, hungering for her?
“Animals,” Benny said. Satisfied with that explanation, he turned from the woods, got up from a squat to a crouch, and peered over the lichen-speckled granite formation, 'examining the rear of Eric's mountain retreat.
Rachael was not convinced that the only source of danger was the cabin, so she rose, leaned one hip and shoulder against the rock, and took a position that allowed her to shift her attention back and forth from the rustic building in front of them to the forest behind.
At the rear of the mountain house, which stood on a wide shelf of land between slopes, a forty-foot-wide area had been cleared to serve as a backyard, and the summer sun fell across the greater part of it. Rye grass had been planted but had grown only in patches, for the soil was stony. Besides, Eric apparently had not installed a sprinkler system, which meant even the patchy grass would be green only for a short while between the melting of the winter snow and the parching summer. Having died a couple of weeks ago, in fact, the grass was now mown to a short, brown, prickly stubble. But flower beds — evidently irrigated by a passive-drip system — ringed the wide stained-wood porch that extended the length of the house; a profusion of yellow, orange, fire-red, wine-red, pink, white, and blue blossoms trembled and swayed and dipped in the gusty breeze — zinnias, geraniums, daisies, baby chrysanthemums, and more.
The cabin was of notched-log-and-mortar construction, but it was not a cheap, unsophisticated structure. The workmanship looked first-rate; Eric must have spent a bundle on the place. It stood upon an elevated foundation of invisibly mortared stones, and it boasted large casement-style French windows, two of which were partway open to facilitate ventilation. A black slate roof discouraged dry-wood moths and the playful squirrels attracted to shake-shingle roofs, and there was even a satellite dish up there to assure good TV reception.
The back door was open even wider than the two casement windows, and, taken with the bright bobbing flowers, that should have given the place a welcoming look. Instead, to Rachael, the open door resembled the gaping lid of a trap, flung wide to disarm the sniffing prey that sought the scented bait.
Of course, they would go in anyway. That was why they had come here: to go in, to find Eric. But she didn't have to like it.
After studying the cabin, Benny whispered, “Can't sneak up on the place; there's no cover. Next-best thing is a fast approach, straight in at a run, and hunker down along the porch railing.”
“Okay.”
“Probably the smartest thing is for you to wait here, let me go first, and see if maybe he's got a gun and starts taking potshots at me. If there's no gunfire, you can come after me.”
“Stay here alone?”
“I'll never be far away.”
“Even ten feet is too far.”
“And we'll be separated only for a minute.”
“That's exactly sixty times longer than I could stand being alone here,” she said, looking back into the woods, where every deep pool of shadow and every unidentifiable form appeared to have crept closer while her attention was diverted. “No way, Jose. We go together.”
“I figured you'd say that.”
A tempest of warm wind whirled across the yard, stirring up dust, whipping the flowers, and lashing far enough into the perimeter of the forest to buffet Rachael's face.
Benny edged to the end of the granite formation, the shotgun held in both hands, peered around the corner, taking one last look at each of the rear windows to be sure no one was looking out of them.
The cicadas had stopped singing.
What did their sudden silence mean?
Before she could call that new development to Benny's attention, he flung himself forward, out of the concealment of the woods. He bolted across the patchy, dead brown lawn.
Propelled by the electrifying feeling that something murderous was bounding through the shadowed forest behind her — was reaching for her hair, was going to seize her, was going to drag her away into the dark of the woods — Rachael plunged after Benny, past the rocks, ' out of the trees, into the sun. She reached the back porch even as he was hunkering down beside the steps.
Breathless, she stopped beside him and looked back toward the forest. Nothing was pursuing her. She could hardly believe it.
Fast and light on his feet, Benny sprang up the porch steps, to the wall beside the open door, where he put his back to the logs and listened for movement inside the house. Evidently he heard nothing, for he pulled open the screen door and went inside, staying low, the shotgun aimed in front of him.
Rachael went after him, into a kitchen that was larger and better equipped than she expected. On the table, a plate held the remnants of an unfinished breakfast of sausages and biscuits. Soup cans and an empty jar of peanut butter littered the floor.
The cellar door was open. Benny cautiously, quietly pushed it shut, closing off the sight of steps descending into the gloom beyond.
Without being told what to do, Rachael hooked a kitchen chair with one hand, brought it to the door, tilted it under the knob, and wedged it into place, creating an effective barricade. They could not go into the cellar until they had searched the main living quarters of the cabin; for if Eric was in one of the ground-floor rooms, he might slip into the kitchen as soon as they went down the steps, might close the door and lock them in the dark basement. Conversely, if he was in the windowless basement already, he might creep upstairs while they were searching for him and sneak in behind them, a possibility they had just precluded by wedging that door shut.
She saw that Benny was pleased by the perception she'd shown when she'd put that chair under the knob. They made a good team.
She braced another door, which probably opened onto the garage, used a chair on that one, too. If Eric was in there, he could escape by rolling up the big outer door, of course, but they would hear it no matter where they were in the cabin and would have him pinpointed.
They stood in the kitchen for a moment, listening. Rachael could hear only the gusty breeze humming in the fine-mesh screen of the open kitchen window, sighing through the deep eaves under the overhanging slate roof.
Staying low and moving fast, Benny rushed through the doorway between the kitchen and the living room, looking left and right as he crossed the threshold. He signaled to Rachael that the way was clear, and she went after him.
In the ultramodern living room, the cabin's front door was open, though not as wide as the back door had been. A couple of hundred loose sheets of paper, two small ring-bound notebooks with black vinyl covers, and several manila file folders were scattered across the floor, some rumpled and torn.
Also on the floor, beside an armchair near the big front window, lay a medium-size knife with a serrated blade and a point tip. A couple of sunbeams, having pierced the forest outside, struck through the window, and one touched the steel blade, making its polished surface gleam, rippling lambently along its cutting edge.
