That’s really the most logical explanation. Nothing else makes much sense. Somebody got to her while she was down in the pool. And I know how bad all this looks. But if the guy’d only wanted to rape her or kill her, he could’ve done that right at the pool. And left her there. But he didn’t. He took her away instead. Would’ve been a lot easier just to leave her, even if there was a whole bunch of guys. So what I think is that he - they - plan to hang onto her.’
‘Keep her prisoner,’ Abilene said, now understanding why Finley sounded excited about the idea.
‘Which means she’s probably alive,’ Cora said.
‘You got it.’
‘God, I hope you’re right,’ Vivian said.
‘It makes sense, doesn’t it?’
‘All we’ve gotta do is find her. And nail the bastard that grabbed her.’
‘Bastards,’ Finley corrected her. ‘I think it’s gotta be more than one.’
Cora put a hand on Abilene’s back. ‘How are you feeling?’
‘A lot better. Let’s get going.’
They left the flashlights on the porch stairs and headed for the corner of the lodge. Finley carried the water bottle. Cora carried the tire iron.
Stopping on the slope beside the Wagoneer, Cora suggested they find something to eat. Abilene climbed in. Reaching over the seatback, she opened the cooler. She grabbed a pack of hot dogs and crawled out. Finley had already taken a bag of potato chips from the box that Helen had left on the driveway. The bag was clamped between her knees as she lifted the box onto the roof of the car.
‘Anybody wanta change before we take off?’ Cora asked.
Abilene considered it. A change into dry clothes would feel good. Sneakers would be much better than moccasins for hiking through the woods. They were probably still wet though.
‘Let’s just go,’ Finley said. ‘Whatever we put on is gonna be soaking before long anyway.’
Vivian nodded.
They hurried down the steep driveway. At the rear corner of the lodge, they followed Cora to the small, outside pool.
Helen’s sneakers and the bag of chips were still there. Abilene noticed that the granite, where she and Cora had climbed out dripping, was completely dry.
‘Okay,’ Cora said. ‘We figure they started here. Why don’t we spread out and head across the field?’
‘Just a second,’ Abilene said. ‘There might be some kind of signs.’ The others waited while she walked along the stone slabs, studying the ground cover beyond the edge, looking for trampled weeds, mashed grass. ‘I don’t see anything,’ she said as she came back. ‘But maybe they stayed on the cobblestones.’
‘Well, let’s keep our eyes open. At least we saw where the kid went yesterday.’
They each took a drink from Finley’s bottle. Then they fanned out, stepped off the granite and made their way slowly across the field. Cora, at the right end of the line, circled around the far side of the brick fireplace. Abilene, in the middle, strode along one of the cobblestone walkways.
The sun, high above the trees ahead, glared in her eyes. She wished she had a hat or sunglasses, but she rarely wore them and they were back in the car. So she squinted and kept a hand at her brow to shield her eyes.
Near the far end of the grounds, they converged on the old swimming pool. Its bottom was swampy with stagnant rain water that looked like brown muck, thick with decayed leaves and branches. It smelled rank. It buzzed with mosquitos and flies.
Helen wasn’t down there.
But something was.
Directly beneath the high dive, four small furry legs protruded from the soupy water. The instant Abilene realized what she was seeing, she averted her eyes. She didn’t want a good look at it.
Finley pointed. ‘Hey. A critter. Toes up.’
Vivian covered her mouth and turned away fast.
‘Probably a raccoon,’ Cora said.
‘Should we fish it out and take it along for lunch?’
Cora and Abilene stared at her.
Finley shrugged. ‘Guess not.’
Walking away from the pool, Abilene realized that she’d been holding her breath. She inhaled. The air was fresh and sweet. But the smell of rot and the image of the dead animal seemed to be stuck inside her head. A raccoon? It might’ve been a dog. She wondered if it had jumped into the pool on purpose. Maybe it saw something appetizing down there, leaped in, and found itself trapped. Or it might’ve been careless, gotten too close and fallen off the edge. Maybe someone had killed it, then thrown it in.
But it wasn’t.
Finley has to be right: Helen wasn’t killed. For whatever reason, she was taken prisoner. Abducted. Led away.
Why?
As Abilene wondered about it, Cora led them to the border of the forest at about the same place where the kid had rushed in yesterday afternoon. She was glad to get out of the sunlight. But the hot air felt motionless and moist.
Cora stepped around a clump of bushes and halted. ‘A trail,’ she muttered.
‘All right!’ Finley said.
The footpath was barely visible, a narrow strip of matted leaves and undergrowth winding away from them. It didn’t look as if it had been heavily used. It might’ve been made by a lone person trampling over the same area every once in a while. A couple of times a day. Maybe only a few times each week.
‘This must be the path the kid takes,’ Cora said.
‘I’d bet on it,’ Finley said.
Abilene wondered why they hadn’t found a similar track leading across the field from here to the lodge. Maybe once clear of the forest, however, the kid altered his route often enough to avoid making a trail.
Single file, Cora going first, they began to follow the path.
Helen might’ve walked over this same ground just a couple of hours ago, Abilene thought. It was probably the way Finley suggested: more than just the kid taking her away. He and some friends. One guy just couldn’t have handled someone as big as Helen. Not the kid, anyway. He’d been fairly small and thin. So he must’ve had help. Even if there’d been several attackers, however, it didn’t seem likely that they would’ve carried Helen away. They took her, but didn’t hurt her. Didn’t hurt her so much, at least, that she wouldn’t be able to walk under her own power.
‘I hope he doesn’t have a gun,’ she said.
Finley glanced back at her. ‘That’d sure be the pits, huh?’
‘Gun or not,’ Cora said, ‘we’re gonna have to take him by surprise. Sneak up on him. So maybe we’d better keep quiet for a while.’
‘They’ve got an awfully big head-start,’ Finley pointed out.
‘Yeah,’ Cora said. ‘And they might’ve stopped anywhere. For all we know, they’re ten feet away from us right now.’
‘Do you think we should try calling out?’ Vivian asked.
Cora and Finley, in unison, said, ‘No.’
After that, they stopped talking. Abilene, at the rear, listened for sounds of voices or movement in the woods around her. She peered through breaks in the trees. For a while, she held onto hopes of spotting Helen off in the shadows. Then she began to hope that she wouldn’t. If Helen were out here, she might be on the ground. Sprawled motionless. Left behind. Discarded like trash.
Afraid to keep looking, Abilene turned her eyes to those in front of her.
Cora’s head kept swiveling. Her short hair, the color of dry hay on top, was dark around her ears and neck
