I turned my mind to my immediate problems.
If Nick Parrish came near again, and I needed to run, I couldn’t afford to be dehydrated. I stood and stretched my sore muscles, drank the water I had filtered and took what seemed to be a lifetime to make the short walk to the stream for a refill.
Food would help, too. I found a few edible shoots near the stream; I wasn’t sure of most of the other plants, and while I might take a risk with
I stumbled back to my hiding place, unable to move with anything close to coordination.
I still had my knife.
I had no sooner remembered this than another thought intruded: Why did I still have my knife?
Why had Parrish left me with a weapon, however small? Why had he let me keep my water bottle and filter and the other contents of my daypack?
Perhaps he hadn’t expected me to have time left to use them; maybe he wanted more of a challenge.
Why had he let me run away? I ran way off my pace, and still I had eluded him. Or had he allowed me to elude him?
He had felled a tree, which might have drained him of energy. He had a shoulder wound — maybe it had started bleeding again when he ran after me.
On the other hand, he had eaten food; he had probably slept. He had not dragged anyone to safety, had not spent the night taking care of an injured man. He was not afraid. He had not been nearly suffocated in the mud.
I weighed these factors, unable to decide if he had allowed me to escape from him, or if I had — at least temporarily — defeated him. The more I thought it over, the more confused I felt; I seemed incapable of holding on to any train of thought for long. One idea drifted past another, and I found myself staring blankly into space, or snapping my head back up, just before nodding off again.
I tried to recall what kind of shape he had been in just before I started running away from him. He had been giving me instructions . . . something about a woman named . . . named what? Nina Poolman. I was supposed to remember her name. But why?
I was tired, and I wanted to sleep, but thinking of Nick Parrish kept me awake, if not at my sharpest.
Faintly, I heard a man’s voice calling something.
I could almost believe it was my name, but I wasn’t sure.
The fog was rapidly lifting; out in the open, I might be seen more easily now. I slowly crawled back into the narrow space within the cluster of boulders.
Minutes later, I heard someone or something crashing through the brush, downstream from where I hid. Was it Parrish? Another deer? A bear? I didn’t dare rise from where I crouched.
I waited. The sound kept moving away. Probably an animal, I told myself. I couldn’t convince myself.
I fell asleep again; I don’t know for how long. In the distance, upstream, I could just make out the sound of a dog barking. I was nearly certain it was Bingle, but the barking had a quality to it that made me fear for both Ben and the dog. It could only mean that Parrish was near them.
I did not want to hide helplessly, listening to whatever horrible things Parrish might do to them, even as faint sounds from a distance.
I slowly left my hiding place. I found a long, sturdy stick, and sharpened it. As I looked at the finished product, I had to resist an urge to leave it behind, if for no other reason than to save myself from serving up embarrassment as a side dish to my own death.
There was no possibility of taking off at a run, but I tried to stretch as I moved along the bank of the stream, using my homemade spear as a walking stick, leaning against it through dizzy spells, doing my best to rid myself of the soreness that made my movements stiff and slow.
Again and again, I heard movement in the brush near the stream; each time I hid as best I could, waited, saw nothing.
As I walked, once more I found myself growing light-headed, feeling confused. The dizzy spells came more often. I stopped to drink again. I was exhausted and scared — of what possible use could I be to Ben and Bingle?
I had no sooner asked myself this question than I heard loud movement through the woods — much louder than before — followed by urgent barking. But if Bingle was here, what had happened to Ben?
I found myself filled with despair. Ben’s survival had never been assured, but his death was a blow I wasn’t ready for. With an effort, I regained my self-control. “Pay the bastard back!” I told myself, gripping my spear.
I was wondering if the dog was going to lead Parrish right to me, when I heard the helicopter. I couldn’t see it, but it sounded as big as God.
I was going to get to it first, I decided — I might be too late to save Ben, but maybe I could warn the pilot off before Parrish started shooting at it. I began moving toward the sound — which was difficult, because it seemed to be coming from everywhere at once. I could hear nothing else. I took my knife out.
I saw movement to one side of me, and then Bingle loping toward me, and someone moving in the woods behind him.
Frantic, at first I stumbled away, but there was no time to run, so I crouched behind a fallen tree, spear in one hand, knife in the other.
Hoping that someone might be near enough to hear me over the helicopter, I screamed at the top of my lungs.
Bingle stopped in his tracks, looking puzzled.
