screamed. “That almost hit us.”
Another rock fell, closer this time. I looked up and saw Peter peering over the edge. He was smiling, and I felt uneasy.
“What's wrong? Why don't you go?” I asked.
He giggled, and to my horror I saw him raise a large stone above his head.
“No!” I yelled. I threw myself over Kevin, hoping to protect him with my own body. The stone, when it landed, bounced off another and hit my right arm below the elbow. The pain was so severe I couldn't even scream. But Kevin could and did. I realized my weight was crushing him.
From above came one more high-pitched giggle. Another rock landed somewhere behind me. The next grazed my right leg. Lying facedown, on top of the screaming child I'd come to rescue, I knew we were both going to die, and there was nothing I could do about it.
I thought of Fred and Noel and hoped someone would give them a good home, and of Garnet, and the baby brother or sister I'd never get to see. “I'm sorry,” I told Kevin, who seemed to have fainted. “I'm really sorry.”
All was quiet for a moment. I tensed my back and waited for the next barrage of rocks-the one that would most likely prove deadly-when I heard a sound that was even more horrifying than Peter's laughter: the unmistakable blast of a shotgun.
Where had he gotten a gun? Would the end come quickly? Would it hurt? I waited. Nothing happened. I rolled off Kevin onto my back and looked up. There was no sign of Peter. I feared he'd gone for more ammunition. I had to get out before he returned.
I started tossing rocks into one corner. The ledge was not too far above. If I could pile up enough stones, I might be able to climb out and get help.
I frantically continued working on my escape route, even when I heard approaching footsteps above me. I climbed to the top of the mound of rocks and reached for the ledge. Almost. Almost.
I had the feeling I was being watched. I looked up in dread and saw not Peter but Pearl staring over the edge at me.
“You two kids won't get away with this,” I yelled at her. “Help me get out of here. Right now!”
“It's okay,” she said. “I done tied him up. But you better hurry. He might get loose.”
I quickly finished my makeshift staircase and climbed out of the pit. Behind me, Kevin moaned pitifully. The child needed help, and he needed it fast.
Peter was lashed to a nearby tree with gray metallic duct tape, tightly wrapped from his chest to his feet. More tape covered his mouth. Blood trickled from a wound on his forehead, and I guessed Pearl must have hit him with something. He writhed and twisted, but the tape held him fast.
Pearl stood a few feet away, cradling an enormous shotgun in her arms.
“You go for help,” she said to me. Her voice was calm and confident.
“
“Uh-uh.” She shook her head. “You wouldn't shoot him if he got loose.” The coldness in her blue eyes said she would if she had to.
Somehow, I found strength I didn't know I had and ran down the trail to the road in only a few minutes. Luck was with me, for a pickup truck, with a dead deer strapped to the hood, came by almost immediately and stopped. I explained to the driver, in a rush, what had happened, and he called for help on his cell phone. He was familiar with the ruins of the old furnace and described to the dispatcher exactly where we were.
He grabbed his rifle from the window rack, retrieved a first-aid kit from the toolbox in the back, and followed me into the woods.
Pearl sat on a rock, gun on her lap, watching Peter, who had stopped struggling. The malevolent gleam in his wild eyes made me pray the tape held.
The kind stranger climbed down into the pit to look after Kevin. “I think he'll be okay,” he called up to me. “Hand me my first-aid kit. I'll stay with him till the ambulance gets here.”
I sat down next to Pearl.
“Well?” I said, not looking at her. “You going to tell me what this is all about?”
The story she told chilled me to the bone. The three children-Kevin, Peter, and Pearl-had been playing on the hill beside the furnace, when Kevin had tumbled into the chimney.
“He was hurt bad,” Pearl said, “and scared, and crying. That's when Peter called him a crybaby and throwed rocks at him. I told Peter to cut it out, but he kept on. I pulled him off the wall, but Kevin was all bloody and wasn't moving, and I thought he was dead.
“I was afraid we'd get in trouble, so to make sure nobody would find him, we covered him with branches and leaves. Then we went home and made up the story about Kevin going home by hisself.”
“But why didn't you try to get help for him?” I asked.
Pearl started to cry, and for the first time I remembered I was talking to a child. “We was real scared. I thought if we done told, they'd take Peter away and stick him in jail forever. I always done took care of him-nobody else does-and I knew if they took him away, then he wouldn't have nobody. Now, they'll do it anyway.”
I put my arms around her. “Peter won't go to jail,” I said. “There are people who can help him.”
She sobbed into my chest. “Promise? I think there's something wrong with him. Ever since he was a little kid, he always liked to pull bugs apart and watch them squirm. And cut up mice and little animals.” She cried, “I kept telling him to stop, but he wouldn't. Last summer he done poured lighter fluid on the neighbor's cat and set it afire. It was awful.”
I shuddered and looked at Peter, who glared back at me. I wondered why I'd been unaware of the unadulterated evil in his eyes earlier. “He'll get counseling. He's just a child,” I said to Pearl. “There are people who can make him better.” I hoped this was true.
I got up and went to the edge of the chimney and looked down at Kevin and the helpful stranger. “How's he doing?” I asked.
“Well as can be expected. Hope the ambulance gets here soon.”
I returned to my spot next to Pearl. “How did you find us here?” I asked.
“I caught sight of him sneaking out of our trailer, so I followed him to Corny's. He didn't have no business there, so I guessed he was going to call someone. Only phone they got's in the office, so I listened through the window. When you came and went in the store, I hid in the back seat of your truck, under all that junk you got there.”
The junk was Garnet's. I hadn't even realized there was a back seat under it.
“The gun-where did it come from? And the duct tape?”
“The gun's my pa's-he don't lock them up. I took the tape from Corny's-just in case.”
“Did you know Peter was going to hurt me?” I asked.
“I thought maybe he might. Didn't want him to hurt nobody else.”
“Thanks, Pearl,” I said, hugging her.
She wrapped her skinny arms around my neck and laid her head on my shoulder, and we stayed that way until we heard the distant wail of an ambulance siren.
Directly below us, water danced and sparkled in a small brook. “By the edge of running water,” Praxythea had said. Once again she'd made a lucky guess.
CHAPTER 10
IT WASN'T LONG BEFORE SEVERAL EMERGENCY Medical Technicians and a state trooper arrived on the scene. With the help of the stranger I'd found on the road, the EMTs placed Kevin on a stretcher board and raised him out of the furnace. While they were fastening the straps to secure him, one said, “We gotta take him way over to Hagerstown Hospital, since the Lickin Creek clinic done closed down.” The accusing look he gave me indicated he blamed me for the disastrous chain of events at the apple festival a few months ago.
