to sleep, honey. All right?”
“All right,” Jenny replied, turning over and closing her eyes. But as soon as her mother was gone she sat up, slid out of the bed, and crept back out to the landing so she could hear whatever was going on downstairs.
“I don’t understand why you’re not out there with them,” she heard her mother saying.
“Mrs. Sheffield, there are still five men out there, but searching that swamp at night is like looking for a needle in a haystack.”
“But our children—” Mary Anderson began.
The police chief cut in. “Believe me, I know how you feel, Mrs. Anderson. And whether you believe it or not, we’re doing everything we can. By sunup Marty and I are going to have enough men out here to search the swamp inch by inch. But that takes some organization, and I can’t do that and be out there in a boat, too.”
“I know,” Barbara sighed, determined not to give in to the fear that was threatening to overwhelm her. “Just let us know what’s going on.”
“You can count on it. And try not to worry. Michael knows the swamp, and Kelly just might walk out anytime.” His gaze shifted to Mary Anderson. “If she was as mad as it sounds like, it seems to me there’s a pretty good chance that she doesn’t want to be found. I have an idea she might just know exactly where she is, and come back home once she cools down.”
“Or she might do something else,” Mary replied, her voice trembling. “If she believes her father thinks she’s crazy, she might try to kill herself again. But we can’t even find her to tell her that no one’s mad at her.” She shook her head sadly. “And even if we could, I don’t think she’d believe a word any adult said to her.”
Barbara managed a sorrowful, wry smile. “Maybe we sent the wrong people out to look for her,” she said. “Maybe Jenny and I should have gone.”
As her mother and the policemen started toward the front door, Jenny silently darted back into Kelly’s room, quietly closing the door behind her. But instead of getting back into bed, she pulled off the pajama top and began putting on her clothes. She put her underwear on backward in the darkness, but didn’t notice it, then got into her jeans and pulled her T-shirt over her head. Shoving her bare feet into her shoes, she fumbled with the laces, but finally got them tied.
As she carefully opened the outside door and stepped onto the landing, she felt a pang of fear.
What if she got lost, too?
She gazed apprehensively at the swamp in the distance and almost changed her mind. But then she saw the path along the edge of the canal, and the bright pools of light that flooded from the lamps that lined it every hundred feet. If she stayed on the path, nothing bad could happen to her. And she could call out to Kelly from there. And if she actually found Kelly—
She felt a surge of excitement. The last of her fear evaporated as she set out on her adventure.
Kelly felt as though she was drowning in a sea of blackness. It was all around her, pressing down on her, constricting her. She had to struggle, had to free herself from its grip. She tried to move, but it felt as if she was mired in quicksand. But then, far off, there was a faint glimmer of light. If she could reach it—bring it into focus—she’d be all right. But it was so far away, and she was so tired.
She moaned softly, and then felt her arms move.
The light brightened, and she realized her eyes were open.
The moon.
It was the bright crescent of the moon she saw, and, as she came slowly back to consciousness, she began to remember.
Running through the swamp, her terror growing every minute.
The alligator attacking her. The shot exploding only a few yards away from her.
The hands lifting her out of the mud, pulling her into the boat.
The face.
The swamp rat’s face.
Her breath caught in a gasp of sudden fear. Almost involuntarily her eyes shifted from the bright light of the moon to the face of the man who sat at the center of the boat.
Not a man.
A boy.
A boy she’d seen before. And then it came back to her.
“I know you,” she said. “I saw you the first night I was here. You were at the edge of the