The Chase Page 0,40

No! Oh, God, no!"

Chapter 11

The kitchen was empty. A trickle of water ran out of the faucet, and there was an odd, sharp smell. Sitting grotesquely in the middle of the green linoleum floor was a paper doll.

It was folded to allow it to sit, and one arm was twisted up to give it a mockingly casual air. As if Audrey were saying: "Here I am. Where have you been?" It was obscene.

Tom's hands were on Jenny's shoulders, trying to calm her. She wrenched away from him and picked the macabre little figure up. It was the doll Audrey had used in the Game, her playing piece in the paper house. Audrey herself had drawn the face, had colored in the hair and clothes with Joey's crayons. Jenny hadn't seen it since she'd packed it up with the rest of the Game in the white box. She realized suddenly that it hadn't been in Angela's toolshed None of the dolls had.

The waxy face looked up at Jenny with a terrible cunning smile. A U of bright pink. As if this doll knew what had happened to the real Audrey, and was glad about it.

"Oh, God-God," Jenny was gasping, almost sobbing. The doll crumpled in her hand. Everything in the kitchen was wavering.

"I don't believe it," Michael said, pushing past the others. "Where is she?" He stared at Jenny, grabbed her arm. "Where is she?"

Tom grabbed Michael. "Let go of her."

"Where's Audrey?"

"I said, let go of her!"

Dee's voice rang out dangerously. "Cool off, both of you!"

"But how did she get out of the kitchen?" Michael said wildly. "We were right around the corner-we didn't hear anything. Nothing could have happened to her. We were right there."

Dee was kneeling on the floor, running her fingers across the linoleum.

"It's darker here-see? This whole area is darker. And it smells burned."

Jenny could see it now, a circle of darker green several feet in diameter.

Tom was still gripping Michael, but his voice was quiet. "You didn't see that thing on the beach-that void, Mike. It didn't make any noise at all. That's how she got out of the kitchen."

'"In the midst of the word she was trying to say,/ In the midst of her laughter and glee,'" Zachary quoted, behind them.

Jenny turned sharply to see him standing there.

With his thin, intense face and his dark-circled eyes, he looked like a prophet of doom. But when his gray eyes met Jenny's, she knew he cared. He was still holding the poem.

The last of the cloudiness in Jenny's head vanished. Tears and hysterics weren't going to help Audrey. They weren't going to help anyone. She looked down at the crumpled paper doll in her hand.

It was her fault. Audrey had fallen into a black hole, and it was Jenny's fault, just as Summer's death had been. But Audrey wasn't dead yet.

"I'll find her," Jenny said softly to the paper thing she held. "I'll find her, and then I'll rip you to pieces. I'm going to win this Game."

It went on smiling its cunning waxy smile, bland and malevolent.

Michael was sniffling and rubbing his nose. Dee was investigating the floor like an ebony huntress.

"It's like the marks a UFO might leave," she said. "When it lands, I mean. A perfect circle."

"Or a fairy ring," Michael said thickly. "She was so scared of that kind of stuff-legend stuff, you know?" Tom patted him on the back.

"The Erlking," Jenny said grimly. She reached across Tom to grip the sleeve of Michael's sweatshirt. "But we got her back from him last time, MichaeL We'll get here back now."

Dee stood in one fluid, graceful motion. "I think we'd all better stay together from now on," she said.

Zach had moved up behind Jenny. The five of them were together, standing in one connected knot in the center of the kitchen. Jenny felt herself draw strength from all the others.

"We can sleep in the living room," Michael said. "On the floor. We can push the furniture back."

They raided the bedrooms for blankets and mattresses and found sleeping bags in the closet. In the bathroom Jenny stripped off her golden dress and put on an old sweatsuit of Michael's. She jammed the shimmering material in the laundry hamper, never wanting to see it again.

It scared her to be alone even for a minute.

But we haven't had another clue, she thought. He can't do anything else without another clue. It wouldn't be fair.

"It wouldn't be sporting," she said through her teeth to the wall. It