The Target

She was lightly snoring. He leaned down and kissed the top of her head. He realized that he'd forgotten all about his damned thigh. He also realized that to this point, his story was pretty bad, probably because he was so tired, his brain woozy. It was lucky she'd fallen back asleep or he would have bored her into yawns.

HE tried to stay off his leg throughout the next day. He stuck to the cabin, sitting by the front window, scanning, forever scanning the meadow and the forest that crept up to the edge. He saw nothing out of the ordinary, and no one.

He was going to lay low today, let himself get stronger, then he'd decide what to do.

He knew she was frightened. He knew it and couldn't do a thing about it. He told her half a dozen stories, and none of them too bad, about the little princess named Sonya who beat the nasty little boy, Luther, in the kite-flying contest, then went on to save her father's life, and cook excellent mushrooms and... well, he wouldn't think ahead to the next story. He found it was better if he just opened his mouth and let the story come out unrehearsed.

She sat on the floor next to his chair by the window, drawing with one of his pencils. The afternoon shadows were lengthening. He looked down to see a stick woman with curly hair holding a kite, a little stick girl standing next

to her, holding a kite the same size as she was. A curved-up line was the woman's smile; there was a curved-up line for the little girl as well.

Her mother had taught her to fly a kite. He praised the drawings. Perhaps, just perhaps, he could get her to draw him pictures of the man or men who'd taken her and where they'd taken her, what they'd done to her. But he balked at that. He wasn't a shrink. The last thing he wanted to do was make things worse.

"It's time to make dinner. You hungry, kiddo?"

She nodded enthusiastically and gathered up her pages and the three pencils he'd given her. She laid them carefully on the coffee table, lining up the pages neatly. He realized he did the same thing. Then she held out her hand to him.

He took her hand and made a big deal of her helping him up. His leg hurt like the devil, but that was no surprise. The fever was gone. His wound was still swelled up and warm to the touch. The skin near the wound was turning a little black and blue. He wasn't about to pull off the tape again. Best to leave the leg alone to heal. At least until tomorrow.

They didn't have much left in the larder. Tomorrow he'd either have to go in to Clement's grocery, exposing her yet again, or he'd pack up the Jeep early and they'd get the hell out of here. No matter how he cut it, their location was known. Even if there wasn't danger from the two men he'd wounded, the people who'd sent them now knew where she was. He knew he should drive right to the sheriff's office. He knew it. He also knew he wasn't going to do it, not yet anyway. He remembered those desperate mewling noises she'd made. She might snap. But the bigger issue was: How could he send her back home where she could be kidnapped again?

Now that the danger was clear, he had to get off this mountain. He wanted to call his friend Dillon Savich at the FBI to ask his advice. Of course Savich would tell him to call the FBI. He might even know about her if she'd been abducted. Ever since the Lindbergh baby's kidnapping back in the early '30s, and the resulting tragedy, kidnapping had been the purview of the FBI. But until he could get to Savich, he knew his bottom line was to keep her safe, and that meant, to him, to keep her with him.

Tomorrow, he thought, tomorrow early, they'd get out of here. He did a checklist in his mind of everything he needed to do in the interim before they could leave.

As he opened a can of vegetable soup, he looked at her tearing pieces of lettuce into a big bowl. She had a look of intense concentration on her small face.

"You want French dressing or Italian?"

She picked up the bottle of French dressing.

"Good choice. That was always my favorite when I was your age." He wasn't going to tell her they were leaving until he was ready to load her into the Jeep.

She cocked her head to one side. He realized he did the same thing in just the same way. Had she picked it up from him in only a week? He shook his head, smiling at her. "Yeah, I was once your age. A long time ago. Don't make fun of me because I'm old."

She gave him an impudent grin that was as kid-normal as kicking a soccer ball.

They ate the soup and salad in front of the fireplace. The evening had turned cold, really cold once the sun went down. It was probably in the low forties.

A coyote howled.

JUST after dawn, he unbolted the door, unfastened the chain, and as quietly as he could, he went out into a silent world where he could see his breath. He needed to chop wood for the fireplace and the wood-burning stove. He stood very still, looking everywhere for any sign of something that shouldn't be here. Nothing. He finally laid his Browning Savage down on the ground, really close to his left foot. He looked around again but couldn't see anything out of the ordinary.