But who else could it be?

He took another few steps. Then another.

One part of his head was already gone, down the path and in the Mercedes. Picking out a CD. Going home.

The other part of his head was whirling with opportunities, with advantages, with unanswered questions about the GWP deal, about Haudenosaunee, about this place, which everybody knew had been the site of van der Hoeven’s great tragedy.

Then he saw the blanket. Heavy wool, brightly striped, dangling off the upper branches of a birch tree growing hard by the edge of the tower. Clean of bird droppings and dried leaves. Unstreaked by rain, unfaded by sun. That blanket hadn’t been outdoors very long. And it hadn’t gotten into the tree by someone throwing it up from the ground. He glanced up at the dark rectangular openings at the top of the tower. Despite the brilliant sunshine, he felt a shiver go through him.

What the hell was Eugene van der Hoeven doing?

He ran for the tower door.

Clare had wanted to wait until the ambulance arrived. It seemed wrong somehow, driving on while a young woman was bleeding on a dirt road a half mile away. But the hunter had pointed out she would have to move her car anyway, in order for the ambulance to get in, so she and Lisa, who clearly just wanted to get home, took off.

“I’ll swing by the hospital after I drop you,” Clare was saying. “Poor woman. God, who would do something like that?”

“That boyfriend they were talking about? Maybe someone from that group that sent her the brochures?” Lisa shuddered in her seat. “I just hope her brother’s not around when they catch the guy.”

“Mr. van der Hoeven? Why?”

Lisa’s eyes widened. “You saw him this morning, didn’t you? With the rifle? I swear, I think if you hadn’t yelled, he would have shot that girl. If he was willing to do that to someone delivering bad news, just think what he’d do to someone who hurt his sister. He really loves her.”

“He’s never been violent before, has he?”

Lisa shook her head.

“Then it was probably a onetime thing. His sister was missing, he was stressing about the land sale, and he acted irresponsibly with a firearm.” Lisa gave her a jaundiced look. “Okay, very irresponsibly. I don’t condone it, but that doesn’t mean he’s about to go out and act like Dirty Harry.”

“Who?”

And Russ thought he was getting old. “It means to be a vigilante.”

“Whatever. I’m just saying. He looked like he was ready to get medieval all over that woman. If he hadn’t had that shotgun, he would have been all over her anyway.” Lisa pointed to where a sign announced the intersection of Muddy Brook Road with Highway 53. “Turn right there.”

“From what I’ve seen of him, Eugene doesn’t seem like the type of man who’d let himself get physically close enough to anyone to assault them.” Clare signaled and turned onto the road. “He’s carrying around a load of baggage from that fire he was in.”

“No lie. You know, his mother died in that fire.”

“Good God, really?” Clare slowed down as Muddy Brook Road approached another narrow blacktop.

“Go left here. Yeah. I guess she and his father had been divorced for a while, but she was up at the camp visiting. From what I heard, she was looking for stuff to take from the old building, you know, to use in her new home? Mr. van der Hoeven-well, he was Eugene then, wasn’t he? Only, like, fourteen years old. He was helping her.”

“How did the fire start?”

“I dunno. I wouldn’t have known all that about his mother, except the lady who used to clean for them, she filled me in when I took over for her.”

“Had they had a bad divorce? Eugene’s mother and father?”

“According to her, it was all smiles and roses. Whatever fucked him up, you can’t blame it on a bad childhood.” There was a beat. Clare waited for it, and wasn’t disappointed. “Sh-” Lisa clapped both hands over her mouth before she could swear again. She looked at Clare with enormous eyes. “I forgot you’re a minister. I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t sweat it. I’ve heard the word before. Even said it a time or two.”

“Really?” Lisa jerked her gaze away from Clare. “There. There’s our drive.”

Clare turned into a rutted dirt road remarkably like the one to Haudenosaunee, complete with kidney-jarring bumps and exhaust-scraping potholes. It never ceased to amaze her, the number of country residents in the Adirondacks who had driveways longer than the average suburban street.

There were several cars in the side yard, none of them looking remotely drivable. She pulled in close to the forlorn steps leading up to an unadorned front door. The house, set in the middle of a bare expanse of dying grass and dirt, seemed unspeakably lonely. No flowers, no bushes, nothing but the limitless forest stretching away in all directions. Lisa climbed out of the car.

“Are you sure you’ll be okay all by yourself?” Clare asked.

“Sure.” She smiled crookedly. “I don’t know who did it, but I can guarantee you whoever worked over Millie van der Hoeven isn’t coming after me.”

Millie never would have guessed fear for her life could be washed away by sheer boredom. At first she had waited, her heart pounding with a combination of fear and rage, next to the door. Later, she hobbled around and around the circumference of the walls, peering as best she could out of the arrow slits, going over and over her plan in her mind. As time slipped past and the sunshine disappeared from the wooden floor, she found it harder and harder to focus-on her planned attack, on her anger, even on her fear of what was to come.

The adrenaline that had spurred her to action earlier burned away, leaving her cold and shaky and tired. She had used the bucket twice more, each time successfully. She tried to ease the cramping pain in her shoulders by leaning into the stones, by sitting, finally by lying on her side on her remaining blanket. She came close to drifting off, only to be snapped awake by the distant cawing of a raven.

The boredom was as painful as her shoulders and wrists-nothing to do, nothing to look at, not even her own voice to keep her company. She began to yearn for her captor to come back, not so much so she could escape but so the endless, monotonous waiting would be over.

Plus, she was hungry. And thirsty. Her stomach had started rumbling at least an hour ago, and beneath her duct-tape gag, her mouth was tissue-paper dry.

What if no one came?

What if she wasn’t being held for ransom but had been snatched by someone who wanted revenge? Although it was difficult to imagine who, or who the target of the revenge might be. Once in a while her mother offended some other Palm Beach matron with whom she played bridge, but those ladies were more likely to spike her mother by tittle-tattling on her face-lift than by kidnapping her daughter. Eugene’s poor mother, who might have held a grudge against the woman who stole her husband, was dead. And Louisa’s mother didn’t give a damn about anything except her horses.

Millie rolled from her side to her back, wincing, and rocked herself into a seated position. Her lower back twinged, and her stomach growled. Stones, bucket, blanket, floor. Nope, nothing had changed. The thinnest line of sunlight striped the floor beneath the western window. Must be past the noon hour.

What if no one came?

There was a scrape at the door. A bolt drawn back. A shock of amazement surged through her, and for a split second all she could do was stare. Then her head caught up with the rest of her senses, and she kicked against the floor furiously. She scooted across the planks, desperate to reach the wall and get on her feet. The door swung open.