There were detailed accounts of sighting after sighting all summer long: where she came from, where she went.
One note said: “It’s a game we play. Like a child’s game of tag.”
Helen continued to turn the pages with trembling fingers.
His book was nearly full and over 90 percent of it was sketches of and notes about the deer. Close-ups of her face and eyes. Notes on her approximate height and weight.
“My god,” Helen muttered, sure she was looking at the diary of a man unwound, a man completely obsessed. She felt sick to her stomach.
Then she got to the last page with today’s date at the top: “She was waiting for me today at our usual place. She was clearly annoyed that I was late. She looked at me as if to say, Please don’t keep me waiting again. Then she took off, running so fast that I could not possibly follow.”
CHAPTER 30
Olive
SEPTEMBER 10, 2015
Olive had been dreaming about Hattie for the past few weeks. Since she’d put Mama’s necklace on. Dreaming not just about Hattie but that she was Hattie. She was standing in front of her house by the bog. Then she heard men and dogs coming for her.
The dreams ended the same: with a noose around her neck and her hanging from the big white pine.
She woke up at midnight on the living room couch and was totally disoriented: she thought she was still Hattie, waking up in the little crooked cabin.
“You okay?” her dad said, standing over her. He was in boxers and a T-shirt. His hair was ruffled and his eyes were puffy.
“Yeah, bad dream,” she said.
“You screamed in your sleep,” he said. “Scared the hell out of me. Woke me up out of a sound sleep. I came tearing out here thinking something…I don’t know what.”
“Sorry.” She rubbed her face and shook her head, trying to rid herself of the dream.
“Then when I got out here, you were talking in your sleep.”
“Yeah? What’d I say?”
“ ‘I’ll always be here,’ ” he said. “That’s what you said.”
Olive got chills.
“You sure you’re feeling okay, Ollie?” Daddy said. He put a hand on her forehead, like she might have a fever. “You don’t look right.”
“I’m fine, Dad,” she said. But she was anything but fine.
“If you’re sick tomorrow, I can call Riley, see if she can come hang out with you.”
“No, Dad, I’m fine, really.”
“Things going okay at school?”
“They’re fine,” she said.
The truth was, even though she was only a few days in, the year was off to a better start. She hadn’t cut so much as a single class. She showed up prepared, did all of her homework.
“Okay, let’s both go back to sleep,” Daddy said. “Don’t go having any more bad dreams.”
“No more bad dreams,” she said. And she meant it. Because no way was she falling back to sleep.
She waited until it was quiet upstairs, then she went into the kitchen and grabbed a flashlight, shoved it into her backpack. She snuck out the back door, crossed the yard, and walked through the woods to the bog, following the path that started at the edge of her yard by the hollow tree. She stopped there, checked the hollow, foolishly hoping that there might be a message inside. Only pine needles and a wood louse.
The night was cool and moonlit. There was a dampness to the air that clung to her.
She got to the bog and found it covered with a fine mist. She thought she saw a figure on the other side, over by where Hattie’s house once stood. She shone her light across the water, then made her way along the edge toward the stone foundation, but there was nothing. No one.
Still, she felt she wasn’t alone.
She took her necklace off, watched it swing in the moonlight.
She hadn’t attempted to communicate with Hattie like this since that first time. It had freaked her out too much. Made her feel half crazy. And, if she had to admit it, she was a little afraid of whatever answers Hattie might give her.
“Are you here, Hattie?” Olive asked, holding the thin leather cord that the silver I see all pendant dangled from.
It began to swing in a slow and steady clockwise direction.
“Am I going crazy?” she asked.
The pendulum held still.
“What am I even doing out here?” she said, more to herself than to Hattie. She was about to put the necklace back on, to give up trying to communicate with Hattie, when the silver circle at the end of the string swung forward, back and forth.
“What does that mean?” she asked. The pendulum just kept swinging out in a forward motion. Weird. She took a step forward.
Yes, the pendulum said, moving clockwise again. Then it went back to moving straight back and forth, only off to a slight left angle. Taking a chance, she took another step in the direction the pendulum was pulling her.
“You want me to follow you?”
Yes.
Olive started to walk, straight at first. Then the necklace swung to the left, and Olive started walking to the left. She was heading out toward the middle of the bog. She’d explored the bog enough to know where the deep places were, but still, it was dark and she felt a little nervous about stepping into a spring.
Then, all at once, the necklace stopped, holding perfectly still.
“Why’d we stop?” Olive asked. “Is there something here?”
The silver circle moved clockwise again.
Olive slipped the necklace back over her head, shone her flashlight down at the ground. She didn’t dare hope, did she? Could it be the treasure? Could Hattie have decided to show her where it was?
Then she got down on her knees and began to dig. She didn’t have a shovel or trowel, so she used her fingers to rip away the grass and peat. She kept the flashlight on the ground beside her, the beam flooding the area where she was digging.
Maybe it wasn’t the treasure but a small piece of the treasure. A little taste. Proof that it was real.
She hadn’t gone down far when her fingers touched something hard. Something flat. Something metal.
The top of a box maybe?
A treasure chest?
Heart pounding, Olive scraped at the mud faster, more frantically. Her fingers were getting torn up, but she dug and scraped until she was able to find the edge of the metal object and pull it out into the light.
An old ax head, pitted with rust.
“Nice,” she said sarcastically. Then she turned, looked out at the bog, and shouted, “Thanks a lot, Hattie. Just what I always wanted!”
She threw it into her backpack and went back home, exhausted and discouraged, her jeans and sneakers soaked through, angry with Hattie for getting her hopes up and giving her nothing but a rusty old ax head.
She changed out of her wet things into a dry T-shirt and pair of sweatpants and lay back down on the couch.
She dreamed of the ax.
That it was cleaned up, sharpened, and she was using it to chop wood.
But then it wasn’t wood she was chopping.
She was hacking her mother up into chunks and throwing them into the bog.
She woke up screaming.
Daddy came flying into the living room, flipping on lights.
He reached out and took her hand, looking at the filthy, bloody fingertips.
“Jesus, girl,” he said. “What’s going on with you?”
She started to cry. He took her in his arms and rocked her like she was a little girl again. “Shh,” he said. “It’s all right.”
But it wasn’t all right.
Maybe her father had been right. Maybe she was sick. Sick in the head. Or maybe it was something worse than that.
Maybe, somehow, Hattie had gotten inside her.
> CHAPTER 31
Helen
SEPTEMBER 10, 2015
Helen opened her eyes. She’d been dreaming of Nate’s white deer. It had been speaking to her in Hattie’s ground-glass voice.
Wake up, Helen, the deer told her. Wake up!
Helen blinked at the open doorway to the bedroom, half expecting to see Nate’s deer there—that the creature might have somehow followed her out of her dream. But there was nothing.
Helen’s head ached. Her thoughts felt slow. Foggy.
She wanted to lay her head back down and sleep, but something was wrong.
Very wrong.
“Nate.” She shoved at him hard. “Get up!”
“What?” he mumbled sleepily.
“Gas,” she said, the panic starting to rouse her. “Propane! I smell propane.”
He sat up. “Jesus,” he said, coughing. “Come on.” He grabbed Helen’s hand, pulled her out of bed and into the hall.
The smell was overpowering, the air thick with propane.
“Don’t turn on any lights,” he warned; “the spark…” His hand was wrapped firmly around hers as they hurried through the trailer in the dark and out the front door, into the cool night air.
Nate ran to the side of the trailer where the big white tank was and switched the gas off.
“Should we call the fire department?” Helen asked.
“I think it’ll be okay,” Nate said. “The front door’s open. Let’s let it dissipate a bit, then we can open all the windows.” He looked at Helen. “How do you feel?”
“I have a headache and I’m a little dizzy, but okay,” she said.
“Me, too. We got lucky. Good thing you woke up when you did.”
Good thing Hattie woke me, she thought.
“What happened?” she asked.
“Must be a leak somewhere,” he said.
They sat outside, holding hands, taking deep breaths.
In a few minutes, they went in and started cranking open all the louvered windows.
“Nate,” she said, “when I went to bed, all these were open.”
“What? Are you sure?”
“Positive. I could hear the frogs.”
Soon, Nate deemed it safe enough to turn on a light. “Helen?” he called. He was standing in front of the stove.
“Yeah?”
“Come take a look at this.” He was pointing at the stove. “The gas is wide open, every burner turned on but not lit.”
“It wasn’t a leak,” Helen said, her whole body tensing.
“You didn’t leave the stove on, did you?” Nate asked.
She shook her head. “I didn’t use the stove at all tonight. And why the hell would I turn on all four burners? When I got home, I hung out here on the computer for a while.”
And I saw your fucked-up nature journal, full of the elusive white doe.
“I’m sure I would have noticed if the gas was on then—I was, like, five feet from the stove.”
“Are you sure?” Nate asked.
“Of course I’m sure!”
“Then what…”
“Someone came into the trailer,” Helen said, the panic returning, replacing the relief. “After we went to sleep—someone came in here, turned on the gas, and closed the windows.”
“But how…who…?” His voice trailed off, then he jumped up. “The cameras would have caught them! We’ll see who it is! Have evidence.”
He went over to his laptop and blinked at it miserably. “The cameras have all been disconnected,” he said. He tapped the keys. “The recordings from tonight are all gone. There’s nothing here. It’s been wiped clean.”
“We need to call the police,” Helen said. She was already dialing 911.
* * *
. . .
A state trooper pulled into their driveway twenty minutes later. He was an older man in his early sixties, with a ruddy complexion, and introduced himself as Trooper Bouchier. He listened to their story. Helen let Nate do most of the talking, fearing that her voice would tremble. The trooper looked at the front door, the windows, and the gas stove. He watched patiently while Nate showed him his computer with feed from the outdoor cameras.
“See,” Nate said. “All the footage from tonight has been wiped clean.”
Trooper Bouchier nodded. “And why do you have all these cameras, exactly?”
“For wildlife,” Nate said.
“Wildlife?” the trooper echoed.
Nate nodded. “Deer, coyotes, owls. That kind of thing.”
“I see,” Bouchier said in a tone that suggested he didn’t see at all. Then he turned to Helen and asked, “And you’re sure you didn’t use the stove at all before you went to bed?”
“I’m positive. And I’m sure all the windows were open.”
“And what time was this?”
“Late,” Helen said. “Near one.”
The trooper nodded. “And you’d been out with a friend before this?”
“She and her friend Riley had a girls’ night,” Nate explained. He turned to Helen. “Where’d you go, anyway?”
“Oh, you know,” Helen said, wondering how much trouble you got in for deliberately lying to the police in a situation like this. “Just out for a bite to eat and drinks.”
“So you’d been drinking?” the trooper asked.
“No,” she said. “I mean, yes, I, uh, had one glass of wine.”
He nodded.
“Any drugs?” he asked. She wondered if her eyes were still red and glossy from the pot.
“No,” she said.
The trooper and Nate were both studying her. Now Nate looked like he was doubting her, too. Like maybe she’d gotten good and wasted with Riley and then…closed all the windows and cranked open all four burners on the stove before passing out?
“So what now?” Helen asked, trying to hide her irritation. “Are you going to dust for fingerprints or something?”
“No, ma’am,” Trooper Bouchier said with a small smile. “I’ll write up a report.”
“A report?” Helen said. “That’s it?”
“Mrs. Wetherell, Mr. Wetherell—there’s no sign of a break-in, no sign of a crime,” the trooper said.
“Someone did this!” Helen said, losing all hold on her composure. “Someone came in here and turned on the gas and closed the windows! We could have died!”
“Mrs. Wetherell,” the trooper said. “It’s just as likely that it was an accident. Maybe you…bumped against the stove and didn’t even realize it. It’s a very small kitchen you’ve got here. And the windows—well, you wouldn’t be the first person in the world to do something on autopilot late at night and forget about it later, now would you? One night, after a few beers, I ate all the leftover meatloaf—wasn’t I mad the next morning when I went to make myself a sandwich for lunch? Said to my wife, ‘Where on earth did you—’ ”
Helen broke in. “Sorry, let me get this straight—you’re not going to do anything because you don’t believe us.”
“Helen—” Nate began.
“What?” she snapped. “That’s what he’s doing. Absolutely nothing.”
“I’ll write up a report,” the trooper repeated, smiling that small, amused smile again. “And of course, if there’s another incident, you be sure to let us know.”
“We appreciate it,” Nate said.
“Great,” Helen muttered. “Very helpful.”
CHAPTER 32
Olive
SEPTEMBER 10, 2015
Olive rolled over on the couch and opened her eyes. She smelled coffee. And pancakes. Her dad never made breakfast. The only one who did was…Mama!
Olive leapt off the couch and ran to the kitchen.
“Morning, sleepyhead,” Riley said, smiling at her.
Olive blinke
d at her aunt, who stood in front of the stove, flipping pancakes on Mama’s big cast-iron griddle. She had on Mama’s pink apron.
“I thought we could have a nice breakfast, then I could give you a ride to school.”
“Where’s Dad?”
“He had to go into work early. They’re starting a big repaving job.”
Olive helped herself to coffee.
“Your dad said you had a rough night,” Riley said.
Olive shrugged. “A couple bad dreams, that’s all. Did Dad call you? Is that why you’re here? ’Cause I’m fine, really.”
“He’s worried about you, Ollie.”
“I just had a nightmare—it’s fine. Everyone has nightmares sometimes, don’t they?”
“What about?”
Olive looked down into her milky coffee. “I don’t remember.”
Riley put pancakes on a plate and set them on the table. Olive sat down and reached for the maple syrup. She wasn’t really hungry, but she dove in with a smile. “These are delicious!” she said.
Riley sat in the chair across from her. She watched her carefully, frowning. “The truth is, I’m concerned about you, too.” A lump formed in Olive’s throat, making it hard to swallow.
“But everything’s good,” Olive said, between bites of pancake. “I mean, it’s just the very beginning of the school year, but things are going okay. I actually like my classes so far.”
“Your friend Mike came to see me,” Riley said.
“What?” Olive set her fork down, her hands clenched into fists. How could he? She would kill him for this.
“Now hang on,” Riley said. “Don’t get all mad at him. He did the right thing. He’s worried about you, Olive.”
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