I stepped out into the dark. Lightning bugs blinked around the edges of lawns where they met the woods. The night air was warm, and it felt like summer. The Bouchers lived on the other side of the mountain; it would take me twenty minutes to walk there. I had to pass the Addisons’—the “Manson House”—on the way. The Addisons had moved to the mountain from California and were a street up from us. Shortly after they moved in, people had started talking. They said that in California Mr. Addison’s company had cut down redwoods that were never used and later dumped in the Pacific Ocean, that he was at the top of the “Death List” Charles Manson had written in prison. A few years earlier, one of the Manson Family had tried to kill President Ford in order to save California redwoods. No one knew for certain if the stories about Mr. Addison were true. Marie had a copy of Helter Skelter, and I’d read it. There was a section in the middle of the book with photographs. I studied them intently, trying to read the faces of the young women who became part of Manson’s group, memorizing them in case I ever saw them here. I still walked away fast whenever I saw a Volkswagen bus.

The Addisons’ house was set deep in the woods. I slowed as I got closer, preparing to run. They had lights on some sort of a sensor, so that at night when anyone passed they clicked on and lit up the house and the woods around it. I crossed the road to avoid setting them off, and about five yards from the start of their property I sprinted, running as fast as I could for a hundred yards, imagining the women assassins in the woods, waiting. I looked over my shoulder to see if there was anything coming behind me. At the top of High Point Lane, there was a shortcut straight ahead through the woods that went past the water tower and was part of the Horseshoe Trail. It was dark, but I knew the path. I’d run it often. The trail was marked by painted yellow rectangles on the trees that caught splinters of moonlight, lighting up briefly in the dark. I always felt reassured by the markers, as if in a fairy tale, telling me I was still on the right path. But tonight a wave of panic washed through me. How far had Ellen walked?