Because it had all happened before. In the split second they stood there, Kate pinioned from behind by Doug's arms, his face contorted with astonishment, she knew what had happened. And where, and how. She was in two places at once, here in the kitchen, and in the haymow back home. She could see the brick side of the apartment building next door and at the same time, superimposed on it, like a film twice exposed, the shadowed dimness of her hiding-place, with the long slanted rays of the late afternoon sun coming in the little high window.

She could smell the dry sweet scent of the hay and feel the sharp prickles where the stem ends pressed into her bare arms and legs. Her chest throbbed where the razor strap had fallen, and her muscles were stiff from the whipping and from sleep. Her eyes were swollen and sore. She sat crouched in a corner, arms wrapped around her knees, her heart thumping with the nearness of discovery. The dread of it and the wish for it.

He opened the barn door and came in, pausing, looking around. She heard the soft thud of bare feet on the wooden floor. There was a moment's silence. Then he began to climb the ladder into the loft. She waited. His head appeared above the top rung, the curly chestnut-bright hair with the cowlick she liked to tease him about. In the gathering dusk his face looked younger than fifteen, and scared.

"Kate, you up here?"

"I'm not coming down."

"Ma's worried about you."

"Let her worry, then. Why don't she ever take up for us kids? Why does she let him slam us around like this?"

"Aw, Katie, you know she can't do nothin'. He'd whup her if she tried to." Paul swung himself up into the loft and came toward her, walking unsteadily on the soft piled hay. He looked skinny and uncertain in his patched jeans and flapping shirttail, his eyes wide open, like a cat's, against the gloom. "I aim to kill him soon's I get big enough."

"I'll help you. I'd like to kill him myself, the mean ol' bastard."

Paul's eyes narrowed. "Did he hurt you bad?"

"Just about killed me, I guess."

"Where does it hurt?"