“I could feel my emotions coming together and I knew all of a sudden that what I felt wasn’t terror after all, it was rage, the same rage I’d felt when I’d done the thing that had so angered him.

“ ‘Get away from me and get out of my house!’ I cried. ‘How dare you come into my very room! How dare you trespass again!’

“I struggled violently to get free. I pushed against his chest with all my might. He was immovable.

“His eyes were a glare in the shadows. Of the rest of him, all I saw was an open white shirt with white cuffs and a black coat. And he let me down on my feet slowly.

“ ‘You little fool,’ he said, gripping my shoulders, and he smiled, and for the first time I saw his mouth, very finely shaped, with thick but perfectly sculpted lips.

“Again, I went wild in his grip. I pushed my knee against him, I kicked his shins. I gained nothing!

“ ‘Never go near the island again!’ he hissed. ‘Never touch what’s mine, do you hear me?’

“ ‘You’re a liar and a trespasser,’ I said. ‘Bring your claim in a court of law!’

“ ‘Don’t you realize I could kill you?’ he returned with blazing anger. ‘I have no qualms about it whatsoever. Why do you protest? Why do you do foolish things? What’s so precious to you?’

“ ‘What’s rightfully mine!’ I said. ‘Get out of my house before I bring it down on you.’

“Of course I knew that no one could hear me. Ramona slept like the dead. The house was too big, the walls too thick, and here we were in a windowless tiled bathroom.

“Suddenly he released his grip. My shoulders ached. He didn’t let me go, however. And then when he spoke it was more calmly:

“ ‘I’m not going to kill you. I don’t want you dead. I have a theory about you. But you ever go near that island again and I will kill you, you understand me? You warn everyone away from that island forever. You make it off limits to the world, or I’ll come back here and drag you out into that swamp and kill you slowly just the way Rebecca died, you impudent child.’

“He had scarcely finished the last two words when the big mirror to his right shattered and great dangerous pieces of glass fell with a loud noise all over the lavatory and the floor. I glimpsed Goblin behind him.

“Goblin’s hands came up around the stranger’s neck and I saw Goblin vanish as he obviously and fiercely exerted pressure.