“No,” I said. I was too filled up with sadness to tell Shar anything. Have a seat in one of these fine chairs, Little Fawn. It was forever ago when Carl said that.

I saw something shiny and I went over to the burnt-out fire, and there was a big triangle of tinfoil. Just like the one in our backyard. I picked it up.

“What’s that?”

“Nothing,” I said.

But Shar snatched it out of my hand. “It’s a hat.” She opened it up and put it on her head. “Who’d make a dumb pirate hat in the woods?” She crumbled it up and threw it into the creek.

It floated for a second and then it went under the water. I wondered if the triangle I found in my backyard was a pirate hat too.

Another branch broke and me and Shar both jumped.

“Maisy,” she said in a shivery way. “I’m afraid.”

Shar didn’t look afraid. She looked excited. The same face she got when she stole stuff. Like the time she found one of those glass machines with a twist knob that gave out candy. It wasn’t working and didn’t need money and she twisted like mad. She filled up her cheeks and her pockets and the inside of her tucked-in top until candy was dropping out the bottoms of her jeans.

“What if he leaps out and stabs us in the guts?”

“Who leaps out?”

“That man who lives under here.”

“He don’t live here no more,” I said. “The police took him.” The police grabbed Carl.

Shar’s mouth was hanging open and she was breathing loud. “But what if, Maisy?”

“Carl wouldn’t stab us,” I said with my teeth locked up. “Carl’s nice.”

“Nice, she says.” Shar started yelling and the sound bounced all around under the bridge. “The bum that drowned my brother is really nice!”

“I didn’t say that.”

I wanted to cry. I couldn’t do that in front of Shar, and I wished she was gone. I wished her dog would find a hole in her backyard and escape under her fence and sniff her out and come chomp right down on her squishy fat. Like he did with those poor rabbits.

—

When we got out of the woods it was almost dark. Gloria was racing across the grass at us, her yellow hair was standing up. “Maisy! Where did you go? I was calling you! I’ve been frantic.”

“I didn’t mean—”

“And you!” Gloria pointed a finger right in Shar’s face. “You get yourself home, miss. Erma’s gone wild looking for you.”

Shar’s eyes went big and round and she took off up the driveway like her backside was on fire.