Now, sitting outside in the driveway, Jenny closed her eyes. She could barely think of going into that house and being alone again. She hadn't felt safe there since they'd moved to Rimrock. And the police? What would they say when she told them what she'd decided: that what had happened with the motorcycle wasn't an isolated incident, that starting with the headless snake, someone was trying to scare her. And that someone was succeeding.

The police would want to know why, and at the moment, Jenny didn't have an answer. But it was true, she knew it. She should have known it all along.

She put her hands to her temples and rubbed, trying to ease the pounding, telling herself to get out of the car, but her body just wouldn't cooperate. She felt herself sinking into a doze and when she heard the music, she thought she must be dreaming.

She opened her eyes. The music didn't stop. It wasn't quite music, though, just a few notes, hauntingly beautiful, drifting through the air.

Jenny slid out of the car and started for the house, mystified and enchanted with the sound. When she reached the porch, she saw the wind chime. Six long metal tubes suspended from a small circle of smooth wood, moving slowly in the gentle breeze. It was hanging from the same piece of wrought iron where she'd found the basket of wild-flowers, and Jenny knew exactly who'd put it there. For the first time in this endless day, she remembered that she had an admirer.

She touched the chimes, setting off another peal of notes, then unlocked the front door and went inside to see if he'd called, too. There was a message, but it was from her father: everything had been worked out; he and her mother would be arriving tomorrow at six in the evening. Maybe the next call would be from her secret admirer, and she'd be home, and the two of them would actually talk. More than anything else right now, Jenny wanted someone to talk to.

Moving like a sleepwalker, she dragged herself upstairs, peeled off her filthy clothes and stepped into the shower. She'd done this just a few hours before, she remembered, but it seemed like days. Her head was still aching when she finished, so she swallowed an aspirin. Then she put on her oldest, softest pair of jeans and a dark-green, oversized

T-shirt, wrapped her wet hair in a towel, and went back downstairs.

If Mom was here, she'd tell you to eat, Jenny thought. She went back outside to the car and got the food, threw out the chicken, the turkey, and the hamburger meat, and forced herself to eat some cheese and an apple. Part of an apple. She couldn*t finish it. She was hungry, but her mind had started working again and the thoughts that whirled around inside didn't go well with food.

Nobody was playing pranks: harmless, innocent pranks. Someone wanted to scare her, to frighten her so badly that she'd . . . what? Leave town? That's what she felt like doing. If she could, she'd move away and never come back.