Something lay still in the grass. She hoped it was a dead deer, hoped it was anything other than what it was. She saw a woman. She saw Hemaucus Three Dresses in the grass, her eyes clouded and wide-open, unblinking in the falling rain. Her arms stretched back above her head, her black hair caught in the weeds. Louise stood up. She could see the dirt under Hemaucus’s nails. She was dead. Louise felt the muscles in her back curl up to her neck. She knew someone had put her there. Her legs were tired from running, but she ran.

When she got to the highway she kept running. She heard a car coming up from behind her and she wanted to hide in the ditch. Blood itched in her tight fingers.

The car pulled off on the shoulder behind Louise. She turned to see Harvey Stoner looking at her from the open window of his big car. She couldn’t remember when she had been so happy to see anyone.

“You’re a sight for sore eyes,” he told her, licking his lips. As she approached him his expression changed. “Hey,” he said, “are you OK? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.” She wanted to tell him she was not OK, there was a dead woman on the hill and she had recently lost her sister but she felt too weary. She got into his car without an invitation.

“There’s a dead woman up on the hill,” she said, “right up there.”

Harvey looked at her as if he could not comprehend what she was telling him. He looked at her strangely. As he was getting out of the car she was locking the doors. When he came back down the hill, his face was gray. He ran his fingers through his thinning hair.

“I’m sorry you had to see that,” he said. He paused and spoke softly, “I heard about your sister. I’m sorry.”

Louise reached for the pack of cigarettes on his dash.

“I’ve been thinking about you,” he said. He traced her breastbone with light fingers.

“Shouldn’t we call someone?” she said. He pulled away from her and slammed the keys in the ignition. Her hair was running water. He grabbed his leather coat from the backseat and tossed it to her. “Try not to get that wet,” he said. She pulled the coat up to her throat, shivering. Hemaucus Three Dresses was open-mouthed under the cold silver sky.

Before she could stop him Harvey turned into the lane going up to Jules Bart’s house. “Guy here has a phone,” Harvey said, but he noticed she leaned her elbow up on the door to shield her eyes. “What’s wrong?” he said, reaching for her. “What’s going on here?”