“Those must be for us,” said Marlin. “At least we know we were expected.”

The other bedroom was clearly their aunt’s but was empty.

Downstairs there was food in the fridge and cupboards so they made a quick meal of cereal and fruit, took showers, and got into the four beds. Fiona wrote a note to Aunt Martha and left it on the kitchen table in case she came back later.

“I can’t imagine what happened to her,” said Fiona.

“I don’t even care,” mumbled Marlin. “I’m just so happy to be lying down. I’m just so happy to—” Before she could finish the sentence she had joined Charlie and Natasha, who were fast asleep.

But Fiona stayed awake, tired as she was, and thought furiously. She did not know what to do about this new twist in their fate. She could think of no good reason for their aunt to have disappeared. Fiona thought and thought and thought and then she too gave up and slept.

Aunt Martha’s Neighbor

THE next morning when the girls awoke, Fiona held out the hope for a second that her aunt had come home in the night and they would find her bedroom occupied. She looked across the hall, saw the bedroom door still open, and got up to investigate. Her aunt’s bed was untouched, and going about the house Fiona knew she had yet to return.

She put out cereal and milk again, feeling odd about taking her aunt’s food without permission although she was sure she wouldn’t mind, and the girls gathered as they came downstairs and settled on comfortable old chairs on the porch. The air smelled of pine and earth and the sea. It was a place smell like none they had experienced before. It was not jungly. It was not deserty. It was not cityish. It smelled March fresh and brisk and teeming with new pursuits the way a good blowing wind makes you feel exciting things must be coming your way. That it carries with it the invigorating energy of newness, new ventures, new plans, winds from across the world full of possibility.

“Mom did say she was peculiar,” said Marlin. “Maybe this is one of the peculiar things she does. Disappears without warning.”

“We could ask the neighbors,” said Natasha.

“Does she have any?” asked Charlie, for all they could see was a huge fenced meadow and pine tree woods in all directions with mountains to the back of the property and beyond.

“She must have some neighbors,” said Marlin. “We just can’t see them from here. We should walk over after breakfast and knock on their doors. Maybe she told someone where she was going.”

The girls put the breakfast things away, washed and dried the dishes, made the beds, and dressed. Then they headed down the road, Charlie holding Fiona’s hand and looking into the forest the whole way, anticipating bears. The first thing they came to was a small cleared lot with a trailer parked on it. A screen hung half off a window, the steps to the front door were broken, there were an old refrigerator and bathtub on the front lawn.