A rustling noise made her whirl around. Something was pushing through the bushes. Her horror and revulsion grew towards panic as thick and coal black, hairy legs felt their way through the branches. The thing kept coming, more long, hairy legs—a gigantic black spider with Jonathan’s head on its body, his face dripping with dark blood.

She awoke bathed in sweat, her heart leaping in her chest. She didn’t know what the dream meant but it had shaken her up badly. There was something evil about the way he looked on that hill—the grin, as if he understood something she did not, and the way those scars on his cheeks and lips had turned white. And the spiders—she hated spiders. In the dream, they had been everywhere, everywhere she turned, covering her with their long, hairy legs and fat, slippery underbellies, and then that thing…

It was a lousy beginning to the morning. After she got up and went downstairs, she gave herself a nasty slice on the ring finger of her left hand with a knife during breakfast. When she got outside and in the car, the roads were filled with blowing snow and covered with drifts, and her windshield wipers didn’t do a thing against the snow that was already falling thickly. She had never been in such a bad storm, and it was only supposed to get worse. “A real doozy,” the silver-haired woman, her landlady, had said. “You really shouldn’t leave the house.”

But she had, of course. It had been no real trouble to come, just as long as she was careful. No trouble yet, she thought, but soon the roads would be impassible.

After she arrived, both men had been civil enough. But she noticed the tension between them. There were a few exchanges of pleasantries; she ordered a cup of coffee. David Pierce sat ramrod straight, his lips pressed together in a thin, white line. He was angry; she could feel it. And there was something else coming from him, the same almost palpable smell that had filled her bedclothes last night; the smell of fear.

“I am interrupting,” she said finally, after her coffee had arrived. “I’m sorry, but I need some answers, and I’m not sure where to turn.”

“What exactly are you looking for, Ms. Seigel?” asked Flint. His fingers drummed on the table, as if he were anxious to be somewhere else. She found it more than a little distracting.

She explained herself again to both men, and as she went on, she imagined they both sat up a little straighter, paid a little more attention. She was no storyteller, but what she had to say clearly had them interested. “And you flew all the way here from Boston,” Flint said. “This guy must be pretty important.”

“He’s an unusual case. Medications never seemed to work very well for him, but therapy worked wonders.