Miriam had done her screaming and her weeping, and now sat in a little café seeking with increasing urgency for a victim for Martin. She had called Sarah again and again, and still had not gotten an answer. But she could not let this problem, as disturbing as it was becoming, intrude on her urgent mission. She did not know exactly what had happened to Martin, except that he was starving, and it was the most horrible thing she had ever seen.

Patience was essential on the hunt, no matter whether you were in a hurry or not. The trouble was, you could not easily imagine the prey to be dangerous, and in an emergency like this, your instincts screamed at you to just grab one, drag it off by the hair, and give it to the poor sufferer immediately.

She forced herself to sit still, to appear seductive. The waiter was admiring her and so were some of the male customers. But nobody moved, nobody did anything.

She sucked in warm smoke from her cigarette, drew it deep into her lungs, then blew it out with a carefully manufactured seductive pout. At least they had reasonably good cigarettes here. This Gitanes reminded her of a Bon-Ton. American cigarettes were awful now.

Why were these stupid men ignoring her? Had customs changed so much? When she had last taken a victim in Europe, everything had been different. There had been an immediate flirting response, a quick seduction. That had happened on a quiet day in Clichy, in a little bar full of bums and Americans.

She was contacting men’s eyes, but they wouldn’t take it farther. She did not intend to let Martin starve, or any Keeper she could help, for that matter. As to why this had happened to him, she did not yet know. She could well imagine, though—something awful that had to do with human oppression of the Keeper. She sucked the cigarette hard, blew out a furious stream of smoke.

The temptation was growing ever stronger to just go off down the street and do what instinct urged. To some Keepers, the finest of all meals came from a sudden, spontaneous impulse to just snatch a victim, tear it open, and drink. That was her instinct, always. She’d been drawn to America in the first place by the easy, rambling life it offered her kind. She’d guzzled her way across the wild frontier. You could go a few miles on horseback and pluck your fruit along the trail without the slightest worry. People disappeared out there all the time.

She’d finished her cigarette and was just starting another when she realized that a young male was heading her way. She said in French, “Can you help me? May I have a light?”