Amy rested most of each day, awakening at dusk to eat. She asked him about where they were—Oregon, he explained, in the mountains, a place where he had gone to camp as a boy—but never why; she either knew already or didn’t care. The lodge’s propane tank was nearly full. He cooked small, easy meals on the stove, soups and stews from cans, crackers and cereal wetted with powdered milk. The camp’s water supply was faintly sulfurous but otherwise drinkable, and poured from the kitchen pump so icy cold it made his fillings tingle. He could see right away he hadn’t brought nearly enough food; he’d have to go down the mountain soon. In the basement he’d found boxes of old books—classic novels in a bound set, moldy with age and dampness—and at night under the glow of candlelight he read to her: Treasure Island, Oliver Twist, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.

Sometimes she would come out during the day, if it was cloudy, and watch him do the chores—cutting wood, fixing a hole in the roof under the eaves, trying to make heads or tails of an old gasoline generator he’d found in one of the sheds. Amy would sit on a tree stump in the shade, wearing her glasses and cap, with a long towel tucked under the headband to cover her neck. But these visits never lasted long; an hour, and her skin would turn a ferocious pink, as if scalded by hot water, and he’d send her back upstairs again.

One evening, after they had been at the camp for nearly three weeks, he took her down the path to the lake to bathe. Apart from her brief hours outside watching him work, she hadn’t ventured from the lodge, and never so far. At the base of the path was a rickety dock, extending thirty feet past the grassy shoreline. Wolgast stripped to his underclothes and told Amy to do the same. He’d brought towels, shampoo, a bar of soap.

“Do you know how to swim?”

Amy shook her head.

“All right, I’ll teach you.”

He took her by the hand and led her into the lake. The water was shockingly cold. They stepped together into deeper water, until it reached Amy’s chest. Wolgast picked her up then and, holding her horizontally, told her to move her arms and legs, like so.

“Let go,” she told him.

“Are you sure?”

She was breathing quickly. “Uh-huh.”