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Mid-week, late September, Kate Brown hadn’t expected the parking lot to be so full or a crowd at the dock. “In a hurry?” they’d asked at the ticket booth, and she’d felt mildly ridiculous, out of breath with her boots slung over her shoulder. As it happened, there was plenty of time to go back to the car. She changed into her boots, left her sneakers, remembered her water bottle and threw another snack into her small daypack. She’d be burning calories, she reasoned. And besides, one could never have too many snacks.
The brochure said ferry. To Kate that meant something large and metal, with multiple decks, possibly a café. Obviously not a car ferry, she hadn’t thought that. The island was too small, and the map showed just the one road, mostly unpaved. Turned out, the ferry was the mailboat, the Miss Lizzie, and it looked to Kate like a lobster boat: white, wooden hulled, a covered area forward, a squared off stern and open deck aft. She loved it. Warm day, light breeze, she’d sit in the open, watch for seals and feel the spray as they plowed through the swells.
Once on board, Kate realized most of the passengers were island residents returning from errands on the mainland. They relaxed and chatted with one another for the 45-minute ride, surrounded by their canvas bags and wheeled carts full of food and supplies. Just a handful appeared to be visitors like Kate, except with their large packs and sleeping bags they obviously planned to camp overnight. She was happy about that; they wouldn’t be in a hurry, she’d be able to get ahead of them, especially once they stopped to set up camp.
Everyone disembarked at the town landing; this late in the season, the mailboat no longer made the extra stop at Duck Harbor Landing within the national park. Kate set off at a vigorous clip, blew past the ranger station, and kept going the 4 miles or so to pick up the Duck Harbor Mountain trail, the only one described as difficult. Since then she hadn’t seen or heard a soul and couldn’t believe that a place so utterly spectacular could exist otherwise unobserved. It felt like a gift given just to her.
She was alone. On an island off the coast of Maine. “Just me, myself and I.” Remembering that Joan Armatrading song, a 1980’s favorite from high school, she sang it to herself now, practically skipping down the rugged trail until the tip of her boot snagged a root. She lurched forward a step but quickly regained her balance. Careful now, she thought. Hiking alone, you know better. She glanced around, nobody in sight, and settled into a more deliberate gait. Within a few steps her smile slid back into place. She did know better. She was a capable woods-woman. Summer camp as a kid, an Outward Bound course after high school, that guided trek on Mount Rainier after college. She had all the necessary skills. If something came up, she could take care of herself in the wilderness. Anywhere, really. Smart, educated, a problem solver, Kate always figured she’d be good in a crisis.
God, she was pleased with herself. She’d done this, all of it, from leaving graduate school, taking a job, and moving to Maine, to giving herself a week in Acadia National Park before starting her new life. She’d already been to tiny Winter Harbor and Schoodic Point, all pounding surf and pink granite, cut with veins of dark basalt and trimmed in pine, birch, spruce and cedar. Then came posh and overrun Bar Harbor and the heart of the park on Mt. Desert Island. Wide carriage trails, iron rung climbs followed by tea and hot popovers, it felt like rusticating with the Rockefellers. This was her last stop, Isle au Haut, the 6-mile long, 2-mile wide island, six miles off the mainland in Penobscot Bay. After that she’d be in Portland, unpacking boxes, setting up house, finding the grocery store, and going to work.
Three hours into her hike, Kate’s spirit remained high, but her body was flagging. She hit the eastern edge of the island, Goat Trail and Squeaker Cove, and was tempted to linger as much by the ache in her legs as the view of granite cliffs and crashing waves. She didn’t. She couldn’t. She wanted to see everything the park had to offer, and she had a boat to catch, 4pm, the last run of the day.
Another 45 minutes, and Kate was on the forested Median Ridge Trail. Her mind wandered to the sounds of her breathing, the slosh from her water bottle, and the scrape and thud of her footfalls on hard rock and springy soil. She liked being alone. It felt familiar, comfortable. Preferable, even. No, not preferable, she amended. She’d been in long term relationships, had gone so far as to be engaged, and knew the joy of sharing her days with a partner. Except it hadn’t worked out that way then or since. Her choice, no regrets. It was just that at 25 she hadn’t considered the likelihood of long-term loneliness. Now 30, alone again, still alone, she did. She thought of them, her former loves, good men to a one. She would have been happy to share this place with any of them.
Come on, Kate, stop wallowing. She lengthened her spine and pulled her shoulders back, shifting the straps of her day pack wider. Scented with pine and cedar and the intermittent tang of seawater, the crisp air touched her skin through her sweat damp shirt. She shivered and laughed out loud at the sweet relief. Behind her were the grime, grit and grey of Pittsburgh, the hot, sticky, overripe heaviness of summer, and the relentless pressures of graduate school. Here in Maine, the season had turned: bright sun, mid-60’s and very low humidity. She inhaled deeply, tilting her head skyward to feel the still powerful warmth of the sun like a caress on her face and neck as she stepped in and out of shadow and light. Paul. If she had to pick, it would be Paul, his touch soft and hot, then rough and eager.
Kate slammed to the ground, landing in a heap with a thud after tripping over a branch. Needle prick pain flared behind her knee, on her calf and the back of her upper arm. She scrambled to her feet, brushed her hand over her arm and twisted to see the back of her leg. Another sharp sting on the back of her hand brought the black and yellow culprit into sharp focus. She followed it with her eyes to the tree stump by the path, the air above it alive with a fevered thrum. Bees!
She ran headlong, pounding down the uneven and rooted path, slapping her neck, arms and legs, tripping, cursing, crying, until she just couldn’t go any further, chest aching, gasping for breath. She slowed to a standstill, propped her hands on her knees and gulped for air. “Shit… Shit.”
As her breathing slowed, Kate straightened and shook her head. Idiot, hiking, looking straight up. Rule one; first stand still, then gawk. She did so now. It was stunning. In the clean, crisp air, color and shape appeared as pure and vivid as if the world was brand new and she the first to see it. Pristine and full of promise it was nothing like Pittsburgh which had felt rusty, drab, and perennially provincial. She’d been stuck there, isolated and out of place in a sea of big hair and segregated neighborhoods while she slogged her way toward a doctorate in Public Health.
That is, until a month ago: a job opening, a chance interview, an offer. After all the dogged misery to stay the course, Kate had found it remarkably easy to abandon ship. She said goodbye to her meagre personal entanglements, which were genuinely fond but without future, carried her twenty-seven boxes of books to the moving truck, and smoked her last cigarette. Taking the early boat, hiking on Isle au Haut, it was more than fresh air and spectacular beauty. It was relief, escape, and reward. It was why she’d moved to Maine and it was a blessing.
At that moment, however, it was a blessing somewhat diminished by a great number of painful stings. Bees, or wasps? A capable woods-woman would know, thought Kate. She untwisted the cap to her water bottle and took a long swallow. She held her trembling hand in front of her, thinking how glad she was that nobody had seen that humiliating display, completely oblivious to the branch laid across the path, then sprawled in the dirt, blind panic, and completely winded in what, a minute, maybe two. More proof that quitting smoking was the right thing to do, but God did she crave one now. Pathetic. There was a nice flat rock in a sunny patch a few yards ahead, perfect for sitting on. A single step in that direction accompanied by weakness and shooting pain from her right ankle added another demerit to the crumbling ‘capable woods-woman’ self-image she had had. ‘Shit.’
She hobbled over to the rock to take the weight off and count her stings. Red, hot, swollen and sore they were easy to find, all 17 of them. Seventeen – was that enough to cause an allergic reaction? She had no idea. What she did know was that she had a boat a boat to catch and she wasn’t going to make it without help. There’d been so few hikers, she figured she’d be more likely to find help on the loop road. She dug around in her pockets and pack for the trail map to see the quickest way to the road. No map. She must have lost it by the hive and she certainly wasn’t going back to retrieve it. Paying attention, holding on to the map, telling somebody where she was going, bringing a first aid kit. That was what a smart and capable woods-woman would have done. A mobile phone would have been handy, too. Not that it would work here. From the few people she knew who had one, they only worked in the big cities.
Kate found a branch to use as a walking stick and continued along the trail away from the hive. Her ankle throbbed, her hand blistered almost immediately from the walking stick, and her stings itched fiercely. She swallowed a few times, listened to her own breathing. Was that a wheeze? Was she going into anaphylactic shock? She was being ridiculous, she thought. Probably.
After fifteen minutes she came upon a stream, surprisingly full and enticing. Whereas the heavy rains plaguing the entire eastern seaboard that fall had left Pittsburgh mired in muck; her rivers bloated and hillsides slumped, here the rains had cleansed and nourished; every leaf and berry washed of dust, moss swollen into plush, verdant beds, and late season trickles returned to the glory days of spring runoff, rushing clear and pure. She could stop, find a pool, and soak her stings, now hard, hot mounds. ‘Never leave the path’ came instantly to mind; the hiker’s maxim as familiar to her as ‘Don’t talk to strangers’ was to a child. And as over simple. She craved relief. What, really, was the risk? She’d follow the stream. She wouldn’t get lost. At worst, she’d miss the boat. Surely, she wouldn’t be the first tourist to do so. It might be expensive, but there would be another way. She opted for the soothing soak.
The ground along the stream was steep and uneven. A lush mat of moss, lichen, fungi and mountain cranberry partially concealed granite slabs and stone rubble, uprooted trees and fallen branches. From this bed grew ferns and young saplings of yew, birch and spruce that vied for light through the mature, late season canopy. Kate made slow progress picking her way downstream, but before too long she found the perfect spot. Sunlight dappled through the trees and a mini waterfall emptied between two boulders into a wider, deeper pool. She dropped her water bottle and daypack behind her and plopped on the ground to take off her hiking shoes and socks. Steadying herself against the boulder, she stepped into the pool, relishing the cool water that reached just above her knees. She dipped first one arm then another up to her armpits, and splashed water on her face and neck. Soothed and refreshed, she sat at the streams edge and floated her badly swollen ankle.
Kate sat for a time, idly gazing at the plants and trees, pretty much none of which she could identify by name. She wondered about poison ivy, remembering only that it was three leafed and hoped to hell she wasn’t sitting in a patch of it. She figured she should probably go. She obviously wasn’t going to die of an allergic reaction to her stings. Not today, anyway. Although now she’d been sensitized, right? She’d ask her new doctor as soon as she chose one. Maybe she’d need an Epi-Pen. She could add it to the first-aid kit she would carry. Cool.
Kate dried off her feet with her socks and pulled on her shoes. Still seated she twisted behind her and reached for her pack. Eyelevel with the ferns, that’s when she noticed it, peeking through the stems and fronds. A small shoe. Attached to a leg. Attached to more, partially hidden and impossible to absorb.
For a moment everything stopped – her heart, her breath, her brain. An instant later, eyes wide and neck constricted, she twisted the rest of the way over onto her hands and knees and launched herself onto her feet, right into the stream. Arms flailing, she almost toppled backward, bashing her right fist into the boulder before using it to steady herself. She looked frantically from side to side, not really seeing anything.
“Hello? Hello?” called out Kate.
Dead silence answered her call.
With a ragged breath, Kate’s gaze dropped to her feet, wavery through the flow of water. Watching, she became aware of the splash and gurgle of the stream and felt the tug of the current against her legs. Kate took several deep breaths. Panic gave way to thought and doubt. Maybe it was just a shoe, lost and forgotten? Kate stooped and looked again. She could still see the shoe from this vantage point. Small, pink and dirty, it was a little girl’s sneaker. She leaned to the left, had a heartbeat’s relief that she didn’t see a leg, until her eye caught a glimpse of a shoulder and a tangle of hair in the undergrowth. Her breath caught, and she held it, waiting, waiting. Eventually, she had to take another breath.
Having no idea what to do, she crawled back out of the stream, socks and boots drenched. Still on her knees, she gathered her pack and water bottle with shaking hands and hugged them close to her body. For the briefest moment she considered leaving, but no, she couldn’t do that. This was on her; there was no-one else. She set her things to the side and crawled forward. She darted quick glances at the shoe, guiding her way forward, but otherwise refused to look at anything other than the ground directly beneath her and the damage she’d inflicted to the knuckles of her right hand. Scraped and trickling blood, the center knuckle impressively swollen, Kate didn’t so much feel the hurt as acknowledge and dismiss it.
Perched at the child’s feet, she could no longer delay the inevitable. She cast her eyes along the length of the body until she reached the child’s face. Kate’s stomach clenched and her hands flew to her own face at the sight. The little girl’s mouth covered in silver duct tape. Kate’s eyes darted from face to hands to hair to body, like a spotlight, taking in each piece separately from another. ‘Oh my God, oh my God’ shrilled in her mind as each image came together into an appalling whole. A little girl, alone, bound and gagged in duct tape, not moving.
Kate kept staring. A little girl, white, about the age of her niece, five, maybe six years old. She wore pink sneakers, closed with Velcro, white socks, jeans and a pink and white striped short sleeved shirt. She was dirty, but just normal little kid running and playing outside dirty. Not corpse in the woods dirty. As if she would know. The girl was laying on her side, hands behind her back, wrists duct taped together, her fingers reddish purple. Her hair was light brown, wavy and about shoulder length. She had bruises on the side of her neck and on the back of her arm. Other than some scratches there was no blood. The child’s eyes were closed. Kate could imagine that, exhausted from play, she’d simply given in to sleep. Kate crawled alongside her and reached out to give her a little shake. That was when she recognized the pattern; four fingers, four bruises; the bruises were fingerprints. Kate lurched to the side and threw up.
Spitting, gulping for air, Kate propped her hands against her thighs and looked up through her tears. She searched the woods toward the path where she’d come from and back down along the stream. She could barely hear it now over her own heavy breathing. Everything she saw looked chaotic: tangles of undergrowth, jagged rock, and broken branches. In what kind of world could something like this happen to a child. To anyone. Kate heaved again, this time dry, the taste of bile in the back of her throat.
Turning back to her, Kate held her hand in front of the child’s nose, but couldn’t be sure whether she felt her breath or not. She was going to have to touch her. Kate watched herself reach out with both hands, hesitating twice before she managed to place them on the child’s shoulder and ever so gently roll her a little way onto her back to reveal her chest and tummy. They were moving, up and down, up and down, with her steady breathing. Kate’s hands slid down onto the girl’s torso, confirming with touch what her eyes told her – the child was alive. Kate’s head dropped, blinded by tears, overwhelmed by relief and horror in equal measure.
Kate gently shook the girl, but nothing stirred her. She could hardly bear to look at her face, the horror of the duct tape so shocking. Actually, she couldn’t bear it; it had to come off. Her hand stiff and bruised, she picked clumsily at the corner but couldn’t get the tape to peel up from the tender skin. Kate worried it would hurt the child terribly. She decided to get the tape off her wrists first. She found a sharp stone and rolled the limp child back onto her side to try and cut the tape in the crease between her arms. All this jostling stirred the child awake. As soon as Kate felt her jerk, she looked up to see her eyes flutter and then close. Kate was desperate now to get the tape off her wrists before she fully awoke. She worked feverishly to tear the tape apart and yank it from her wrists. Finally, she tore it free only to look back at the child’s face and see the abject terror in her eyes. Kate jumped away, forgetting her sore ankle. She crashed down on her butt and scuttled backward to put distance between herself and the child.
“I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you. I was just trying to get off the tape. Really, I’m so sorry,” said Kate, the words tumbling from her mouth. The child tried to sit up but listed far to the side, slowly ending up back on the ground, arms crossed in front of her, curled into a ball. Her face was hidden from Kate’s view. A line had been drawn. She wouldn’t approach the child, not without permission, not after seeing how desperately frightened she was. Frightened of Kate.
Kate looked away from the child, toward the stream, her gaze idle and unfocused. She wanted to help, knew the responsibility was hers, but was at a complete loss as to how. She would wait. Stay put and wait for help. That was the rule, wasn’t it? No, not if you were in danger. Kate’s eyes snapped into focus; she hadn’t been paying attention. She looked frantically this way and that for any sign of movement. Nothing. Not yet. But at any moment. She should go get help. A quick glance at the child still curled in the fetal position banished the thought as absurd. No, of course not, she couldn’t leave the girl. Somehow, she’d have to convince her to come with her. It came back to that, the child’s fear. She needed to gain her trust. The prospect of conning the child to believe Kate knew what to do, was worthy of her trust, nauseated her. She hadn’t a clue. Around and around the questions swam. Should they stay or should they go? Where would they go? Who would they find? What if they found the bad guy? How would she know? What would she do? She had no idea. At all. How could she not know what to do?
Frustrated and frightened, Kate started to cry. She swiped away the tears with the back of her hands, leaving a small smear of blood like a stripe of war paint, one-sided, ill-prepared for battle.
“Listen. I don’t want to scare you. I’m not leaving and I’m not going to come any closer. I’m just going to go get my pack and water bottle, bring them over here.”
When she returned, she took a seat, no closer, but in a spot that allowed her to see the child’s face. The child had changed position, still lying on the ground, but uncurled in order to track Kate’s movements. Her eyes were open and wary and had settled on Kate’s face, watching her without blinking. The duct tape across her mouth glared hideously. More than anything Kate wanted to remove it from sight, to return to a world where such things weren’t seen and didn’t happen.
“Listen. You want some water?” asked Kate, extending the bottle toward her. “I could help, you know, get the tape off. But only if you say it’s okay.” The girl continued to stare in silence, and Kate blushed, feeling idiotic. “Sorry. With a wave. You can tell me it’s okay with a wave,” she amended.
Kate set the bottle to rest on the ground between them. The girl balled up her fist and moved it slowly along her body toward her mouth. There was no mistaking the gesture, the girl wanted to be absolutely sure that her movement was not mistaken for a wave. Kate held her palms forward and said, “I promise, I won’t get any closer.”
Just like Kate, the girl couldn’t get a corner or edge to peel up from her skin, her fingers swollen and stiff.
“Try moving your chin around, stick out your tongue,” said Kate, making all kinds of crazy faces as she stuck her tongue in her checks and between pursed lips. The girl made a snorting noise, which Kate hoped to God was a laugh. She continued making faces, pretended to giggle, even stuck her finger up her nose to make the girl snort again. Snorts and silliness and nose-picking, that was the world Kate was desperate to return to.
The girl gave up on the tape and instead started scuffling around, working herself onto her knees, blinking slow and hard, her hands planted to the ground on either side of her. Kate stayed put and kept talking, telling her she had food in her pack, about gorp, good ole raisins and peanuts, how she’d added M&Ms, but if the girl had a nut allergy like her niece not to worry, she had other food too. She talked about how she was happy to share, about how nice it would be to get the tape off, how she could help her, that all she had to do was wave.
The child did not wave. She stayed on her knees for a while, then ventured to her feet, swaying alarmingly, before finding her balance. Resisting the urge to help, Kate held herself in place and kept chattering. The child staggered over to Kate’s pack, dropped to her knees on the opposite side of it. Ignoring Kate, she opened the pack and pulled out the snacks, lining them out one by one in a row between them. Kate finally stopped talking while the child studied the items. She moved an apple a foot closer to Kate and moved a chocolate bar closer to herself.
“A good trade,” smiled Kate, sitting up straight. “I love apples.”
After careful consideration, the child moved the gorp toward Kate and the cheese and crackers toward herself.
“Okay, that seems fair, that way we both get some chocolate. If you let me have some of the cheese, I’ll let you have some of the M&Ms.” Kate paused. “So now what? Time to get the tape off?”
The child looked at her warily, but then got to her feet, chocolate bar in hand, and walked, stilted but steadier, around to Kate’s side of the pack and dropped to her knees in front of her.
“Great, okay, let’s see what we can do.” Kate pulled the skin taut with one hand, using her other hand to work the edge, muttering all along a steady stream of reassurances. Finally, triumphant, Kate exclaimed, “I got it, I got a tiny corner, I’ll just pull it back a little at a time.”
At the first tug, the child slapped Kate’s hands away and scrambled back a few feet, tears welling in her eyes. Kate clutched her hands to her lap, alarmed and guilt-ridden that she had hurt her. The child had to do it herself, thought Kate, and she cajoled her into trying with the promise of chocolate and the hope that it would hurt less by her own hand. The child tugged, once, twice and stopped, the hope proven a lie and the bribe too small. Seeing the fresh tears welling in those scared eyes, Kate knew she’d been wrong, cowardly, to ask the little girl to be brave while she sat back and watched. Now she understood, they would have to be brave together; Kate to help and the child to let her.
“Listen,” Kate started to explain, but stopped and turned to look upstream when she heard the whistling. It was light and familiar, that whistled theme song, the Andy Griffith show. She barked a laugh as the wave of relief drained the tension from her muscles. Rescue!
“Hey. Help. Down here. I need help,” she called, her hands cupped around her mouth. Beaming, Kate turned back to the child and blanched at the sight of her. The girl’s eyes were wide with terror. Her whole body was shaking.
“Whoa, whoa, shh, shh,” whispered Kate, even though the child hadn’t made a sound. “It’s okay, it’s okay. It’s just someone who can help us.” As soon as the words were out of her mouth, she looked away, back toward the whistler, no longer whistling. What if it wasn’t okay? What if he was the bad guy? The thought felt like a physical blow. But no, it didn’t make sense. Why come back and risk being caught? Why whistle a warning? It was Andy Griffith, for God’s sake. It had to be okay. The girl was just scared. She’d been scared of Kate too at first. Who wouldn’t be after what she’d been through?
“Hello? Somebody down there?” called a man.
She looked back at the girl, white as death, practically vibrating. Kate had never seen someone so frightened.
She pulled her into a tight embrace, holding her head against her shoulder, trying to still her. “Shh, shh. You’re safe with me. I’ll take care of it.”
“Hey? Are you okay? Where are you?” called the man.
“Yeah. Fine. Um… never mind,” called Kate over her shoulder, cringing at how idiotic it sounded.
“What?” called the man. After a long pause he called again, “Hey, are you okay?”
Fuck. Kate’s mind was racing. He wasn’t going to just go away. Which was good, right? She was almost certain he would help them. Almost. Kate put her hands on the girl’s shoulders and whispered in her ear. “Listen, really, it’s okay. You can hide and I’ll check it out – be sure it’s safe. I won’t let anything happen to you. I promise.”
The girl looked at Kate, her eyes pleading, for what exactly Kate wasn’t sure. Not to be seen? Not to be left alone? To be saved. She was begging to be saved. And that was what Kate was doing; she was finding someone who could save them both.
“Listen, I’ll walk a little way up the stream, around that bend. I won’t go far. You can hide behind those trees right there. No-one will see you and I promise I won’t leave you. I’ll make sure it’s safe and I’ll come back for you. Okay?”
The little girl, the tape still across her mouth, gave Kate an imploring look before running for the trees. It took Kate’s breath away. She’d done it after all, tricked the child, forced the girl to trust her. Letting her go, watching her disappear into the woods, turning her back on her, it was almost enough to make Kate sick again. But she knew she needed help. Whatever happened to that child, whatever needed to happen, was completely out of her depth. It wasn’t until she took her first steps that she remembered her ankle. God – let the whistler be there to save them, prayed Kate. She listened again but didn’t hear anything. She hobbled along, around the bend in the stream, out of sight, just like she promised.
“Hello,” she called to the whistler. “Hello. Hello. Can you hear me?”