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Finally, just before dawn, Lila said she had to push Had to Nobody believed she was ready but the doctor checked her and found, an running around, rearranging the rooloves, folding away a section of the bed below Lila’s pelvis Wolgast felt useless, a rudderless ship at sea He took Lila’s hand as she pushed, once, twice, three tiled scissors, for Wolgast to cut the cord The nurse put Eva in a warars Then she put a hat on the baby’s tiny head and wrapped her in a blanket and handed her to Wolgast How astonishing! Suddenly it was all behind them, all the pain and panic and worry, and here was this sparkling new being in the roo in his life had prepared hihter, in his arms Eva was small, just five pounds Her skin arm and pink-the pink of sun-ripened peaches-and, as he pressed his face close to hers, gave off a smoky smell, as if she’d been plucked froy froast was surprised to find there was blood on the floor, a wide dark slick below her; in all the confusion, he had never seen this happen But Lila was fine, the doctor said Wolgast showed her their baby and then held Eva a long, long ti her name over and over, before they took her to the nursery

· · ·

Aht did not abate Wolgast found, in one of the outbuildings, stacks of plywood and a ladder, and a hammer and saw and nails He had to measure and cut the boards by hand, then carry them up the ladder and hold them in place while he nailed, to seal the s of the second floor But after the long cliht, seemed completely incredible-this small, ordinary chore see at dusk to eat She asked hion, he explained, in the one 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 frole 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, low of candlelight he read to her: Treasure Island, Oliver Twist, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea

So the day, if it was cloudy, and watch hi a hole in the roof under the eaves, trying to enerator he’d found in one of the sheds Alasses 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 fro hie, 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 Aht towels, shampoo, a bar of soap

"Do you kno to swiht, 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 A her horizontally, told her to o," she told hi quickly "Uh-huh"

He released her; she sank like a stone Through the ice-clear water, Wolgast could see that she’d stoppedaround, like an anirace, she extended her ar herself through the water in a deft, froglikealong the sandy bottoed ten feet away, in water that reached well over her head, s with her legs "Like flying"

Wolgast, duh "Be careful-" he said, but before he could finish she’d filled her lungs with a gulp of air and dived down again

He washed her hair, did his best telling her how to do the rest By the time they were done, the sky had darkened froht doubled in the lake’s still surface; no sounds at all except for their own voices and the basal throb of the lake’s water against the shoreline He led theht They ate a dinner of soup and crackers in the kitchen, and afterward, he took her upstairs to her rooht was her do his own as well So to her

"Thank you," A doith a book: Anne of Green Gables

"What for?"

"For teaching me to swim"

"It looked like you already knew Somebody must have showed you"

She considered this claim with a puzzled expression "I don’t think so," she said

He didn’t knohat to make of any of it So much of Amy was a mystery She seemed well-better than well, in fact Whatever had happened to her at the compound, whatever the virus was, she appeared to have weathered it; and yet the business with the light was strange And other things: why, for instance, did Aast’s hair now curled below his collar; and yet Amy, as he looked at her, appeared exactly the saernails either, nor seen her do this And of course the deeper mysteries: What had killed Doyle and everyone else in Colorado? How could that have been both Carter and not Carter on the hood of the car? What had Lacey meant when she’d said to him that Amy was his, that he’d knohat to do? It seemed so; he had knohat to do And yet he could explain none of this

Later, when he finished reading for the night, he told her that in thedown the ht, that she could stay in the lodge by herself It would only be for an hour or two He’d be back before she knew it, before she was even awake

"I know," she told hiast didn’t knohat to make of this, either

He left at a little after seven After sopollen fro protest when he tried to start it, but eventually the engine caught and held Theto burn away He put it in gear and began his long creep down the drive

The closest real toas thirty o that far If the Toyota broke down, he’d be stranded, and so would Ae was close to empty in any event He retraced the route of their arrival, pausing at each fork to double-check hisin such a remote place; and yet this absence disturbed hi to, however briefly, felt like a different place than the one he’d left three weeks ago

Then he saw it: MILTON’S DRY GOODS / HUNTING, FISHING LIC In the dark, that first night, it had seeer than it was; in fact it was just a se in the woods, like soh an old van, ast exited the Toyota and stepped to the front door

On the porch were half a dozen newspaper vending boxes, all ee headline splashed across it through the dusty door, which was propped open When he withdrew a copy, he found that the paper was just two folded sheets long He stood on the porch and read