Astonishing to Hannah, Wes has vanished, a coarse-skinned stranger in army fatigue pants and black T-shirt, hair in a slovenly ponytail, has taken his place on the sofa.

  Squinting up at Hannah sleepy-eyed, baring his teeth in a grimace of a smile—“Thanks, Mrs. J__!” Taking the bottle from Hannah and drinking from it, wipes his mouth on his T-shirt.

  Hannah in an open-eyed trance with no idea why she has returned to this room, to her captor. Why she hasn’t fled screaming. Or locked herself in the guest bathroom, phone in hand.

  Why simply standing there irresolute, blinking and smiling inanely and her knees quivering like water.

  Frowning Mikey reaches up, seizes Hannah’s wrist, and pulls her roughly down beside him. The delicate wineglasses fall from her hand to the carpet, where they will be discovered hours later, miraculously intact.

  Grunting, grimly tugging at her light summer clothing: white poplin top, beige cord Bermuda shorts. As Hannah weakly protests No, don’t—please … Tries to kiss her mouth, mauls and pummels her, panting now, instantaneously aroused as Hannah pushes at his chest, not hard, not hard enough (she thinks) to seriously offend him, antagonize him for in the confusion of the moment Hannah wants to think that this is a playful interlude merely, not so serious, for isn’t this person waiting to try the TV again, isn’t he intensely interested in TV news, also he is so young, Hannah is so much older, in terror of provoking a temper tantrum in one so young, a rage for which she, the mature and responsible woman, will pay; the surprise is, the ponytailed boy is unexpectedly strong, close to breaking her wrist when he’d grabbed her and yanked her down beside him.

  Mouth fixed in a pathetic smile Hannah hopes to placate her assailant by not resisting him exactly, stiff-bodied and uncooperating yet not openly fighting him, a weak creature displaying its throat in denial of the predator’s teeth. So long as the ponytailed boy is laughing, Hannah reasons that she is not in (serious) danger, but the laughter is coarse, a kind of grunting, possibly not laughter but grunting; and then Hannah’s head is gripped as in a wrestling hold, neck straining, the assailant forces his mouth on hers, hot, damp, smelling of wine, forces his tongue into her mouth, Hannah begins to gag, choke and gag as her dazed brain tries to explain that she is (probably) misunderstanding, this is not what it appears to be, not an assault, will not end in rape, her lower body is tightening, shrinking in terror of being forced open, her muscles clench, hadn’t she and the ponytailed boy reached a sort of understanding?—in the kitchen?—that he wouldn’t hurt her, not if she fed him properly, which Hannah has done, which Hannah is happy to have done, exulting in her power to provide such nourishment; and so, isn’t he grateful, isn’t he indebted to her, she must not resist him but remain calm, must not scream or seriously fight him, he is so much stronger than Hannah, only the greatest restraint keeps him from breaking her neck in the headlock or closing his fingers around her neck to strangle her.

  Take him upstairs. Your only hope.

  In the bedroom, in the bedside table: the key.

  Key to the cabinet, and in the cabinet: the gun.

  He is drunk, he can be beguiled. He will stagger into the bedroom, he will express naïve amazement at the size of the king-sized bed, he will sprawl on the white quilt coverlet which in his coarseness he will hope to soil, Hannah can lean over him like Delilah leaning over the prostrate Samson tugging off his shoes, she can begin to undress him, soothe him with her hands, he will be foolishly mesmerized by her, it is not too late to secure the revolver, she will lead him to believe that she is undressing but in fact she will turn from him to unlock the cabinet, she will remove the (loaded) gun from the drawer into which Wes had so pointedly placed it and she will hold the gun in both hands aiming the barrel at the target as Wes had taught her, or tried to teach her, pulling the trigger blindly as she sucks in her breath, stunned by the deafening sound of the shot, the near-naked boy with the build of a wrestler convulsing as bullets tear into his chest, blood bubbles out of his anguished mouth …

  No. Cannot.

  Not possible.

  Never could Hannah pull the trigger, never could Hannah shoot another person, it is not possible to extinguish another’s life, even the life of one who wishes to hurt her; and it is not possible for Hannah to shoot someone in her bed, a stranger, whose (bloodied, limp) body would have to be explained to others … So Hannah understands sobbing helplessly, hopelessly for she is utterly trapped as one trapped in a glass cubicle rising in deathly silence into the sky as into oblivion as if what is happening to her and around her is happening beyond her volition as in a dream in which Hannah is not the dreamer but a participant: Who is this stranger ranting furious and aggrieved (she has no idea why!), tearing at her clothing, the chic white “classic” poplin top from Saks, the “classic” Bermuda shorts from Neiman Marcus, accusing her, calling her bitch, cunt as if he is angry at her but why, why angry at her, Hannah has not opposed him, in fear of her life Hannah has not dared to oppose him, she has tried to flatter him, the maleness in him that is so needy of flattery, has she not made herself abject that she might survive, has she not emptied herself of all will, the instinctive female strategy, the desperate female strategy, how can it possibly fail her now?

  Young stallion-eyes rolling white above the rim of the dilated black iris, quick percussive panting, flaring nostrils—no words now but guttural moans as the ponytailed boy has bared Hannah’s breasts, torn away her clothing, the tight-strapped brassiere, white striated skin exposed, once beautiful and now flaccid, fattish, deflated for Hannah has lost weight, her skin is too loose to hold the tender flesh tight; yet still the roseate nipples shimmer with beauty, a girlish beauty, or the memory of such beauty, the size of copper pennies, oversensitive, unbearable sensation like a raw nerve. In a delirium her assailant has begun to bite and suck at the nipple of Hannah’s right breast, he has gripped Hannah so tight she dare not struggle for fear of her ribs cracking. This is nothing like the sweet-sensuous nursing of Hannah’s babies, the elation, euphoria of that nursing, a mild pain at first, discomfort, chafed and raw-aching nipples, bruised breasts at the time firm and hard with milk, and a great pride in that milk, the young nursing mother praised, flattered and praised, how well she is doing, how well the baby is nursing, even Hannah’s mother (famously stinting with her praise) had been impressed. Nursing, an aria! For one scarcely able to sing, what a triumph! But now struggling on the leather sofa in the TV room with the flung-open doors of the mahogany cabinet exposing the large scum-colored screen in which reflections are dully mimicked there is no milk in the mother’s breasts, there is no mother remaining in the luckless woman, there can be no elation or euphoria nor even relief, only the hard hungry sucking of a mouth, a disembodied mouth sucking sullenly at a stone, furious with the stone for being but a stone, yielding no milk. Rocking against Hannah as he sucks the life out of her, bites and sucks, giant furious infant hunched at the breast, faceless, eyeless, shameless all mouth, moaning uncontrollably as in excruciating pain, anguish sucking at the tender roseate nipple until the nipple becomes a hard little pit retreating into the breast raw and bleeding and even then the ravenous infant will not release the wounded breast, in a convulsion of desire he will not release it, to save herself Hannah clutches at him, her arms gripping the stranger’s head, as a drowning swimmer might grip another swimmer in the delusion that he may save her, no longer conscious of who the assailant might be, or who she is expected to be, or where the two of them are, what is happening to them. Her jaws are clenched against the terrible urge to cry I love you—no idea to whom she is speaking, only the brute physical necessity—Don’t stop, don’t leave me, I love you.

  Pressing her face against the coarse hair smelling of the assailant’s scalp, his body, the tight-muscled boy body rocking against her, shuddering and expiring against her, very close to being suffocated Hannah strains to turn her head, lifting her head at an angle, neck craning, tendons in her neck straining for the hope is simply to breathe, one breath indrawn and then another, and another as Hannah’s chest is tight-compressed in the viselike arms, her lungs compressed, a shadow eclipsing a lung as shuddering ripples course at last through the assailant’s body and through Hannah like waves washing over both, extinguishing them, rendering them helpless, obliterated like bodies left on the littered shore as the tide retreats.

  Love love you.

  Don’t leave me.

  Evidence

  Ma’am—is this yours?”

  Where usually Ismelda addresses her employer with a neutral expression not wishing to incur her employer’s (unpredictable) wrath, on this occasion Ismelda is looking frankly perplexed.

  Within ten minutes of returning to the house with the children, in the kitchen beginning to prepare their evening meal Ismelda has discovered, in a corner of the room, looking as if it has been flung there, Hannah’s wallet.

  “Oh. Yes. I think—yes.”

  Hannah betrays no surprise. No shock, or embarrassment. Calmly takes the wallet from Ismelda, thanking her.

  Fragrant from the luxury of a late-afternoon bath, hair damp, in a white terry-cloth robe, bare legs, bare feet in sandals. Nerves soothed, humming: five milligrams of Valium. The wife of the house, unalarmed. The wife of the house, restored. Preparatory to dressing for a late dinner with Wes, after the children have eaten and are in bed.

  No attempt to explain to the nanny why, how her wallet had come to be flung into a corner of the kitchen, but politely thanking Ismelda for finding it, no fuss, no exclamations of surprise, gratitude. Matter-of-factly Hannah checks credit cards, cash (intact), and returns the wallet to the hemp shoulder bag on a chair, leaves the kitchen to take the shoulder bag upstairs to her bedroom where it belongs not allowing herself to think—She knows. Knows something.

  Nor even to think—She can’t know. How could she!

  The smell of him? Ismelda’s sharp nostrils? No.

  He’d left forty minutes before Ismelda returned. He’d left abruptly, taciturn and abashed and sober. (Possibly) alarmed at his own behavior. Leaving no trace.

  Suffused with euphoria filling her lungs like helium—No trace! No trace.

  The smell of him gone, soon the memory gone. Briny odor of semen, oily hair, wine-stained teeth. His belching breath, dirt-edged nails. In loathing of him she’d flung open the French door to the deck, she’d turned the ceiling fan on high. The befouled leather sofa she’d wiped clean with Windex, wads of paper towels carried to the trash bin in the garage so that no one (that is, Ismelda) might notice them, the perplexing quantity of them, in a wastebasket. The empty wine bottle, even the wineglasses that had not cracked when dropped—all thrown away in a fit of loathing.

  So happy!—Hannah has been spared.

  Again, another time—spared.

  If the ponytailed boy had refused to leave. If the ponytailed boy had been too drunk to leave. If Ismelda had returned home earlier, and seen him sprawled there on the sofa slack mouth agape. If the children had seen him. If Wes had seen him.

  No words to explain him. No possible words.

  And she had not killed him with the gun upstairs on the bed. That, she has been spared.

  The adulterous wife dazed with gratitude for her own good luck that might have been, so easily, unspeakably bad luck.

  Imposter Mommy, basking in such luck.

  On her knees hugging, kissing the children, laughing in delight as they chatter excitedly about all the fun they’d had that afternoon, Mommy is moved to tears by their beauty and has to be helped to her feet by the alert brown-skinned nanny—Ma’am? Are you all right?

  For a confused moment thinking that Conor and Katya have been at the Haydens’ house on Ashtree Circle and not the Mayhews’ house on Dupont Drive.

  Since they’d been chattering about a dog named Ziggy. Mommy can we have a dog! Mom-my!

  Something about a dog? Is this the dog that fled from Ashtree Common and left little Robbie Hayden behind to be murdered?

  In a trance of relief and happiness soaking in a hot bath. Bruised breasts, bleeding nipples soothed by the hot bath. To calm her racing heart, her favorite medication in dark green plastic five-milligram capsules. Half hour, forty minutes as the bath water cools planning the surprise for Wes: a candlelit dinner, Hannah in a white summer dress with a pleated skirt, freshly bathed, hair brushed and shining.

  Love me. We can try. It isn’t too late. I will make up everything to you. I love you.

  A bottle of Tuscany wine near-identical to the wine Wes opened the other evening, Wes will have no way of knowing that this isn’t the very bottle he’d opened.

  Alive!

  The Hayden boy has been found—alive.

  The first of Babysitter’s eight victims to be found alive.

  On TV news, footage of a littered area behind a strip mall on Maple Road, Bloomfield Hills, where the abducted boy, missing since Monday, was discovered that afternoon bound and gagged and wrapped in a blanket, severely dehydrated.

  Cut to the facade of Beaumont Hospital, Birmingham, where the ten-year-old was brought by ambulance, is in critical condition.

  Cut to the WXYZ van outside the hospital, swarm of reporters pursuing the Haydens as they enter the hospital accompanied by uniformed Far Hills police officers—parents of the abducted boy ten-year-old Robbie Hayden, Jill and Brian Hayden of Far Hills, Michigan, arrive at the Beaumont Hospital in Birmingham.

  Cut to the facade of a stately Colonial house set some distance back from the road—Hayden residence, Ashtree Circle, Far Hills, Michigan.

  Hannah feels a moment’s vertigo, confusing the Haydens’ house with her own.

  Cut to parkland, a hiking trail amid tall trees—Ashtree Common believed to be the site of the abduction of Robbie Hayden this past Monday.

  Cut to a photo of an abashed-looking moist-eyed sand-colored spaniel—nine-year-old Lupa left behind when Robbie Hayden was abducted from Ashtree Common.

  Cut to photos of attractive couple Jill Hayden and Brian Hayden. Photo of Robbie Hayden looking younger than ten.

  Family photo of Jill Hayden and Brian Hayden on a beach with two children (Esme, Robbie) and spaniel Lupa, in a happier time.

  Cut to recent TV footage, the elder Haydens interviewed by a popular WXYZ broadcaster by the name of Trim Bangor, a Detroit personality usually associated with sports events. Hannah had not seen this hastily arranged and painful interview in which the parents of the missing boy desperately appeal to the phantom abductor to please release Robbie unharmed, and to anyone who might have information about the abduction, and to Robbie himself—We love you, honey! Please come home if you can, we are praying for you.

  Reward money of ten thousand dollars for information leading to the return of Robbie Hayden.

  Ghastly smile of Jill Hayden, clenched jaws of Brian Hayden trying to answer Trim Bangor’s questions as relentless as ping-pong.

  Cut to previous TV footage: trails in the woods at Ashtree Common, rescue workers and volunteers making their way through woods, fields, vacant lots.

  Cut to a WXYZ interviewer asking brisk pert questions of a grave-voiced Far Hills police captain.

  No, the 911 call can’t be traced—the caller hung up too quickly.

  Yes, there is a recording of the conversation but no, the caller’s voice isn’t clear.

  No, no indication where Robbie was confined for four and a half days.

  No, we have no “suspects” at the present time.

  Yes, we have been following all leads. Hundreds, thousands of “tips”—we take each one seriously.

  Yes, we are questioning “persons of interest.”

  No, we are not prepared to release any names yet.

  No, no other child of the eight abducted since February 1976 by the person or persons designated “Babysitter” has been found alive.

  No, we have no idea why Robbie Hayden was an exception.

  No, it is not believed that “race” is involved in any way.

  Not while the investigation is underway, those details will not be released to the media.

  Cut (again) to the littered area behind the strip mall. Close-up, behind a dumpster where the missing boy was found bound and gagged and wrapped in a blanket, severely dehydrated.

  Cut to store clerks, shoppers at the strip mall interviewed near the site—No, we didn’t see anything! Not a thing.

  Jarring cut to happily smiling faces, bicyclists, an advertisement for Coca-Cola.

  Wes switches to WJBK News where the sheriff of Oakland County is explaining to a very blond young woman interviewer that “details” of Robbie Hayden’s abduction and medical condition will not be released to the media for the foreseeable future.

  Yes, we will interview Robbie when we can of course. When he is able to speak to us.

  No, we have no idea why he was allowed to live. No idea where he was confined for four and a half days.

  Yes, such information may be released at a later date. But not while the investigation is underway.

  Jarring cut to happily smiling faces, beautiful tanned bodies in scanty swimwear running into the surf, advertisement for Camels.

  Wes mutes the volume and switches to another channel—another advertisement.

  Wes tells Hannah that the police always hold back information from the media. Details about the abductions, the killings. The condition of the children’s bodies. So that when they question a suspect they can check what the suspect seems to know against what they know. And if some crazy person tries to confess, for instance.

  “When they find Babysitter,” Wes says, “he will be the only person who knows certain facts. So police will know that they have the killer.”

  Hannah hesitates to question Wes who speaks with such authority but wonders: Is this true?

  The abductor could share his secrets with someone else, surely. A trusted friend. An accomplice.

  “There’s the privacy factor, too. Whatever was done to that poor kid. You wouldn’t want the public to know. Things I’ve heard, I wouldn’t tell you, Hannah. About the other kids he’d murdered—their bodies … We have a sick sick monster here, it’s all of us in the ‘suburbs’ he’s targeting. Don’t tell me.”