Firestarter(76)

He put the suitcases down and picked her up and hugged her. She kissed his cheek and then hugged him again, very tightly. "Are you ready?" he asked, setting her down. "I guess so," Charlie said. She was close to tears again. "Daddy... I won't make fires. Not even if they come before we can get away."

"Yes," he said. "That's all right, Charlie. I understand that."

"I love you, Dad."

He nodded. "I love you too, kiddo."

Andy went to the door and opened it. For a moment the sunlight was so bright that he could see nothing at all. Then his pupils contracted and the day cleared before him, bright with melting snow. To his right was Tashmore Pond, dazzling, jaggedly irregular patches of blue water showing between the floating chunks of ice. Straight ahead were pine woods. Through them he could barely see the green shingled roof of the next camp, free of snow at last.

The woods were still, and Andy's feeling of disquiet intensified. Where was the birdsong that had greeted their mornings ever since the winter temperatures had begun to moderate? There was none today... only the drip of snow melting from the branches. He found himself wishing desperately that Granther had put in a phone out here. He had to restrain an urge to shout Who's there? at the top of his lungs. But that would only frighten Charlie more.

"Looks fine," he said. "I think we're still ahead of them... if they're coming at all." "That's good," she said colorlessly. "Let's hit the road, kid," Andy said, and thought for the hundredth time, What else is there to do? and thought again how much he hated them.

Charlie came across the room to him, past the drainer full of dishes they had washed that morning after breakfast. The entire cottage was the way they had found it, spick-and-span. Granther would have been pleased.

Andy slipped an arm around Charlie's shoulders and gave her one more brief hug. Then he picked up the suitcases and they stepped out into the early spring sunshine together.

4

John Rainbird was halfway up a tall spruce one hundred and fifty yards away. He was wearing lineman's spikes on his feet and a lineman's belt held him firmly against the trunk of the tree. When the cabin door opened, he threw the rifle to his shoulder and seated it firmly. Total calm fell over him in a reassuring cloak. Everything became startlingly clear in front of his one good eye. When he lost his other eye, he had suffered a blurring of his depth of perception, but at moments of extreme concentration, like this one, his old, clear seeing came back to him; it was as if the ruined eye could regenerate itself for brief periods.

It was not a long shot, and he would not have wasted a moment's worry if it had been a bullet he was planning to put through the girl's neck-but he was dealing with something far more clumsy, something that jumped the risk element by a factor of ten. Fixed inside the barrel of this specially modified rifle was a dart tipped with an ampul of Orasin, and at this distance there was always a chance it might tumble or veer. Luckily, the day was almost without wind.

If it is the will of the Great Spirit and of my ancestors, Rainbird prayed silently, guide my hands and my eye that the shot may be true.

The girl came out with her father by her side Jules was in it, then. Through the telescopic sight the girl looked as big as a barn door. The parka was a bright blue blaze against the weathered boards of the cabin. Rainbird had a moment to note the suitcases in McGee's hands, to realize they were just in time after all.

The girl's hood was down, the tab of her zipper pulled up only to her breastbone, so that the coat spread open slightly at the throat. The day was warm, and that was in his favor, too.

He tightened down on the trigger and sighted the crosshairs on the base of her throat.

If it is the will-

He squeezed the trigger. There was no explosion, only a hollow phut! and a small curl of smoke from the rifle's breech.

5

They were on the edge of the steps when Charlie suddenly stopped and made a strangled swallowing noise. Andy dropped the suitcases immediately. He had heard nothing, but something was terribly wrong. Something about Charlie had changed.

"Charlie? Charlie?"

He stared at her. She stood as still as a statue, incredibly beautiful against the bright snowfield. Incredibly small. And suddenly he realized what the change was. It was so fundamental, so awful, that he had not been able to grasp it at first.

What appeared to be a long needle was sticking out of Charlie's throat just below the Adam's apple. Her mittened hand groped for it, found it, twisted it to a new and grotesque, upward-jutting angle. A thin trickle of blood began to flow from the wound and down the side of her throat. A flower of blood, small and delicate, stained the collar of her shirt and just touched the edging of fake fur that bordered the zipper of her parka.

"Charlie!" he screamed. He leaped forward and grabbed her arm just as her eyes rolled up and she pitched outward. He let her down to the porch, crying her name over and over. The dart in her throat twinkled brightly in the sun. Her body had the loose, boneless feel of a dead thing. He held her, cradled her, and looked out at the sunshiny woods that seemed so empty-and where no birds sang.

"Who did it?" he screamed. "Who did it? Come out where 1 can see you!"

Don Jules stepped around the corner of the porch. He was wearing Adidas tennis sneakers. He held the.22 in one hand.

"Who shot my daughter?" Andy screamed. Something in his throat vibrated painfully with the force of his scream. He held her to him, so terribly loose and boneless inside her warm blue parka. His fingers went to the dart and pulled it out, starting a fresh trickle of blood.