She watches until he has disappeared around the side of the house. Then the cat bounds down the porch steps and sets off after him.
The next morning, she tells herself she didn’t do anything wrong. If she confessed it all to Fletcher, he’d only praise her for being sociable. It isn’t true, though. He wouldn’t be glad to know about her holding George Ray’s face, feeling his cheekbones, and taking in those sad eyes. For that matter, what did George Ray think of it? During breakfast, she sits by the window watching the lawn. When she spots him, she hurries out to ask if he’ll be eating dinner in the house tonight, trying to make it sound like an everyday, ordinary question. He answers that he will be and he seems relaxed, but it doesn’t stop her worrying.
She calls the doctor’s office at nine, only to be told by the secretary that the results still aren’t in; there’s been a problem at the lab. Probably they won’t need a retest, but it could take another week. “So why are you telling people I’m pregnant?” Maggie wants to ask, but she can’t bring herself to do it. When she steps on the bathroom scales, they say she’s gained another pound.
She spends the morning in the garden among the pumpkins, less because they need tending than for the sake of a distraction. Her hands and knees grow slick with muck, while her feet bang around in her rubber boots until they blister and the blisters pop. For a long time she watches the bird feeder near the house, which has become an airport for chickadees, each one winging in and pecking for its seed before bursting away to eat in a private place. There’s a desire to record them that she regrets, because such wishes take her back to the box of Super 8 equipment sitting someplace in Boston.
No sign of George Ray. Perhaps last night was too much for him and he’s left for good—except he has no car and presumably no money, so until Morgan Sugar pays for his ticket home next month, he might as well be a captive here. And what of her? The camper van is Fletcher’s, and the money in the bank is mostly his. Next week October will arrive and he’ll return. He’ll help her harvest the pumpkins, which should bring them some cash, and he’ll be impressed by how little she has spent since he left. By that point she’ll have heard from her father, too.
She thinks she hears the phone ringing. As she runs toward the farmhouse, the popped blisters make her wince. Then the ringing stops.
Maybe Lenka’s right. Maybe she should have an abortion.
Yia Pao and Gordon lay huddled on the ground with Xang between them, besieged by rain. They have covered themselves with banana leaves, but all three are shivering. Yia Pao gives loud, hacking coughs, and every few seconds Xang whimpers.
“Can you sleep?” asks Gordon. Yia Pao says he can’t. “Neither can I. Let’s keep going.”
They continue on through knee-high mud. After a few miles Yia Pao takes off his boots to inspect his feet. They’re covered with bruises and pus-filled pockets of infection. Gordon raises his pant leg and finds half a dozen leeches fixed to his calf. When he tries to pull one off, the body elongates, then snaps, while the mouth remains dug into his flesh and blood streams from the wound. Yia Pao gestures for him to keep moving.
They hear the river before they see it. The water runs high and coffee brown through a narrow gorge, the banks rocky on both sides. At the edge, they fall on their knees to drink, Xang crying on the ground behind them. Then Yia Pao scoops water into his palms and brings it to his son’s mouth.
“If we can get to the other side, they’ll have a hard time tracking us,” says Yia Pao. But the river is too deep and quick to ford, so for a mile they follow it downstream until the track dead-ends. The water is calmer here, and someone has strung a thick rope from one bank to the other. Still, the current looks powerful.
Gordon offers to carry the baby across. He points out that he’s taller than Yia Pao and in better health, but Yia Pao insists that he’s the father and will take responsibility. Finally Gordon relents and starts for the other side. The rope is slimy, and he gasps that the water is freezing. A few feet out, it paralyzes him. Yia Pao has to urge him onward.
In the middle, he stumbles and loses his footing. His head submerges; the noise of the world is reduced to an underwater roar. When he comes up sputtering, Yia Pao shouts to him from the bank, and he calls back that he’s all right, clinging to the rope in the same way the leech stayed fastened to his skin.
After dragging himself onto the far shore, he looks back and sees Yia Pao is already more than halfway across, the water up to his chest, holding Xang with one arm while hooking the rope with the other. It seems he’ll manage it on his own, but as he draws near he gives a shout, and Gordon rushes back into the water. He tries to reach for the baby while still grasping the rope. Yia Pao tips forward and pushes Xang into Gordon’s chest. The force sends Gordon underwater once more. When he comes back up, he’s holding on to the rope and infant at once. But Yia Pao is gone.
Gordon turns to see him being swept down the canyon by the current. Yia Pao’s head bobs and disappears, resurfaces. The river pins him against a rock, and Gordon can see his scrunched eyes as the water pounds him. Then he’s sucked back into the water and carried away.
On the bank, Gordon struggles for air even as he checks the silent baby. Xang is breathing but stupefied, too sickly to complain about his near drowning. He only stares into the treetops as if he has been waiting a long time for a decision to be made about his fate and is resigned to waiting for a long time still.
Gathering himself, Gordon discovers there’s no path on this side of the river either. The bank on which he sits is crowded by jungle. He couldn’t chase after Yia Pao even if he had the strength.
He sits until the mosquitoes begin to circle and he has to shoo them from Xang’s face. Finally he rises and starts into the jungle with the little boy in his arms.
When Maggie walks out to check the mail that afternoon, she sees an unfamiliar object at the end of the driveway: a placard not more than two feet across held up by thin metal poles. The sight of it sets her stomach grinding, but the sign is oriented toward the road, so she has to wait until the last moment before the words become plain.
FOR SALE.
The bastard. He didn’t even warn her.
To make sure it isn’t an error, she phones the realtor listed on the sign. Then she calls Fletcher at his parents’ house. It’s his father’s doing, it must be. If the man answers, she doesn’t know what she’ll say to him. But it’s Fletcher who picks up.
“How are you?” he asks. The line whispers overtop of silence. “What is it? Are you all right?” She hates the way he says it. He’s never coming back, she can tell just from his tone.
“Somebody put a For Sale sign out front today.” On the other end there’s an exclamation of surprise. “You didn’t know?”
“It must be a mistake.” He sounds genuinely upset. A month ago she would have taken him at his word. “I’ll talk to Dad. We’ll get it sorted out.”
“Why don’t you let me speak with him?”
“You mean right now? I don’t think he’s here.” He says it too hastily.
“You knew about this, didn’t you? Or was it your idea?”
“Really, he didn’t say anything.” He clears his throat before continuing. “All he told me was that if I couldn’t show him a viable plan, he wouldn’t be able to defend continued ownership.”
She hates the way he lapses into his father’s business-talk. “So you showed him a plan?”
“First I wanted to talk with you. I don’t know whether things are feasible.”
She hates words like “feasible.” He doesn’t call unless she badgers him. He lets her live on his father’s money to salve his conscience while he lounges in Boston, and all because he was crazy enough to think she’d be turned on by that film.