'I bet she feeds you, doesn't she?' I said to him as I got out the key.

He stood with his front paws up, as if protesting something.

'Well, I don't have a thing except memories of a pretzel,' I said. 'I'm really very sorry.' I paused as he hopped a little closer. 'And if you're rabid I'll have to shoot you.'

I went inside, disappointed there was no burglar alarm.

'Too bad,' I said, but I wasn't going to move.

I locked the door and turned the dead bolt. No one knew I was here. I should be fine. Anna had been coming to Hilton Head for years and saw no need for a security system. Gault was in New York and I did not see how he could have followed me. I walked into the living room, with its rustic wood and windows from floor to sky. Hardwood was covered in a bright Indian rug, and furniture was bleached mahogany upholstered in practical fabrics in lovely bright shades.

I wandered from room to room, getting hungrier as the ocean turned to molten lead and a determined army of dark clouds marched in from the north. A long boardwalk led from the house, over dunes, and I carried coffee to its end. I watched people walking and riding bicycles, and an occasional jogger. Sand was hard and gray, and squadrons of brown pelicans flew in formation as if mounting an air attack on a country of unfriendly fish or perhaps the weather.

A porpoise surfaced as men drove golf balls into the sea, and then a small boy's Styrofoam surfboard blew out of his hands. It cartwheeled across the beach while he madly ran. I watched the chase for a quarter of a mile, until his prize tumbled through sea oats up my dune and leapt over my fence. I ran down steps and grabbed it before the wind could abduct it again, and the boy's gait faltered as he watched me watching him.

He could not have been older than eight or nine, dressed in jeans and sweatshirt. Down the beach his mother was trying to catch up with him.

'May I have my surfboard, please?' he said, staring at the sand.

'Would you like me to help you get it back to your mother?' I asked kindly. 'In this wind it will be hard for one person to carry.'

'No, thank you,' he shyly mumbled with outstretched hands.

I felt rejected as I stood on Anna's boardwalk, watching him fight the wind. He finally flattened the surfboard against himself like an ironing board and trudged across damp sand. I watched him with his mother until they were scratches on a horizon I eventually could not see. I tried to imagine where they went. Was it a hotel or a house? Where did little boys and mothers stay on stormy nights out here?

I had not taken one vacation when I was growing up because we had no money, and now I had no children. I thought of Wesley and wanted to call him as I listened to the loud wash of surf rushing to shore. Stars showed through cloudy veils and voices carried on the wind and I could not decipher a word. I may as well have been hearing frogs scream or birds crying. I carried my empty coffee cup inside and did not feel afraid for once.

It occurred to me that there was probably nothing to eat in this house and all I'd had today was that pretzel.

'Thank you, Anna,' I said when I found a stack of Lean Cuisines.

I heated turkey and mixed vegetables, turned on the gas fire and fell asleep on a white couch, my Browning not too far away. I was too tired to dream. The sun and I rose together, and the reality of my mission did not seem real until I spied my briefcase and thought about what was in it.