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the Duck River . But where it could have been picturesque and pretty, it was just sluggish and muddy brown. It looked unhealthy, like it was carrying disease. A half dozen rusted trailers — mobile homes in my new, professional lingo — were scattered through the spindly trees, and a few shacks squatted here and there among them. Clapboard shacks, low-slung and dilapidated, with leaking roofs and leaning walls. The few cars were American, old and rusted; some had missing parts or sat on cinderblocks, and none looked like they had been driven in the last few years. My immaculate Volvo — the only thing I had gotten in settlement after my short-lived marriage to Bradley Ferguson, aside from the chunk of change that was currently evaporating out of my savings account with every month that went by — was as out of place here as a prize brood mare among mules.
    I turned off the engine and got out. The slam of the car door sounded very loud in the silence. And it was very silent here. No birds singing, no children playing, no conversations or music. The brook didn’t even babble. Very quiet.
    Maybe too quiet, as they say in the movies. But I was here, so I looked around anyway. There were no names or numbers anywhere, or for that matter any mailboxes. Nothing to indicate in which of these depressing shacks LaDonna Collier had lived and died. If these people ever got mail, it must all arrive together in the big box up on the main road, and be distributed once someone had carried it all down here. Every place looked deserted, and just as neglected and derelict as the next. There was no sign of life, and no one I could ask directions of.
    Just for kicks, since I was here anyway, I made my way over to the nearest of the shacks and peered through its dirty window. The interior was empty, save for some debris on the floor. Wire-hangers, crumpled papers, roach motels. It didn’t look as if anyone had lived there for a while.
    Stepping carefully around broken bottles, crumpled beer cans and twigs, I moved to the next home. It was empty, too. Mother was right; people had been deserting the Bog like rats fleeing a sinking ship. There was nothing for me to do here but to go home. I turned on my heel to go back to the car, and stopped with a gasp.
    He had moved so quietly through the dry grass that I hadn’t heard him, and now he stood between me and the Volvo. For a second, with the sun in my eyes, all I could see was a tall, dark figure, and I recoiled.
    He didn’t move. Not when I stumbled back, not when the heel of my insensible shoe got caught in a snake hole, and not when I ended up on my derriere on the dusty ground, with my skirt twisted around my hips and my thighs on display. The only thing that moved was his eyes, from my face to my feet and back, with insolent appreciation.
    “Didn’t your mama teach you better manners?” I inquired coldly, in spite of my burning cheeks. The tiny smile on his lips transformed into a full fledged, dangerous grin.
    “Hell, no. My mama always said, grab what you can get, ‘cause it’ll be gone afore you know it.”
    He held out a hand. I hesitated, trying to remember whether anyone had ever said anything about Rafe Collier being in the habit of forcing himself on women.
    “Or you can stay there,” he added, pointedly. I took the hand and let him haul me to my feet. We stood contemplating one another in silence for a moment.
    “Are you following me?” I asked, finally.
    “Why’d I be following you ? This is my place.”
    “I thought you were in Nashville ,” I said.
    “I thought you were in Nashville .”
    “It’s my mother’s birthday. I came down for the party.”
    He didn’t answer. After a second I added, awkwardly, “I heard about what happened to your mother. I’m sorry.”
    “So you came to offer your condolences?” His voice was dry.
    I shrugged. It wasn’t as if I could tell him that I had come to the Bog out of idle curiosity, because I wondered if there might