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her up in his strong arms.
    Sam-I-Am, he whispered, just as he had when she was little. He still looked the same—his face sooty up to his forehead, then pale white where his miner’s helmet had covered his head. He smelled of cold and metal, and she could feel his outrage—his desire to come into this room and smash the doctor’s head in, strangle Boyko like a rag doll. But he made no move to do that. Instead she simply felt his warmth around her as he whispered, It’s all up to you, Sam-I-Am . Now it’s all up to you.

Seven
    Miles away, Chase Buchanan lay in bed, reliving the call that had come this afternoon on Gudger’s precious and forbidden telephone.
    â€œChase?” Though the young female voice had been faint, his heart nearly stopped. It was Sam calling.
    â€œSam?” he’d cried. “Where are you?”
    She said something; he couldn’t hear it. Pressing the heavy black receiver to his ear, he turned. Gudger was banging on the glass panes of the door next to the fireplace, his face now contorted with rage instead of laughter. “That’s my private phone, you little asshole!” he shouted from the other side of the door. “Hang that up!”
    He ignored Gudger, listening as Sam’s words came sketchily over the old receiver. “Trouble … scared … Mama.”
    â€œWhat did you say?” He gripped the phone harder. “I can’t hear you!”
    â€œTell Mama … men … want … ”
    â€œWhat?” he cried. “What—”
    Then he heard no more. Rough fingers ripped the phone from his grasp as a hand pushed him so hard he fell down. “I told you never to answer this phone, you little bastard!” Gudger cried, his upper lip curling in a snarl.
    â€œBut it was my call,” he’d cried, tears streaming down his cheeks. “It was for me!”

    â€œAt least I didn’t tell him who it was,” he whispered now, staring at the cracks in his ceiling. He’d barely been able to stand it until his mother came home; then when she walked in the kitchen door, his head began to swim with doubts about what he’d heard. The voice had sounded like Sam, but why had she called Gudger’s landline? If she were in trouble, why not call 911? Or even his mother, at work? That made him think maybe it wasn’t Sam—maybe it was just someone playing a trick. But who would do that? One of those snotty high school girls who used to call Sam the Coal Miner’s Daughter? Or somebody from his class, Ms. Norman’s fifth grade? He tried to figure out who it might have been, but he couldn’t come up with anybody. He and Sam were new to their school, uncool outsiders from West Virginia. They weren’t important enough for anybody to play a trick on. He turned over, crumpling his pillow. As he did, it occurred to him that maybe Gudger had hired someone who sounded like Sam to call. But why? To raise his hopes? To see if he would tell his mother? To drive them both crazy? Gudger was mean enough to do that, but Gudger was also cheap. He’d never pay someone to make a fake phone call.
    â€œNo,” he told himself aloud. “It was Sam—I know it was. The landline must have been the only number she could remember.”
    But where was she? What had happened to her? Why hadn’t she called back? He got up from bed and turned to look out the window. The blue plastic shards of their ruined pool glowed in the patio lights. In the shadows beyond stood the toolshed where he’d taken off his clothes. Behind the toolshed was the fence that enclosed Gudger’s property, and behind that, in Mrs. Carver’s yard, was his backpack with Mary Crow’s business card.
    Mary Crow would know what to do, he decided. She was the governor’s cop. She could trace the number, find out where Sam was calling from. But why had he put the card in his backpack, instead of his pocket,