"She's been through a lot," Bishop said.

Quentin didn't bother to say that it wouldn't have made much difference in how she reacted to him. Instead, he glanced at Belinda's drowsy face and lowered his voice to say, "You heard her all the way up there; I assume you can hear her now. What happened to her?"

"She doesn't remember." Bishop's voice was low as well.

"What, nothing?"

"Nothing after waking up this morning. She doesn't remember the earlier ride with her father or the beginning of the picnic." Bishop paused, then added, "Not so uncommon after a head in-jury."

"No, but... how did she get that injury? And how the hell did she travel miles across a valley and up into the mountains in hardly more than a couple of hours?"

"I don't know."

"No hoofprints around that old shack, except for those our horses made. No tire tracks. Hell, no footprints that I saw — not even hers."

"Yeah, I noticed that."

Since they had nearly reached The Lodge, Quentin dropped the subject for the time being. But after Belinda had been safely returned to her overjoyed parents and all the questions and exclamations and thanks had been dealt with — with amazing discretion and creative evasiveness on Bishop's part — he brought it up again.

The two men sat at a fairly isolated table in a shady section of one of the verandas with a couple of cold beers — compliments of The Lodge.

"You noticed there were no footprints up there. I think we both believe she couldn't have gotten all that way on her own. So what do you think happened to Belinda?"

"I don't know. Without evidence of any kind, there's no way to know."

"I'm not asking what you know. I'm asking what you think. What you feel. I saw your face when we got to that old shack up there, and it didn't take a telepath to know you were picking up something you didn't like."