WHEN the knock sounded on Madeline’s door, she started so badly that tea sloshed out of her cup and onto her book. She looked up from the couch, seeing the outline of someone behind the door curtain. She glanced down at her watch. It couldn’t be George. He wasn’t due back in town until later that day.

Her stomach went sour as she rose, trying to make out the shape behind the curtain: a woman.

The knock came again, but Madeline stood frozen in the middle of the tiny apartment. After a moment’s hesitation she sat back down, opening her book once more. Then the knocking started again. Incessant knocking.

“Madeline?” came a woman’s voice from the other side of the door. “Are you in there?”

Who the hell?

“Please, Madeline. It’s a matter of life and death. We need you.”

Need her? No one had ever needed her before. Avoided her at all costs, but not needed her.

“It’s my daughter. She’s missing.”

The book fell out of Madeline’s loose fingers. Slowly she rose to her feet, then walked numbly to the door. Pulling aside the little curtain, she saw Natalie Stevenson, a young mother who had often whispered about Madeline at the grocery store or in the line at the post office.

“Your mom told me where I could find you,” Natalie said through the glass.

“My mom?” A daze filled Madeline’s head. She didn’t realize her parents knew anything but her PO address.

“Please.” Natalie’s tearstained face was pitifully red and swollen.

Then Madeline felt herself opening the door though everything inside her screamed to just lower the curtain and walk away.

Ten minutes later, Madeline raced across a field behind the Stevensons’ house, clutching the last thing little Kate Stevenson had been known to touch; a small robot action figure. She tried not to stumble, speeding faster and faster as she leapt through the tall grass. Clearing her mind, she let the images come to her freely.