Trisha slid off the fallen tree to the ground. The bark scraped against the wasp-stings on her hip, but she hardly noticed. Mosquitoes settled with immediate hungry intent on her bare back where her shirt and the tatters of the blue poncho had rucked up, but she didn't feel them. She gazed at the last held glimmerglow in the brook - fading tar-nished quicksilver - and sat on the damp ground with her fingers pressed to the sides of her mouth. Suddenly it seemed very important that Tom Gordon should preserve the one-run lead, that he should secure this victory against the mighty Yankees, who had lost a pair to Anaheim at the start of the season and had hardly lost since.
"Come on, Tom," she whispered. In a Castle View hotel room her mother was in an agony of terror; her father was on a Delta flight from Boston to Portland to join Quilla and his son; at the Castle County state police barracks, which had been designated Rally Point Patricia, search-parties very much like the ones the lost girl had imagined were coming back in after their first fruitless sallies; outside the barracks, newsvans from three TV stations in Portland and two in Portsmouth were parked; three dozen experienced woods-men (and some were accompanied by dogs) remained in the forests of Motton and the three unincorporated townships which stretched off toward New Hampshire's chimney: TR-90, TR-100, and TR-110. The consensus among those remaining in the woods was that Patricia McFarland must still be in Motton or TR-90. She was a little girl, after all, and likely hadn't wandered far from where she had last been seen. These experienced guides, game wardens, and Forest Service men would have been stunned to know that Trisha had gotten almost nine miles west of the area the searchers considered their highest priority.
"Come on, Tom," she whispered. "Come on, Tom, one two three, now. You know how it goes."
But not tonight. Gordon opened the top of the ninth by walking the handsome yet evil Yankee shortstop, Derek Jeter, and Trisha remembered something her father had once told her: when a team gets a lead-off walk, their chances of scoring rise by seventy percent.
If we win, if Tom gets the save, I'll be saved. This thought came to her suddenly - it was like a firework bursting in her head.
It was stupid, of course, as dopey as her father knocking on wood before a three-and-two pitch (which he did every time), but as the dark drew deeper and the brook gave up its final silver tarnish, it also seemed irrefutable, as obvious as two-and-two-makes-four: if Tom Gordon got the save, she would get the save.
Paul O'Neill popped up. One out. Bernie Williams came up. "Always a dangerous hitter," Joe Castiglione remarked, and Williams immediately ripped a single to center, sending Jeter to third.
"Why did you say that, Joe?" Trisha moaned. "Oh cripes, why did you have to say that?"
Runners on first and third, only one out. The Fenway crowd cheering, hoping. Trisha could imagine them leaning forward in their seats.
"Come on, Tom, come on, Tom," she whispered. The cloud of minges and noseeums were still all around her, but she no longer noticed. A feeling of despair touched her heart, cool and strong - it was like that hateful voice she had discovered in the middle of her head. The Yankees were too good. A base hit would tie it, a long ball would put it out of reach, and the awful, awful Tino Martinez was up, with the most dangerous hitter of all right behind him; the Straw Man would now be down on one knee in the on-deck circle, swinging a bat and watching.
Gordon worked the count on Martinez to two and two, then threw his curveball. "Struck him out!" Joe Castiglione shouted. It was as if he couldn't believe it. "Aw, man, that was a beauty! Martinez must have missed it by a foot!"
"Tw o feet," Troop added helpfully.
"So it all comes to this," Joe said, and behind his voice Trisha could hear the volume of the other voices, the fan voices, begin to rise. The rhythmic clapping started. The Fenway Faithful were getting to their feet like a church con-gregation about to sing a hymn. "Two on, two out, Red Sox clinging to a one-run lead, Tom Gordon on the mound, and - "
"Don't you say it," Trisha whispered, her hands still press-ing against the sides of her mouth, "don't you dare say it!"
But he did. "And the always dangerous Darryl Straw-berry coming to the plate."
That was it; game over; great Satan Joe Castiglione had opened his mouth and jinxed it. Why couldn't he just have given Strawberry's name? Why did he have to start in with that "always dangerous" horsepucky when any fool knew that only made them dangerous?
"All right, everybody, fasten your seatbelts," Joe said.
"Strawberry cocks the bat. Jeter's dancing around third, try-ing to draw a throw or at least some attention from Gordon.
He gets neither. Gordon looks in. Veritek flashes the sign. To the set. Gordon throws... Strawberry swings and misses, strike one. Strawberry shakes his head as if he's disgusted..."
"Shouldn't be disgusted, that was a pretty good pitch,"
Troop remarked, and Trisha, sitting in the dark bugblown armpit of nowhere, thought, Shut up, Troop, just shut up for a minute.
"Straw steps out... taps his cleats... now he's back in.
Gordon with the look to Williams on first... to the set...
he pitches. Outside and low."
Trisha moaned. The tips of her fingers were now so deeply pressed into her cheeks that her lips were pulled up in a strange distraught smile. Her heart was hammering in her chest.
"Here we go again," Joe said. "Gordon's ready. He fires, Strawberry swings, and it's a long high drive to right field, if it stays fair it's gone, but it's drifting... it's drifting...