Vanish

The man does not talk as he drives. At first I think he is merely ignoring us, that we are of no interest to him. Then I catch a glimpse of his eyes in the rearview mirror, and I realize he’s been studying me, studying both of us. In his silence, he’s as alert as a cat.

The lights of the service station glow ahead, and we pull into the driveway and stop beside the pump. The man gets out to fill his tank, then he says to us: “I’ll ask about the tow truck.” He walks into the building.

Olena and I remain in the car, uncertain of our next move. Through the window, we see our driver talking to the cashier. He points to us, and the cashier picks up a phone.

“He’s calling the police,” I whisper to Olena. “We should leave. We should run now.” I reach for the door and am about to push it open when a black car swings into the service station and pulls up right beside our car. Two men step out, both dressed in dark clothes. One of them has white-blond hair, cut short as a brush. They look at us.

In an instant, my blood freezes in my veins.

We are trapped animals in this stranger’s car, and two hunters have now surrounded us. The blond man stands right outside my door, gazing in at me, and I can only stare back through the window at the last face the Mother ever saw. The last face I will probably ever see.

Suddenly, the blond man’s chin snaps up and his gaze shifts to the building. I turn and see that our driver has just stepped outside, and is walking toward the car. He has paid for the gas, and he is stuffing his wallet back in his pocket. He slows down, frowning at the two men who now flank his car.

“Can I help you gentlemen?” our driver asks.

The blond man answers. “Sir, could we ask you a few questions?”

“Who are you?”

“I’m Special Agent Steve Ullman. Federal Bureau of Investigation.”

Our driver does not seem particularly impressed by this. He reaches into the service station bucket and picks up a squeegee. Wrings out the excess water and begins to wipe his dirty windshield. “What do you two fellows want to talk to me about?” he asks, scraping water from the glass.

The blond man leans in closer to our driver and speaks in a muted voice. I hear the words female fugitives and dangerous.

“So why are you talking to me?” the driver says.

“This is your car, right?”

“Yeah.” Our driver suddenly laughs. “Oh, now I get it. In case you’re wondering, that’s my wife and her cousin sitting in the car. They look real dangerous, don’t they?”

The blond man glances at his partner. A look of surprise. They don’t know what to say.

Our driver drops the squeegee back in the bucket, throwing up a splash. “Good luck, guys,” he says, and opens his car door. As he climbs in behind the wheel, he says loudly to Olena: “Sorry, honey. They didn’t have any Advil. We’ll have to try the next gas station.”

As we drive away, I glance back and see that the men are still staring after us. One of them is writing down the license number.

For a moment, no one in the car speaks. I am still too paralyzed by fear to say a word. I can only stare at the back of our driver’s head. The man who has just saved our lives.

Finally he says: “Are you going to tell me what that was all about?”

“They lied to you,” says Olena. “We are not dangerous!”

“And they’re not FBI.”

“You already know this?”

The man looks at her. “Look, I’m not stupid. I know the real deal when I see it. And I know when I’m getting bullshitted. So how about telling me the truth?”

Olena releases a weary sigh. In a whisper she says: “They want to kill us.”

“That much I figured out.” He shakes his head and laughs, but there is no humor in it. It’s the laugh of a man who ca

“Because of what we have seen tonight.”

“What did you see?”

She looks out the window. “Too much,” she murmurs. “We have seen too much.”

For the moment he lets that answer suffice, because we have just turned off the road. Our tires bump over a dirt track that takes us deep into woods. He stops the car in front of a ramshackle house surrounded by trees. It is little more than a rough-hewn cabin, something that only a poor man would live in. But on the roof is a giant satellite dish.

“This is your home?” Olena asks.

“It’s where I live,” is his odd answer.

He uses three different keys to open the front door. Standing on the porch, waiting for him to open his various locks, I notice that his windows all have bars. For a moment I hesitate to step inside because I think of the other house that we have just escaped. But these bars, I realize, are different; these are not to trap people in; they are meant to keep people out.

Inside I smell wood smoke and damp wool. He does not turn on any lights, but navigates across the dark room as though he knows every square inch of it blind. “It gets a little musty in here when I go away for a few days,” he says. He strikes a match, and I see that he is kneeling at a hearth. The bundle of kindling and logs are already waiting to be lit, and flames soon dance to life. The glow illuminates his face, which seems even more gaunt, more somber in this shadowy room. Once, I think, it might have been a handsome face, but the eyes are now too hollow, and his lean jaw has several days’ growth of dark stubble. As the fire brightens, I glance around at a small room made even smaller by tall piles of newspapers and magazines, by the dozens and dozens of news clippings he has tacked to the walls. They are everywhere, like yellowing scales, and I imagine him shut up in this lonely cabin, day after day, month after month, feverishly cutting out articles whose significance only he understands. I look around at the barred windows and remember the three locks on the front door. And I think: This is the home of a frightened man.

He goes to a cabinet and unlocks it. I am startled to see half a dozen rifles racked inside. He removes one and locks the cabinet again. At the sight of that gun in his hand, I retreat a step.

“It’s okay. Nothing to be scared of,” he says, seeing my alarmed face. “Tonight, I’d just like to keep a gun close at hand.”

We hear a bell-like chime.

The man’s head jerks up at the sound. Carrying his rifle, he moves to the window and peers out at the woods. “Something just tripped the sensor,” he says. “Could be just an animal. Then again…” He lingers at the window for a long time, his hand on his rifle. I remember the two men at the service station watching us drive away. Writing down our license number. By now, they must know who owns the car. They must know where he lives.

The man crosses to a stack of wood, picks up a fresh log, and drops it onto the fire. Then he settles into a rocking chair and sits looking at us, the rifle on his lap. Flames crackle, and sparks dance in the hearth.

“My name is Joe,” he says. “Tell me who you are.”

I look at Olena. Neither one of us says anything. Though this strange man has saved our lives tonight, we are still afraid of him.

“Look, you made the choice. You climbed in my car.” His chair creaks as it rocks on the wooden floor. “Now it’s too late to be coy, ladies,” he says. “The die has been cast.”

When I awaken, it is still not daylight, but the fire has burned down to mere embers. The last thing I recall, before falling asleep, were the voices of Olena and Joe, talking softly. Now, by the glow from the hearth, I can see Olena sleeping beside me on the braided rug. I am still angry at her, and have not forgiven her for the things she said. A few hours’ sleep has made the inevitable clear to me. We ca

The creak of the rocking chair draws my gaze; I see the faint gleam of Joe’s rifle, and feel him watching me. He has probably been watching us sleep for some time.