made so that you could survive. You let someone else do the killing. You're above even thinking about it. When I eat an animal, I have a fuller understanding. I don't do it casually. I don't depersonalize it."

"Okay," Myron said, "while we're on the subject, what about those hunters who don't kill for food?"

"Most do eat what they kill."

"But what about those who kill for sport? I mean, isn't that part of it?"

"Yes."

"So what about that? What about killing merely for sport?"

"As opposed to what, Myron? Killing for a pair of shoes? Or a nice coat? Is spending a full day outdoors, coming to understand how nature works and appreciating her bountiful glory, is that worth any less than a leather pocketbook? If it's worth killing an animal because you prefer your belt made of animal skin instead of something man-made, is it not worth killing one because you simply enjoy the thrill of it?"

He said nothing.

"I'm sorry to ride you about this. But the hypocrisy of it all drives me somewhat batty. Everyone wants to save the whale, but what about the thousands of fish and shrimp a whale eats each day? Are their lives worthless because they aren't as cute? Ever notice how no one ever wants to save ugly animals? And the same people who think hunting is barbaric put up special fences so the deer can't eat their precious gardens. So the deers overpopulate and die of starvation. Is that better? And don't even get me started on those so-called ecofeminists. Men hunt, they say, but women are too genteel. Of all the sexist nonsense. They want to be environmentalists? They want to stay as close to a state of nature as possible? Then understand the one universal truth about nature: You either kill or you die."

They both turned and stared at the deer for a moment. Proof positive.

"You didn't come here for a lecture," she said.

Myron had welcomed this delay. But the time had come. "No, ma'am."

"Ma'am?" Sophie Mayor chuckled without a hint of humor. "That sounds grim, Myron."

Myron turned and looked at her. She met his gaze and held it.

"Call me Sophie," she said.

He nodded. "Can I ask you a very personal, maybe hurtful question, Sophie?"

"You can try."

"Have you heard anything from your daughter since she ran away?"

"No."

The answer came fast. Her gaze remained steady, her voice strong. But her face was losing color.

"Then you have no idea where she is?"

"No idea."

"Or even if she's..."

"Alive or dead," she finished for him. "None."

Her voice was so monotone it seemed on the verge of a scream. There was a quaking near her mouth now, a fault line starting to give way. Sophie Mayor stood and waited for his explanation, afraid perhaps to say any more.

"I got a diskette in the mail," he began.

She frowned. "What?"

"A computer diskette. It came in the mail. I put it in my A drive, and it just started up. I didn't have to hit any keys."

"Self-starting program," she said, suddenly the computer expert. "That's not complicated technology."

Myron cleared his throat. "A graphic came on. It started out as a photograph of your daughter."

Sophie Mayor took a step back.

"It was the same photograph that's in your office. On the right side of the credenza."

"That was Lucy's junior year of high school," she said. "The school portrait."

Myron nodded, though he didn't know why. "After a few seconds her image started melting on the screen."

"Melting?"

"Yes. It sort of dissolved into a puddle of, uh, blood. Then a sound came on. A teenage girl laughing, I think."

Sophie Mayor's eyes were glistening now. "I don't understand."

"Neither do I."

"This came in the mail?"

"Yes."

"On a floppy disk?"

"Yes," Myron said. Then he added for no reason: "A three-and-a-half-inch floppy."

"When?"

"It arrived in my office about two weeks ago."

"Why did you wait so long to tell me?" She put a hand up. "Oh, wait. You were out of the country."

"Yes."

"So when did you first see it?"

"Yesterday."

"But you saw me this morning. Why didn't you tell me then?"

"I didn't know who the girl was. Not at first anyway. Then when I was in your office, I saw the photograph on the credenza. I got confused. I wasn't sure what to say."

She nodded slowly. "So that explains your abrupt departure."

"Yes. I'm sorry."

"Do you have the diskette? My people will analyze it."

He reached into his pocket and withdrew it. "I don't think it'll be any help."

"Why not?"

"I took it to a police lab. They said it automatically reformatted itself."

"So the diskette is blank?"

"Yes."

It was