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Juniper’s heart thrashed.
    Suddenly security was at the gates, pushing the crowd back. But it wasn’t for Juniper’s sake. Mr. and Mrs. Berry’s car was coming through.
    As the black Bentley wheeled past the gates, the roar of the crowd grew. Their hands slapped at the tinted windows. “Who’s in there?” they shouted. “Which one is it?” Then, as if in response, Mrs. Berry’s hand emerged from a crack in the rear window and waved. “I love you! I love you!” the crowd shrieked, loud enough for Juniper to hear all the way on the roof. One fan jumped on the hood of the car and had to be forcefully removed. Some were actually crying. “You’re the best!” “Stop, please!” More pounding of palms against the windows and doors. Hands extended markers to sign their pictures and T-shirts, cameras clicked away madly.
    Finally, the car drove off, the gates closing automatically behind the chaos.
    â€œI don’t understand any of this.” Juniper had seen enough. It was time to find Giles.
    By the time she crept back through the attic window, walked down two flights of stairs and out the back door, Giles was sitting on a tree stump watching the ax man chop some more firewood on the far side of the yard. Giles looked to be in awe at the power of each swing, the crack of blade splitting wood with ease.
    â€œI was going to call you, but . . . look how fast he goes,” he said as Juniper approached, never shifting his eyes. “It’s like the ax is a part of him.” He grabbed at his own biceps and frowned.
    â€œThat’s Dmitri,” she told him, hands still grasping her binoculars although they were attached to a strap hanging about her neck. “He does a lot of work around here.”
    Hearing his name, Dmitri stopped, looked over, and waved. He was a big man with a large dark beard speckled with gray, brown, and orange, and massive arms and shoulders. After wiping his brow, he spat on the ground, dug his heels into the dirt, and went back to work.
    â€œDo you think we can talk to him? I’d like to be able to do that, become as big as him.” Giles turned to Juniper but kept glancing back at Dmitri.
    Juniper, however, had more engaging thoughts on her mind. She grabbed Giles by the arm, noticing that her hand could almost close entirely around it. “I’ve been thinking about what you said yesterday,” she told him. “Maybe you were right to follow your parents, maybe they’re up to something in the woods.”
    â€œYou think so?”
    Juniper thought of her parents’ strange behavior from the previous day and all the days leading up to it. “It’s possible.”
    â€œBut where did they disappear to?” Giles looked around, his hand displaying the sprawl of the woods. “It could be anywhere. We could search for days.”
    â€œTrue,” Juniper said, “but I have a place to start. Right before I saw you yesterday I was exploring the woods with Kitty. We were playing a game. She hides and I try to find her.”
    â€œLike hide-and-seek,” Giles said.
    Juniper looked blankly at him. Hide-and-seek sounded familiar, maybe, but she certainly never played it. No, she played Here, Kitty Kitty. “Well, I couldn’t find her for the longest time, and just when I came across a clearing, I heard her barking. Someone had been out there, but I never had a chance to inspect it because of Kitty. I went running and that led me to you.”
    â€œYou never went back to check it out?” Giles asked.
    Juniper shook her head. “But we can now. Together.”
    Without another word, for they were understandably quite eager, they made their way into the woods.
    It took some time for Juniper to remember where she had gone, but, searching for evidence of her steps with her magnifying glass, she eventually found the clearing.
    Nothing whatsoever grew within this curious