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critical condition.”
    Diana’s face crumpled and Tyler’s voice softened. “You’re exhausted, you’re frightened, and you’ve had a hell of a shock. You’ve already fainted. Unless you want to end up in the hospital, too, you’ll go home. You’re in no shape to hang around here and neither is Mrs. Hanson.
Especially
Mrs. Hanson. The fire burned a large hole in her roof and destroyed part of the kitchen and living roomwall. Also, embers might be smoldering beneath some of the roofing and they could set another fire.”
    “Oh, no,” Diana moaned.
    “Oh, yes. That lady can’t stay in her house tonight. Does she have any place else to go?”
    “I don’t know. I’ve barely met her.” She paused. “I live in Ritter Park,” she said, referring to the seventy-acre park stretching along the Southeast Area and up into the Southeast Hills of Huntington. “She could come home with me.”
    “Ritter Park, eh? The ritzy neighborhood. I should have known.”
    “The house belongs to my great-uncle,” Diana said irritably. “I don’t own it—I’m just a boarder for a while. Anyway, the house is large. There’s plenty of room for guests.”
    “Fine. I know the area. Just direct me to the house.”
    “Mr. Raines, I know how to drive.”
    “I told you before that my name is Tyler, and I’m sure you’re usually a first-rate driver, but not tonight. Now let’s go tell Mrs. Hanson she’s having a sleepover with her new best friend.”
    A few minutes later, they informed Mrs. Hanson that Penny was alive. “How badly hurt is she?” the woman asked. “She must have gotten burned.”
    “We don’t know any details,” Tyler said quickly, then, before she could ask more questions, he told her she would be spending the night at Diana’s house. Mrs. Hanson widened her eyes and shook her head vehemently. “I can’t just desert my home. Someone could break in!”
    Tyler spoke to her gently and patiently. “Mrs. Hanson, firefighters and probably the police will be here most of the night. You see, they haven’t found the little girl yet.”
    Mrs. Hanson’s slender, thin-skinned hand flew to her throat in distress. “They haven’t found Willow? I just assumed . . .”
    Mrs. Hanson seemed to drift away from them for a moment. Diana and Tyler exchanged looks over the woman’s head.
She can’t bear this tragedy
, Diana thought.
Maybeshe’s going to have a heart attack. Maybe we should take her to the hospital
.
    Abruptly, Mrs. Hanson interrupted Diana’s thoughts with a crisp voice. “I thought of this when both of you were at the house, then I forgot about it when you came back with news of my house burning. I remember now, though.” The woman took a breath, concentrating. “Earlier, I glanced outside and I’m almost certain I saw Willow climbing out of her bedroom window. Penny had left Willow’s bedside lamp on. That’s how I could see her room.”
    “Willow climbed out of her window!” Diana was incredulous. “But she just had an operation.”
    “I know, but Penny told me they were doing some procedure that didn’t cause as much pain as the old-fashioned surgery. It also enables people to heal faster. I guess Willow felt all right.”
    “Where did she go?” Tyler asked urgently.
    “She went toward the backyard. Penny has no outside lights, so I only saw Willow for a moment because she was walking very fast. Almost running. Maybe she was going toward the woods. On this street, the woods border all of our backyards. I went back to my chair—my phone is on a little table beside my favorite chair—and I was calling Penny to tell her about seeing Willow, when . . . when . . .”
    The woman’s eyes filled with tears.
When the house burst into a ball of fire
, Diana thought. She reached out and patted Mrs. Hanson’s shoulder, frustrated that she couldn’t think of anything more comforting to do for the woman. “Don’t cry. It’s going to be all right.”
    “How can you possible say