dizzy." When he discovel! the gauze that had pulled away from the cut onhis-forehead, he gaped at the small spots of blood on the tips of his fingers.

"What the A Killer Smile A Killer Smile hell happened to me?" He glared at Ellen as if she was the source of his pain.

She stiffened under the heat of his harsh stare.

"Don't look at reel All I did was find you."

"C'mon, you," ve got to know what hap"-- Jack started to stand, but he

aled and lowered himlf back to' the bed. He leaned forward and covered his face, failing to hide his grimace from her. Eventually he shifted upright, staring at the red blotch in the palm of one hand.

Ellen knelt beside him, trying to banish her own fears and force her

voice to sound soothing and calm.

"It's just a little blood. You'll be fine." She wondered if he noticed the uncertainty in her words.

He seemed to push back whatever memories the s'ht of blood evoked and

tried to grin at her.

"Yeah. Just a little blood." The pasty mile made a mockery of his strong face.

"Funny ... I don't remember doing this. Falling or whatever."

Ellen tried to give him a mssuring look, but found the - tremor which shook his body to be disconcerting. Using her fingertips, she gently

pressed the gauze bandage back in place. She reached over and trieved his thermal shirt from the floor.

"You need to put this on before you get cold;" Stretching the neck

opening, she guided it over his head, careful of his injmy, then helped

him into the uncooperative sleeves.

"Better?" she asked as she smoothed the material over his muscular shoulders.

"Uh-huh ..." Jack focused on her arm, and anxiety invaded his expression. He looped the fingers of one hand around her wrist and used the other hand to pull back the loose flaps of her sleeve. He stared at the ugly discoloration that extended fwm her wrist to elbow. A dark wariness shadowed his words.

"Did I do this?"

"Not really," she lied.

"Did it happen when I fell on you?"

Ellen pulled her arm away from him, tugging at the sleeve to cover the

bruise.

"No, not at all."

His penetrating stare tore through her.

"I bet I did it to you sometime list night, right?"

" She turned her head so she didn't have to see his clouded expressionof regret.

"Yes--but you were delirious." Ellen busied herself with the quilt,straightening the material as she continued.

"You didn't know What you were doing."

Jack released a weary sigh, "Sorry," he w in a hoarse voice, lowering his lcad to the pillow.

Something in her hastened to assure him.

"It's okay." She pulled the quilt over him, tucking it around his chest.

"I'll make us some tea.

How does that sound?"

"Good, I guess." He gripped the edge of the blanket and closed his eyes.

Ellen returned with two mugs of tea, hers strong and plain, his weak and sugary.

"Jack?" she prompted He responded with a soft snore.

"Oh, well ..."

She filled the hours with mundane tasks, trying to recapture the normalrhythm bf her day. What little momentum she-achieved ground to a haltevery time she glanced over and spotted the figure in her bed.

Her sleeping guest represented an intrusion into a very private world.In some ways she resented his presence. Four years was a long time toisolate oneself from a bustling world, and she'd gotten used to thesolitude.

Yet she still wondered how things had changed in her absence. The briefperiods of clear radio reception served only to provide her with thebasics and whet her appetite for more. She knew who the president was.She knew A Killer Smile A Killer Smile about the Persian Gulf crisis,the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the earthquake in California, theravaging floods.

It was the everyday things she'd taken for granted and, subsequently,missed the mst. Several weeks earlier she had stumbled onto a forgottencache, an old purse con- tining her expired driver's license. Ellenwondered if she could even remember how to drive.

Her only contact with the rest of the world came through an old familyfriend, George Pembroke, a forest ranger-who lived nearby. He maintainedthe fragile but necessary link to civilization she needed for survival.It was George who refused to take a fee for delve ring her suppliesevery month.

He was the one who negotiated the agreement with the greeting cardcompany for her artwork.

Perhaps a lesser man might not have been so honest. But George Pembroke,an old friend of her father's, couldn't conceivably he descnxt as alesser man.

A man of great stature and even greater character, he dutifully, eventhusiasticaily, reported back each month on the popularity of her work,delivering an account stalmnent each quarl, showing a healthy andincreasing savings baia nd like a sttrrogal father he continued tobadger her about letting him take some of her manuscripts, having themtranscribed and submitting them to a publisher. He always seemed to havefaith in her even when hers lagged. She'd flu ally broken down andallowed him to one handwri . tn manuscript as a lst case.

She expected nothing; George expected evevithing. He was her lifeline,her staunch supporter, her friend. And if she intended to keep the finkalive, she needed to get some work done.

Ellen tried to sit down and sketch, but her bruised arm made her finemotor movements erratic. It didn't matter; what she really warnxi to dowas write. Artwork might pay the bills, but it was her daily quota ofwords that kept her mind active, alive, functioning. She pulled out hercurrent project and stared at it.

The words refused to come.

She sharpened her pencil.

She stared out the window at the fog of snow and ice. She reread thescene where she'd left off. The characters began to Sake hold of herimagination.

To whisper. To move Ellen started writing.

JACK WATCHED HER.

She was either brave or foolish to turn' her back on him. He didn't know which. Of course, he didn't know a lot of things at the moment. like his own name.

Yet, when she called him Jack it did have a familiar ring to it. ButJack who? From where? He stared past her and to the window, where thesnow obscured the trees, the mountains, the horizon. Stuck in the middleof a storm. in the mid die of nowhere. What a life.

Whose life? he asked himself, hoping for a prompt answer from hissubconscious. The inner man remained silent. He drew a deep breath thatmade his head throb.

"You knocked the sense right out of you, didn'cha, boy?" He heard thevoice as dearly as if it were. his own.

But it wasn't his. It belonged to a man, an older man. His father?

Jack probed his mind, searching for some clue to the voice's identity,some clue to his own identity. All he found were mental cobwebs.

He glanced again at Ellen, who seemed anything but absorbed in her work.She fidgeted, fiddled and squirmed, spending more time eras' rag thanwriting.

He wished she'd A Killer Smile turn around; he wanted a better look ather face. But from his position, all he could really see was her longbraid of hair, which danced against her back whenever she got into anerasing frenzy.

At the moment, he knew very little about Ellen Coster except that shehad long hair, she lived in the middle of nowhere and she had a verynice voice.

And a pretty smile.

And was too trusting.

He closed his eyes. Entirely too trusting.

ELLM PUSHED AWAY from the table and drew in a sharp breath at the twingeof pain that traveled to her shoulder. Maybe later.

Hermitt kicked his bowl across the room, signifying the approachingmealtime.

Ellen relaxed as she fell into some semblance of a daily routine. Aftershe fed her dog, she toyed with her own supper, wishing Jack were awakeso she could ask him about the world beyond her mountain. Then theabsurdity of her thought struck her. What does a man with no memory knowabout current events?

After cleaning her dishes, Ellen shoved another log in the fhlace andknelt on the hearth. She tried to warm her cold hands alternately abovethe heat of the flames and against the radiant warmth of her hot mugHermitt grunted a lazy warning, and she slapped the dog affectionatelyon the rump.

"Move over, you beast. Your fur'll start smoking if you get any closerto the fire." She sat down next to the Lab and sipped her tea. The stonemade a cold and unyielding seat beneath her, but she ignored thediscomfort, trying to bask in the warmth of the flames as well as fightsleep.

Sleep meant dreams, and nnlike her written stories, dreams veered offinto uncontrollable areas, taking her' A Killer Smile uncomfortableplaces where, many times, she didn't wish to go. She stifled a yawn.

Sleep? Right. Where? She glanced at her bed and its occupant. Inchingcloser to the fire, she soaked in as much heat as she could beforecharging across the cabin and retrieving her sleeping bag from thestorage shelves.

She spread the bag out beside the hearth, praying it would warm quickly.

After changing into her nightgown, she slipped into the sleeping bag,convinced it hadn't benefited at all from the proximity to the flames.As she set fled into her makeshift bed, Ellen made a fragile resolution.

I just won't go to sleep.

She stared into the flames, her eyes growing heavy. No sleep. No dreams.

A downdraft of wind forced a small puff of smoke into the room. Nofears.

Chapter Three.

A cloud of smoke hung over the bar.

f'what'll ya have?" the barmaid mumbled without disturbing the inch-long ash from the cigarette welded to her lip.

I tried not to cough.