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But finally she saw and understood what it was that the bear was actually questing for and saw that the entire train of thought concerning menstrual blood had been a dangerous exercise in self-absorption. The bear was coming for what bears always came for: garbage. The empty trays of the MREs. Owing to constraints imposed by the ankle chain and the surrounding wall of stacked brush, she had not been able to dispose of these in the Girl Scout–approved manner of bagging them and hanging them from a tree far from camp.

The animal sounded, seemed, as if he were only arm’s length from her, but she told herself that her fear was making the distance seem smaller than it was. She had one more MRE left. She peeled the lid back and shoved it in the direction of that snuffling and panting sound, then withdrew beneath the truck’s undercarriage.

On its tank treads the vehicle was jacked up absurdly high, its running boards at the altitude of Zula’s hip. She couldn’t stand up beneath it but she could easily squat on her haunches with her head projecting into the space between its driveshaft and its frame. The volume beneath it was not empty, but choked with undergrowth, a mixture of shrubs and small coniferous seedlings that had passed safely beneath the truck’s bumper as it eased into this position. These remained upright and undisturbed. So she was both hiding in undergrowth and taking shelter beneath a truck, which she hoped would suffice to keep her out of the bear’s clutches. She had the idea that it was a big one. But of course she would think that. Perhaps it was too bulky to want to cram itself underneath the truck; it would be satisfied with the easier pickings of the MRE that Zula had tossed in its direction. This it certainly seemed to be enjoying. She tried to think of what she would do if it crept under here to get her. Punch it in the nose? No, that was what you were supposed to do to a shark. Might not work on a bear. With bears you were supposed to make yourself look big. Don’t try to run away. The not running away part was taken care of. Making herself look big might be difficult. The chain on her ankle was a good twenty feet long. Less than half of it had been used to connect her ankle to the trailer hitch. The remainder just trailed on the ground. She began gathering it up, wrapping it around her left hand, turning it into a fat steel club. The weight of it threw her off balance, and she threw out her right hand to steady herself against the truck’s frame. She thought it would be all solid and strong, and for the most part it was; but something small and flimsy moved beneath her hand there.

She froze and made herself still. The bear was still making hugely satisfied smacking noises, getting the most out of that MRE. But a few moments later, it too became quiet and still, as though listening, wondering about something. Zula’s first thought was that she must have made some noise or that a shift in the breeze had betrayed her presence.

The bear went into movement, and she cringed, thinking it might be moving toward her; but it wasn’t. The light of the morning was coming in now through the wrecked screen of camouflage, and ducking down, using that hand on the frame to steady herself, Zula peered back between the truck’s rear treads to see its hind legs—only its hind legs—planted on the ground. It was standing up to sniff the air and to listen. It let out a kind of indignant barking sound, then dropped to all fours and sauntered away.

There was definitely something under Zula’s right hand. She explored it with her fingertips and found that she could pry it loose from its lodging against the frame. It was a little plastic box.

She let the chain spiral off her other hand, then crawled out from beneath the truck to where the light was better.

The little box was a hide-a-key, with a magnet on one side. She slid it open and found two keys linked together by a split ring. One of them looked like a spare ignition key for the truck. The other was much smaller and looked like it belonged to a padlock. She tried it on the lock that was holding the chain around her ankle, but it would not even slide into the keyhole; this was made for a different brand.

Her eyes went to the toolbox padlock that Jones had discarded on the ground yesterday.

Voices were approaching from down the slope. This was probably what the bear had been reacting to. Zula pocketed the keys, then retreated beneath the truck again and put the box back in its place against the frame.

It was Abdul-Wahaab and Sharif.

The open padlock had been half trodden into the ground. Zula pulled it out, dusted it off, and looked at it for a few moments. Then she hooked its hasp through the last link on the chain and snapped it shut.