The Target

wanted to ask her what she was thinking, what she was feeling, but she was afraid that she wouldn't say the right thing if Emma were to tell her something awful. Instead, she said, her voice bright and warm with the overwhelming love she felt for her daughter, "We've got sun today, kiddo. What do you say we go to Bunratty Castle? Maybe have a picnic on the grounds? Since it was raining the other day when we went, you just got to spend ten minutes there. Ramsey says it's a great place to visit, when the sun's out."

    Emma grinned every time someone mentioned Bunratty Castle, just west of Limerick, where William Penn had been born in 1644, and where his father, Admiral Penn, had surrendered in the civil war and sailed off to America. Ah, and that had led to stories of the Quakers in Pennsylvania, a good half dozen that Ramsey had been told growing up near Harrisburg.

    Emma wiped her hands on her jeans as she said to Molly, "I'd like to climb all those steps. Maybe I'll get all the way to the top this time without Ramsey having to carry me. Yes, let's go, Mama. Tommy said that the tourist buses will start coming soon. But it's still early, he said."

    Molly blinked. It was the end of May. Life had changed so irrevocably that Molly had forgotten the day of the week, much less the month. "Yes, it is very early in the tourist season. Isn't that something?" A month before she'd been taking pictures, trying to polish her craft, her life busy and fun. Not really full, but that was okay. Emma would be starting first grade in the fall. They'd both looked forward to that. Then Emma had been kidnapped and their lives had flown out of control.

    Suddenly, Emma held out her left hand. "Tommy gave me this." It was a small elaborately worked dark silver ring with a purple stone in it. "Tommy said it was Celtic."

    Molly held her daughter's small white hand and looked at the lovely child's ring on Emma's middle finger. "It's beautiful. He gave it to you this morning?"

    "He said if I ate my oatmeal, he had a small present for me. It was yesterday."

    Molly felt a sudden jolt of fear. She'd seen Tommy speaking to Emma, but when had he given her the ring? Was Tommy one of those monsters? Was he trying to seduce Emma into trusting him? For a moment she was so afraid she couldn't breathe. No, she was being ridiculous. He was a nice boy, no older than seventeen, hair as red as a swatch of crimson silk, face very fair and freckled. No, Tommy was simply a nice boy. Still, she found herself taking Emma's hand for no good reason at all.

    "Mama, you're hurting me."

    "What? Oh goodness, Em, I'm sorry. Look, there's Ramsey. Let's see if he wants to go to Bunratty."

    They left Dromoland grounds an hour later, a picnic basket packed in the backseat beside Emma, with ham-and-cheese sandwiches, nothing else, because the Irish, Molly said, evidently didn't believe in mayonnaise or mustard or tomatoes or lettuce. They did, however, have potato chips. And lots of local cider.

    The lanes were so narrow that if another car came along, they had to back up into one of the bulges, Emma called them, and park until the other car passed. "I'm nearly used to driving on the wrong side," Ramsey said as they passed a car on a turnout. "In the east of Ireland there are lots more people and better roads. By the time you get over Dublin way, you're pretty much used to all these strange things."

    There was only one tour bus parked at Bunratty. They had nearly the entire shaded park to themselves. Emma climbed the castle's main stairs all on her own.

    "WE think we've found him. or at least we know who he is." Ramsey gripped the phone tight. It was midnight in Ireland, seven o'clock in Washington, D.C. Savich said again, "Ramsey, you there? Damned telephones. We got a poor connection?"

    "No, it's fine. You really found him, Savich?" "Yep. Well, we don't have him in the slammer yet, but we know who he is. His name's John Dickerson, aka Sonny Dickerson, aka Father Sonny. He's forty-eight years old, an ex-priest, finally booted out by the Church because he'd been so flagrant that the good bishops and the cardinal had to oust him. You remember how they used to just ship the pedophile priests from one unsuspecting parish to another after having sent the offending priest off for spiritual and psychological rehabilitation?"

    "Yeah. Thank God the Church now hands them over to be prosecuted."

    "Yes, once they realized there were no cures. This guy was so over the edge