Running Out of Time by Margaret Peterson Haddix Page A

camera. Maybe …
    Without a firm plan, Jessie moved through the underbrush toward the guardhouse. She crept slowly, trying not to rustle the bushes. She’d always heard Indians were good at walking through the woods without making a sound, but it wasn’t a skill she’d learned. The guard didn’t turn around, though, and the cars were going by too fast for anyone in them to notice.
    Finally Jessie reached a bush opposite the guardhouse. She was close enough to see the hair on the back of the guard’s neck. It was black and bristly. He was wearing a loose-fitting shirt, suspenders, and britches just like Pa wore, but Jessie knew that didn’t mean he was from Clifton. It was like Mrs. Spurning wearing a long skirt; Mrs. Spurning and this man both looked a little uncomfortable in their clothes.
    Another car pulled up. The guard turned to the driver, and Jessie ducked lower in the bush.
    â€œWelcome to Clifton!” the guard said. “Parking’s at the top of the hill. The ticket window’s right inside the front door of the guest center. Tours are available every thirty minutes, on the hour and half hour.”
    An arm reached out from the car and seemed to be giving the guard money. Jessie wasn’t sure what that was for. Did people actually pay to watch Clifton? Jessie gasped.
    â€œThat’s quite a fence you have there,” a man’s voicegrowled. “I was afraid I’d turned into the state prison by mistake.”
    Jessie saw the guard look toward the fence. She listened intently to his answer.
    â€œOh, our fence isn’t that big,” the guard said. “It’s just that we have something of a game preserve around Clifton—the same number of bears, wolves, deer, you know, that would have been here in the 1800s. There’s no danger, but some of Clifton’s neighbors are farmers with livestock and they’re happier with a fence between us.”
    Jessie waited for the man in the car to say that was ridiculous. Everyone knew there were bears and wolves and deer everywhere. Weren’t there? The man only grunted.
    â€œLook, Jamey. See the man’s funny costume?” a woman’s voice said from the car.
    That bothered Jessie. She couldn’t see the woman or Jamey, but she’d bet anything they had on stranger costumes than the guard’s ordinary clothes.
    Then the car drove on and Jessie returned to studying her escape route. The guard seemed occupied in his booth, so she risked moving to another bush with a better view.
    The road split into two here, with the guardhouse in the middle. A long thin rail hung about three feet off the ground, reaching from the guardhouse almost to the bushes by Jessie. As two more cars drove up, Jessie watched the process. People would pay, the rail would lift magically, by itself, then it lowered again as soon as the car was past.
    Jessie thought about witchcraft again, and pushed the thought away. Probably there was a pulley involved, or something like that. The inside of the Clifton mill would look likemagic, too, if you didn’t know how much water turned the wheel outside. Still, Jessie didn’t like the moving rail.
    She waited for a car to leave, most curious about what happened then. Finally a big yellow one—one of the monster maybe-limousines Jessie had gawked at earlier—roared down the road. It was packed with schoolchildren now. It slowed down, almost stopping. The driver seemed to be easing it over some large bump. Then it sped up and disappeared. Evidently, there was no rail to stop people on the way out.
    Jessie frowned. That meant she couldn’t hide in a car while it stopped for the rail. Well, she still had another option. She could hike back up the hill, hide in one of the empty cars, and wait for it to leave.
    If that was her plan, she needed to start walking. But something made Jessie stay near the guardhouse. She’d lose so much time walking all the way