My Pretty Sweetheart (Arianna)

We talked from night until dawn. When early morning came, Pollard went to look for a phone from the villagers.

At about noon, he returned, forlorn and empty handed. He told us, "It seems some police officers are coming up here. You can see for yourselves."

Everyone was enthusiastic at the news, but Naomi immediately became wary. "Why the sudden visit?"

Momentarily stunned, Pollard replied, "Rumor has it that they came to look for some people, but I don't know the details. Why don't you have a look?"

They were looking for people?

We all shared a look, suddenly suspicious of this turn of events. Would they come this far to look for us?

Taking into account the many mountains we'd climbed and the many paths we'd walked the past few days, we were so far off from where we started. Weren't they wary of ringing any alarm bells if they made it too obvious that they were really trying to find us?

"What's wrong?" Pollard asked, confused, sensing how anxious we were.

any trouble for him, so our replies

is, we still have to be careful. Worst case scenario, we can still keep going. We could still meet people from town who can help. We could go to the border

everyone nodded in agreement. It was the only way

said our goodbyes to Pollard and Yannie and left in a

before we could leave, however, we heard the sounds

we do?" Rainie pulled on the hem of my

I glanced at Naomi, and walked out of

was almost impossible for him to hide all

had taken us in,

men standing in the yard, all wearing black police uniforms with badges on their

darkened when

more taken aback than anything,

chief looked at us and said something. We could not answer; we just stared blankly at

He turned to look at another man behind him and said something