He kills—he killed—he will kill—he has killed—he had killed—he will have killed—he would have killed—he is killing—he was killing—he has been killing—he would have been killing—he will have been killing—he will be killing—he would be killing—he may kill.

We decided that none of these tenses or moods suited him. Did he kill, will he kill, will he have killed? We think he is killing, with every step, with every breath, with every . . . We don’t like him to get close to us but we come across him when we go clam-digging on the beach. We walk from north to south, and he comes from south to north, closer to the dunes, as if looking for pebbles. He looks at us and we look at him—did he kill, will he kill, would he have killed, is he killing? We put down the sack with the clams and hold each other’s hand till he passes. He doesn’t throw so much as one little pebble at us, he doesn’t even look at us, but afterward we’re too weak in the knees to go on digging clams.

The other day he walked by us and right afterward we found an injured sea gull on the beach. We took the poor thing home and on the way we told it that we were good, not like him, that it didn’t have to be afraid of us, and we even covered it up with my jacket so the cold wind wouldn’t hurt its broken wing. Later we ate it in a stew. A little tough, but tasty.

The next day we went back to run on the beach. We didn’t see him and we didn’t find a single injured sea gull. He may be bad, but he’s got something that attracts animals. For example, when we were fishing: hours without a bite until he suddenly showed up and then we caught a splendid sea bass. He didn’t look at our catch or smile, and it’s good he didn’t because he looked more like a murderer than ever with his long bushy hair and gleaming eyes. He just went on gathering his pebbles as though nothing were wrong, thinking about the girls that he has killed, will kill, kills.

When he passes by we’re petrified—will it be our turn someday? In school we conjugate the verb to kill and the shiver that goes up our spine isn’t the same as when we see him passing on the beach, all puffed up with pride and gathering his pebbles. The shiver on the beach is lower down in our bodies and more stimulating, like sea air. He gathers all those pebbles to cover up the graves of his victims—very small, transparent pebbles that he holds up to the sun and looks through from time to time so as to make certain that the sun exists. Mama says that if he spends all day looking for pebbles, it’s because he eats them. Mama can’t think about anything but food, but I’m sure he eats something else. The last breath of his victims, for example. There’s nothing more nourishing than the last sigh, the one that brings with it everything that a person has gathered over the years. He must have some secret for trapping this essence that escapes his victims, and that’s why he doesn’t need vitamins. My sister and I are afraid he’ll catch us some night and kill us to absorb everything that we’ve been eating over the last few years. We’re terribly afraid because we’re well nourished, Mama has always seen to it that we eat balanced meals and we’ve never lacked for fruit or vegetables even though they’re very expensive in this part of the country. And clams have lots of iodine, Mama says, and fish are the healthiest food there is even though the taste of it bores us but why should he be bored because while he kills his victims (always girls, of course) he must do those terrible things to them that my sister and I keep imagining, just for fun. We spend hours talking about the things that he does to his victims before killing them just for fun. The papers often talk about degenerates like him but he’s one of the worst because that’s all he eats. The other day we spied on him while he was talking to the lettuce he has growing in his garden (he’s crazy as well as degenerate). He was saying affectionate things to it and we were certain it was poisoned lettuce. For our part we don’t say anything to lettuce, we have to eat it with oil and lemon even though it’s disgusting, all because Mama says it has lots of vitamins. And now we have to swallow vitamins for him, what a bother, because the better fed we are the happier we’ll make him and the more he’ll like doing those terrible things the papers talk about and we imagine, just before killing us so as to gulp down our last breath full of vitamins in one big mouthful. He’s going to do a whole bunch of things so repulsive we’ll be ashamed to tell anybody, and we only say them in a whisper when we’re on the beach and there’s nobody within miles. He’s going to take our last breath and then he’ll be as strong as a bull to go kill other little girls like us. I hope he catches Pocha. But I hope he doesn’t do any of those repulsive things to her before killing her because she might like it, the dirty thing. I hope he kills her straightaway by plunging a knife in her belly. But he’ll have his fun with us for a long time because we’re pretty and he’ll like our bodies and our voices when we scream. And we will scream and scream but nobody will hear us because he’s going to take us to a place very far away and then he will put in our mouths that terrible thing we know he has. Pocha already told us about it—he must have an enormous thing that he uses to kill his victims.

An enormous one, even though we’ve never seen it. To show how brave we are, we tried to watch him while he made peepee, but he saw us and chased us away. I wonder why he didn’t want to show it to us. Maybe it’s because he wants to surprise us on our last day here and catch us while we’re pure so’s to get more pleasure. That must be it. He’s saving himself for our last day and that’s why he doesn’t try to get close to us.

Not anymore.

Papa finally lent us the rifle after we asked and asked for it to hunt rabbits. He told us we were big girls now, that we can go out alone with the rifle if we want to, but to be careful, and he said it was a reward for doing so well in school. It’s true we’re doing well in school. It isn’t hard at all to learn to conjugate verbs:

He will be killed—he is killed—he has been killed.