第73章

  says the boy from district 1.
  “i keep telling you, forget about him. i know where i cut
  him. it’s a miracle he hasn’t bled to death yet. at any rate, he’s
  in no shape to raid us,” says cato.
  so peeta is out there in the woods, wounded badly. but i am
  still in the dark on what motivated him to betray the careers.
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  “come on,” says cato. he thrusts a spear into the hands of
  the boy from district 3, and they head off in the direction of
  the fire. the last thing i hear as they enter the woods is cato
  saying, “when we find her, i kill her in my own way, and no
  one interferes.”
  somehow i don’t think he’s talking about rue. she didn’t
  drop a nest of tracker jackers on him.
  i stay put for a half an hour or so, trying to figure out what
  to do about the supplies. the one advantage i have with the
  bow and arrow is distance. i could send a flaming arrow into
  the pyramid easily enough — i’m a good enough shot to get it
  through those openings in the net — but there’s no guarantee
  it would catch. more likely it’d just burn itself out and then
  what? i’d have achieved nothing and given them far too much
  information about myself. that i was here, that i have an ac-
  complice, that i can use the bow and arrow with accuracy.
  there’s no alternative. i’m going to have to get in closer and
  see if i can’t discover what exactly protects the supplies. in
  fact, i’m just about to reveal myself when a movement catches
  my eye. several hundred yards to my right, i see someone
  emerge from the woods. for a second, i think it’s rue, but then
  i recognize foxface — she’s the one we couldn’t remember
  this morning — creeping out onto the plain. when she decides
  it’s safe, she runs for the pyramid, with quick, small steps. just
  before she reaches the circle of supplies that have been lit-
  tered around the pyramid, she stops, searches the ground, and
  carefully places her feet on a spot. then she begins to ap-
  proach the pyramid with strange little hops, sometimes land-
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  ing on one foot, teetering slightly, sometimes risking a few
  steps. at one point, she launches up in the air, over a small
  barrel and lands poised on her tiptoes. but she overshot
  slightly, and her momentum throws her forward. i hear her
  give a sharp squeal as her hands hit the ground, but nothing
  happens. in a moment, she’s regained her feet and continues
  until she has reached the bulk of the supplies.
  so, i’m right about the booby trap, but it’s clearly more
  complex than i had imagined. i was right about the girl, too.
  how wily is she to have discovered this path into the food and
  to be able to replicate it so neatly? she fills her pack, taking a
  few items from a variety of containers, crackers from a crate, a
  handful of apples from a burlap sack that hangs suspended
  from a rope off the side of a bin. but only a handful from each,
  not enough to tip off that the food is missing. not enough to
  cause suspicion. and then she’s doing her odd little dance
  back out of the circle and scampering into the woods again,
  safe and sound.
  i realize i’m grinding my teeth in frustration. foxface has
  confirmed what i’d already guessed. but what sort of trap
  have they laid that requires such dexterity? has so many trig-
  ger points? why did she squeal so as her hands made contact
  with the earth? you’d have thought . . . and slowly it begins to
  dawn on me . . . you’d have thought the very ground was going
  to explode.
  “it’s mined,” i whisper. that explains everything. the ca-
  reers’ willingness to leave their supplies, foxface’s reaction,
  the involvement of the boy from district 3, where they have
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  the factories, where they make televisions and automobiles
  and explosives. but where did he get them?