Dale had never put considerable thought into killing someone, especially when it came to a child. From what he could tell, the tree she perched upon was five meters from him, and she was three meters up, too far to reach. When she came down, Dale would make his decision. Graduate from grave-robber to murder. 

The girl spoke, breaking the silence" Aw, you've stopped talking, did I hurt your feelings, or you just that boring?... Come on. Let's have some fun. Ah, this bark has already started cutting my butt," she stood up slowly and seemed to pat herself down. "I'll be right down, just don't cry" She walked the span of the tree, but rather than return to the base of the tree, she walked nosiness to the very end of the tree branch and stopped. The tree branch seemed motionless under her weight. Speechless, Dale watched the girl take one last step to plunge into the darkness below.

Coming to his senses, the Dale searched for where she may have landed. But there was only the stillness of the forest. He had lost her. The new silence unsettled Dale more than the girl's presents had moments ago. Then he remembered.

She could still tell someone, tell someone what he'd done.

Turning hard to retrieve the dead woman's body, he had made his decision. He would run. But as he moved to action on his plan, Dale found something other than the woman's corpse. The girl sat on the tips of its toes, scrutinizing the dead woman beside her. Reflexively the Dale leaped back a step and drew his knife once more.

"Wow, she looks different from up close... So you planned to do her right here, huh?" asked the girl as she prodded the woman's face with her finger.

"Get your hands off her!" Dale balled up his fist in preparation for a strike.

"Well, someone's touchy, so do you steal the dead one cuz you can't get a living one spend time with you?... how sad."

"Tha-That's none of your business! Now tell me why you're spying on me? Tell me, or I'll make you tell me right here and now!"

"Will you now?... Well, I guess you could say I saw something interesting to me, and I wanted to watch" The girl's face was still mostly concealed as she spoke.

Dale regarded the girl with a quizzical stare, "Watch?"

"Yes, I saw you through the moonlight working so hard to carry away this woman, and I thought to myself, 'I'd like to see where this goes'… And so here I am! But now that you know I'm here, I guess I can't see," a rueful smile could be seen lining the girl's lips from under her hood. "I know I'll hide again, and you pretend I wasn't here. That way, we both win! You get to have your night of unbridled passion, and I get to watch."

Disgust filled Dale's palette. "I would never do something so indecent to her! I brought her so she could be safe from filth"!

"So you're going through all this to keep a rotting corpse clean? So much for being interesting…." The girl again could not hide the disappointment in Dale. "Watching dead things is boring. It would be more fun if she were alive."

"Alive?... Don't be silly. Everyone knows nothing can bring her back now, no matter how much I wish she were. This is all I have of her now. If there were, I'd do anything to hear her voice again, feel her warmth again". Dale fell to his knees as tears filled his eyes as he gazed at the woman's pale vestige.

"Hmmm, is that so?...then I think I know how to have some fun with you yet" There was Mischief in the girl's voice. "I'll make you a deal… I'll bring back both of those, her voice and warmth. so long as you keep me entertained."

"Bring them back… what nonsense are you-" Looking up, Dale saw the girl's face in full moonlight for the very first time. Something deep inside him screamed.

This little girl is no innocent child. This girl is a predator looking down on its prey with a smile.