] This time they were followed by a glare so bright that for a moment Lois believed she must be blinded. She clapped her hands over her eyes but saw  in the last instant when she could see anything  that the light had centered on the scissors Clotho was holding up like a twopronged lightningrod. There was no refuge from that light; it turned her eyelids and upraised, shielding hands to glass. The glare outlined the bones of her fingers like Xray pencils as it streamed through her flesh. From somewhere far away she heard a woman who sounded suspiciously like Lois Chasse, screaming at the top of her mental voice [Turn it off! God, please turn it off before it kills me!] And at last, when it seemed to her that she could stand no more, the light did begin to fade. When it was gone  except for a fierce blue afterimage that floated in the new darkness like a pair of phantom scissors  she slowly opened her eyes. For a moment she continued to see nothing but that brilliant blue cross and thought she had indeed been blinded. Then, as dim as a developing photograph at first, the world began to resurface. She saw Ralph, Clotho, and Lachesis lowering their own hands and peering around with the blind bewilderment of a nest of moles turned up by the blade of a harrow. Lachesis was looking at the scissors in his colleagues hands as if he had never seen them before, and Lois was willing to bet he never had seen them as they were now. The blades were still shining, shedding eldritch fairyglimmers of light in misty droplets. Lachesis [Ralph! That was . . . ] She lost the rest of it, but his tone was that of a common peasant who answers a knock at the door of his hut and finds that the Pope has stopped by for a spot of prayer and a little confession. Clotho was still staring at the blades of the scissors. Ralph was also looking, but at last he lifted his gaze to the bald doctors. Ralph [ . . . the hurt?] Lachesis, speaking like a man emerging from a deep dream [Yes . . . wont last long, but . . . agony will be intense . . . change your mind, Ralph?] Lois was suddenly afraid of those shining scissors. She wanted to cry out to Ralph, tell him to never mind his one, to just give them their one, their little boy. She wanted to tell him to do whatever it took to get them to hide those scissors again. But no words came from either her mouth or her mind. Ralph [. . . in the least . . . just wanted to know what to expect.] Clotho [. . . ready? . . . must be . . . ] Tell them no, Ralph! she thought at him. Tell them NO! Ralph [. . . ready.] Lachesis [Understand . . . terms he has . . . and the price?] Ralph, impatient now [Yes, yes. Can we please just . . .] Clotho, with immense gravity [Very well, Ralph. It may be so.] Lachesis put an arm around Ralphs shoulders; he and Clotho led him a little further down the hill, to the place where the younger children started their downhill sledruns in the winter. There was a small flat area there, circular in shape, about the size of a nightclub stage. When they reached it, Lachesis stopped Ralph, then turned him so he and Clotho were facing each other. Lois suddenly wanted to shut her eyes and found she couldnt. She could only watch and pray that Ralph knew what he was doing. Clotho murmured to him. Ralph nodded and slipped out of McGoverns sweater. He folded it and laid it neatly on the leafstrewn grass. When he straightened again, Clotho took his right wrist and held his arm out straight. He then nodded to Lachesis, who unbuttoned the cuff of Ralphs shirt and rolled the sleeve to the elbow in three quick turns. With that done, Clotho rotated Ralphs arm so it was wristup. The fine tracery of blue veins just beneath the skin of his forearm was poignantly clear, highlighted in delicate strokes of aura. All of this was horribly familiar to Lois it was like watching a patient on a TV doctorshow being prepped for an operation. Except this wasnt TV. Lachesis leaned forward and spoke again. Although she still couldnt hear the words, Lois knew he was telling Ralph this was his last chance. Ralph nodded, and although his aura now told her that he was terrified of what was coming, he somehow even managed a smile. When he turned to Clotho and spoke, he did not seem to be seeking reassurance but rather offering a word of comfort. Clotho tried to return Ralphs smile, but without success. Lachesis wrapped one hand around Ralphs wrist, more to steady the arm (or so it seemed to Lois) than to actually hold it immobile. He reminded her of a nurse attending a patient who must receive a painful injection. Then he looked at his partner with frightened eyes and nodded. Clotho nodded back, took a breath, and then bent over Ralphs upturned forearm with its ghostly tree of blue veins glowing beneath the skin. He paused for a moment, then slowly opened the jaws of the scissors with which he and his old friend traded life for death. 7 Lois staggered to her feet and stood swaying back and forth on legs that felt like lumber. She meant to break the paralysis which had locked her in such a cruel silence, to shout at Ralph and tell him to stop  tell him he didnt know what they meant to do to him. Except he did. It was in the pallor of his face, his halfclosed eyes, his painfully thinned lips. Most of all it was in the blotches of red and black which were flashing across his aura like meteors, and in the aura itself, which had tightened down to a hard blue shell. Ralph nodded at Clotho, who brought the lower scissorblade down until it was touching Ralphs forearm just below the fold of the elbow. For a moment the skin only dimpled, and then a smooth dark blister of blood formed where the dimple had been. The blade slid into this blister. When Clotho squeezed his fingers, bringing the razorsharp blades together, the skin on either side of the lengthwise cut snapped back with the suddenness of windowshades. Subcutaneous fat glimmered like melting ice in the fierce blue glow of Ralphs aura. Lachesis tightened his hold on Ralphs wrist, but so far as Lois could tell, Ralph did not make even a first instinctive effort to pull back, only lowered his head and clenched his left fist in the air like a man giving a Black Power salute. She could see the cords in his neck standing out like cables. Not a single sound escaped him. Now that this terrible business was actually begun, Clotho proceeded with a speed which was both brutal and merciful. He cut rapidly down the middle of Ralphs forearm to his wrist, using the scissors the way a man will to open a parcel which has been heavily taped, guiding the blades with the fingers and bearing down with the thumb. Inside Ralphs arm, tendons gleamed like cuts of flank steak. Blood ran in freshets, and there was a fine scarlet spray each time an artery or a vein was severed. Soon fans of backspatter decorated the white tunics of the two small men, making them look more like little doctors than ever. When his blades had at last severed the Bracelets of Fortune at Ralphs wrist (the operation took less than three seconds but seemed to last forever to Lois), Clotho removed the dripping scissors and handed them to Lachesis. Ralphs upturned arm had been cut open from elbow to wrist in a dark furrow. Clotho clamped his hands over this furrow at its point of origination and Lois thought Now the other one will pick up Ralphs sweater and use it as a tourniquet. But Lachesis made no move to do that; he merely held the scissors and watched. For a moment the blood went on flowing between Clothos grasping fingers, and then it stopped. He slowly drew his hands down Ralphs arm, and the flesh which emerged from his grip was whole and firm, although seamed with a thick white ridge of scartissue. [Lois . . . Loisssss . . . ] This voice was not coming from inside her head, nor from down the hill; it had come from behind her. A soft voice, almost cajoling. Atropos? No, not at all. She looked down and saw green and somehow sunken light flowing all around her  it rayed through the spaces between her arms and her body, between her legs, even between her fingers. It rippled her shadow ahead of her, scrawny and somehow twisted, like the shadow of a hanged woman. It caressed her with heatless fingers the color of Spanish moss. [Turn around, Loisss . . . ] At that moment the last thing on earth Lois Chasse wanted to do was turn around and look at the source of that green light. [Turn around, Loisss . . . see me, Loisss . . . come into the light, Loisss . . . come into the light . . . see me and come into the light . . . ] It was not a voice which could be disobeyed. Lois turned as slowly as a toy ballerina whose cogs have grown rusty, and her eyes seemed to fill up with Saint Elmos fire. Lois came into the light. CHAPTER TWENTYEIGHT 1 Clotho [You have your visible sign, Ralph  are you satisfied?] Ralph looked down at his arm. Already the agony, which had swallowed him as the whale had swallowed Jonah, seemed like a dream to him, or a mirage. He supposed it was this same sort of distancing which allowed women to have lots of babies, forgetting the stark physical pain and effort of delivery each time the act was successfully accomplished. The scar looked like a length of ragged white string rippling its way over the bulges of his scant muscles. [Yes. You were brave, and very quick. I thank you for both.] Clotho smiled but said nothing. Lachesis [Ralph, are you ready? Time is now very short.] [Yes, Im] [Ralph! Ralph!] It was Lois, standing at the top of the hill and waving to him. For a moment he thought her aura had changed from its usual dovegray to some other, darker color, and then the idea, undoubtedly caused by shock and weariness, passed. He trudged up the hill to where she stood. Loiss eyes were distant and dazed, as if she had just heard some amazing, lifechanging word. [Lois, what is it? Whats wrong? Is it my arm? Because if thats it, dont worry. Look! Good as new!] He held it out so she could see for herself, but Lois didnt look. She looked at him instead, and he saw the depth of her shock. [Ralph, a green man came.] A green man? He reached out and took her hands, instantly concerned. [Green? Are you sure? It wasnt Atropos or] He didnt finish the thought. He didnt have to. Lois shook her head slowly. [It was a green man. If there are sides in this, I dont know which one this . . . this person . . . is on. He felt good, but I could be wrong. I couldnt see him. His aura was too bright. He told me to give these back to you.] She held out her hand to him and tipped two small, glittering objects from her palm to his her earrings. He could see a maroon speck on one, and supposed it was Atroposs blood. He started to close his hand over them, then winced at a tiny prick of pain. [You forgot the backs, Lois.] She spoke in the slow, unthoughtful tones of a woman in a dream. [No, I didnt  I threw them away. The green man said to. Be careful. He felt . . . warm . . . but I dont really know, do I? Mr Chasse always said I was the most gullible woman alive, always willing to believe the best of everybody. Of anybody.] She reached out slowly and grasped his wrists, looking earnestly into his face all the while. I just dont know. Vocalizing the thought seemed to wake her up, and she stood blinking at him. Ralph supposed it was possible  just barely  that she actually had been asleep, that she had dreamed this socalled green man. But perhaps it would be wiser to just take the earrings. They might mean nothing, but then again, having Loiss earrings in his pocket couldnt hurt . . . unless he poked himself with them, that was. Lachesis [Ralph, what is it? Is something wrong?] He and Clotho had lagged behind, and so had missed Ralphs conversation with Lois. Ralph shook his head, turning his hand to hide the earrings from them. Clotho had picked up McGoverns sweater and brushed away the few bright leaves which had been clinging to it. Now he held it out to Ralph, who unobtrusively slipped Loiss noback earrings into one of its pockets before putting it on again. Time to get going, and the line of warmth up the middle of his right arm  along the scar  told him how he was supposed to begin. [Lois?] [Yes, dear?] [I need to take from your aura, and I need to take a lot. Do you understand?] [Yes.] [Is it all right?] [Yes, of course.] [Be brave  it wont take long.] He put his arms on her shoulders and clasped his hands behind her neck. She copied the gesture, and they slowly leaned together until their foreheads were touching and their lips less than two inches apart. He could smell some perfume still lingering about her  coming perhaps from the dark, sweet hollows behind her ears. [Ready, dear?] He found what came in return both odd and comforting. [Yes, Ralph. See me. Come into the light. Come into the light and take the light.] Ralph pursed his lips and began to inhale. A band of smoky brilliance began to flow from her mouth and nose and into him. His aura began to brighten at once, and it continued to do so until it had become a dazzling, cloudy corona around him. And still he went on inhaling, breathing with something that was beyond breath, feeling the scar on his arm grow hotter and hotter until it was like an electric filament buried in his flesh. He could not have stopped even if he had wanted to . . . and he didnt. She staggered once. He saw her eyes lose focus and felt her hands loosen for a moment on the back of his neck. Then her eyes, large and bright and full of trust, returned to his, and her grip firmed again. At last, as that titanic intake of breath finally began to crest, Ralph realized her aura had grown so pale he could hardly see it. Her cheeks were milkwhite and the gray had come back into her hair, so much that the black was now almost gone. He had to stop it, had to, or he was going to kill her. He managed to pull his left hand free of his right, and that seemed to break some sort of circuit; he was able to step back from her. Lois swayed on her feet and would have fallen, but Clotho and Lachesis, looking quite a bit like Lilliputians from Gullivers Travels, grabbed her arms and lowered her carefully to the bench again. Ralph dropped to one knee before her. He was frantic with fear and guilt, and at the same time filled with a sense of power so great that he felt as if a single hard jolt might cause him to explode, like a bottle filled with nitroglycerine. He could knock down a building with that karatechop gesture now  maybe a whole row of them. Still, he had hurt Lois. Perhaps badly. [Lois! Lois, can you hear me? Im sorry!] She looked up at him dazedly, a woman who had blasted forward from forty to sixty in a matter of seconds . . . and then right past it and into her seventies, like a rocket overshooting its intended target. She tried a smile that didnt work very well. [Lois, Im sorry. I didnt know, and once I did, I couldnt stop.] Lachesis [If youre to have any chance at all, Ralph, you must go now. Hes almost here.] Lois was nodding agreement. [Go on, Ralph  Im just weak, thats all. Ill be fine. Im just going to sit here until my strength comes back.] Her eyes shifted to the left, and Ralph followed her gaze. He saw the wino theyd frightened away earlier. He had returned to inspect the litterbaskets at the top of the hill for returnable cans and bottles, and although his aura did not look as healthy as that of the fellow they had met out by the old trainyards earlier, Ralph reckoned he would do in a pinch . . . which, for Lois, this definitely was. Clotho [Well see that he wanders over this way, Ralph  we dont have much power over the physical aspects of the ShortTime world, but I think we can manage that much.] [Youre sure?] [Yes.] [Okay. Good.] Ralph took a quick look at the two little men, noted their anxious, frightened eyes, and nodded. Then he bent and kissed Loiss cool, wrinkled cheek. She gave him the smile of a tired old grandmother. I did that to her, he thought. Me. Then you better make sure you didnt do it for nothing, Carolyns voice responded tartly. Ralph gave the three of them  Clotho and Lachesis were now flanking Lois protectively on the bench  a final glance, and then began to walk down the hill again. When he reached the toilets, he stood between them for a moment, then leaned his head against the one marked WOMEN. He heard nothing. When he tipped his head against the blue plastic wall of MEN, however, he heard a faint, droning voice raised in song Who believes that my wildest dreams And my craziest schemes will come true? You, baby, nobody but you. Christ, hes nuttier than a fruitcake. This is news, sweetheart? Ralph supposed it wasnt. He walked around to the door of the Portosan and opened it. Now he could also hear the distant, waspy buzz of an airplane engine, but there was nothing to see that he hadnt seen dozens of times before the cracked toilet seat resting askew over the hole in the seat, a roll of toilet paper with a strange and somehow ominous swelled look, and, to the left, a urinal that looked like a plastic teardrop. The walls were tangles of graffiti. The largest  and most exuberant  had been printed in foothigh red letters above the urinal TONY BOYNTON HAS GOT THE TIGHTEST LITTLE BUNS IN DERRY! A cloying pinescented deodorizer overlay the smells of shit, piss, and lingering winofarts like makeup on the face of a corpse. The voice he was hearing seemed to come from the hole in the center of the Portosans bench seat, or perhaps it was seeping out of the very walls From the time I fall asleep Until the morning comes I dream about you, baby, nobody but you. Where is he? Ralph wondered. And how the hell do I get to him? Ralph felt sudden heat against his hip; it was as if someone had slipped a warm coal into his watchpocket. He began to frown, then remembered what was in there. He reached into the scrap of a pocket with one finger, touched the gold band he had stowed there, and hooked it out. He laid it on his palm over the place where his loveline and lifeline diverged and poked at it gingerly. It had cooled again. Ralph found he wasnt very surprised. HD  ED 5887. One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to bind them, Ralph murmured, and slipped Eds wedding band onto the third finger of his own left hand. It was a perfect fit. He pushed it up until it clinked softly against the wedding ring Carolyn had put onto his own finger some fortyfive years ago. Then he looked up and saw that the back wall of the Portosan had disappeared. 2 What he saw, framed by the walls which did remain, was a justpastsunset sky and a swatch of Maine countryside fading into a bluegray twilight haze. He estimated that he was looking out from a height of about ten thousand feet. He could see glimmering lakes and ponds and vast stretches of dark green woodland scrolling down toward the Portosans bench seat and then disappearing. Far ahead  up toward the roof of the toilet cubicle  Ralph could see a glimmering nest of lights. That was probably Derry, now no more than ten minutes away. In the lower left quadrant of this vision Ralph could see part of an instrument panel. Taped over the altimeter was a small color photograph that stopped his breath. It was Helen, looking impossibly happy and impossibly beautiful. Cradled in her arms was the Exalted  Revered Baby, fast asleep and no more than four months old. He wants them to be the last thing he sees in this world, Ralph thought. Hes been turned into a monster, but I guess even monsters dont forget how to love. Something on the instrument panel began to beep. A hand came into view and flicked a switch. Before it disappeared, Ralph could see the white indentation on the third finger of that hand, faint but still visible, where the wedding ring had rested for at least six years. He saw something else, as well  the aura surrounding the hand was the same as the one which had surrounded the thunderstruck baby in the hospital elevator, a turbulent, rapidly moving membrane that seemed as alien as the atmosphere of a gas giant. Ralph looked back once and raised his hand. Clotho and Lachesis raised theirs in return. Lois blew him a kiss. Ralph made a catching gesture, then turned and stepped into the Portosan. 3 He hesitated for a moment, wondering what to do about the bench seat, then remembered the oncoming hospital gurney, which should have crushed their skulls but hadnt, and walked toward the back of the cubicle. He clenched his teeth, preparing to bark his shin  what you knew was one thing, what you believed after seventy years of bumping into stuff quite another  and then stepped through the bench seat as if it were made of smoke . . . or as if he were. There was a scary sensation of weightlessness and vertigo, and for a moment he was sure he was going to vomit. This was accompanied by a feeling of drain, as if much of the power he had taken in from Lois was now being siphoned off. He supposed it was. This was a form of teleportation, after all, fabulous science fiction stuff, and something like that had to use up a lot of energy. The vertigo passed, but it was replaced by a perception that was even worse  a feeling that he had been split at the neck somehow. He realized he now had a completely unobstructed view of a whole sprawling section of the world. Jesus Christ, whats happened to me? Whats wrong? His senses reluctantly reported back that there was nothing wrong, exactly, it was just that he had achieved a position which should have been impossible. He was seventythree inches tall; the cockpit of the plane was sixty inches from floor to ceiling. This meant that any pilot much bigger than Clotho and Lachesis had to slouch his way to his seat. Ralph, however, had entered the plane not only while it was in flight but while he was standing up, and he was still standing up, between and slightly behind the two seats in the cockpit. The reason his view was unobstructed was both simple and horrible his head was sticking out of the top of the plane. Ralph had a nightmare image of his old dog, Rex, whod liked to ride with his head out the passenger window and his raggedy ears blowing back in the slipstream. He closed his eyes. What if I fall? If I can stick my head out through the damned roof, whats to keep me from sliding right down through the floor and falling all the way to the ground? Or maybe through the ground, and then through the very earth itself? But that wasnt happening, and nothing like it would happen, not on this level  all he had to do was remember the effortless way theyd risen through the floors of the hospital and the ease with which theyd stood on the roof. If he kept those things in mind, he would be okay. Ralph tried to center on that idea, and when he felt quite sure he had himself under control, he opened his eyes again. Sloping out just below him was the planes windshield. Beyond it was the nose, tipped with a quicksilver blur of propeller. The nestle of lights he had observed from the door of the Portosan was closer now. Ralph bent his knees, and his head slid smoothly through the ceiling of the cockpit. For a moment he could taste oil in his mouth and the tiny hairs in his nose seemed to bristle as if with an electric shock, and then he was kneeling between the pilots and copilots seats. He didnt know what he had expected to feel, seeing Ed again after all this time and under such extravagantly weird circumstances, but the pang of regret  not just pity but regret  which came was a surprise. As on the day in the summer of 92 when Ed had run into the West Side Gardeners truck, he was wearing an old teeshirt instead of an Oxford or Arrow with buttons up the front and a fruitloop on the back. He had lost a lot of weight  Ralph thought perhaps as much as forty pounds  and it had had an extraordinary effect, making him look not emaciated but somehow heroic, in a gothicromantic way; Ralph was forcefully reminded of Carolyns favorite poem, The Highwayman, by Alfred Noyes. Eds skin was as pale as paper, his green eyes both dark and light (like emeralds in moonlight, Ralph thought) behind the small round John Lennon spectacles, his lips so red they looked as if they had been rouged. He had tied the white silk scarf with its red Japanese characters around his forehead so that the fringed ends trailed down his back. Within the thunderbolt swirls of his aura, Eds intelligent, mobile face was filled with terrible regret and fierce determination. He was beautiful  beautiful  and Ralph felt a sense of dj vu twist through him. Now he knew what he had glimpsed on the day hed stepped between Ed and the man from West Side Gardeners; he was seeing it again. Looking at Ed, lost inside a typhoon aura from which no balloonstring floated, was like looking at a priceless Ming vase which had been thrown against a wall and shattered. At least he cant see me, not on this level. At least, I dont think he can. As if in response to this thought, Ed turned and glanced directly at Ralph. His eyes were wide and full of mad caution; the corners of his finely molded mouth quivered and gleamed with buds of saliva. Ralph recoiled, momentarily positive that he was being seen, but Ed didnt react to Ralphs sudden backward movement. He threw a suspicious glance into the empty fourseat passenger cabin behind him instead, as if he had heard the stealthy movements of a stowaway. At the same time he reached past Ralph and put his right hand on a cardboard carton which had been seatbelted into the copilots chair. The hand caressed the box briefly, then went to his forehead and made some tiny adjustment to the scarf serving him as a headband. That done, he resumed singing . . . only this time it was a different song, one that sent a tremor zigzagging up Ralphs back One pill makes you bigger, One pill makes you small, And the ones that Mother gives you Dont do anything at all . . . Right, Ralph thought. Go ask Alice, when shes ten feet tall. His heart was triphammering in his chest  having Ed suddenly turn around like that had scared him in a way even finding himself riding along at ten thousand feet with his head sticking out of the top of the plane hadnt been able to do. Ed didnt see him, Ralph was almost positive of that, but whoever had said that the senses of lunatics were more acute than those of the sane must have known what he was talking about, because Ed sure had an idea that something had changed. The radio squawked, making both men jump. This is for the Cherokee over South Haven. You are on the edge of Derry airspace at an altitude which requires a filed flightplan. Repeat, you are about to enter controlled airspace over a municipal area. Get your hotdogging butt up to sixteen thousand feet, Cherokee, and come to one seventy, thats onesevenoh. While youre doing it, please identify yourself and state Ed closed his hand into a fist and began to hammer the radio with it. Glass flew; soon blood also began to fly. It spattered the instrument panel, the picture of Helen and Natalie, and Eds clean gray teeshirt. He went on hammering until the voice on the radio first began to fade into a rising roar of static and then quit altogether. Good, he said in the low, sighing voice of a man who talks to himself a lot. Lots better. I hate all those questions. They just He caught sight of his bloody hand and broke off. He held it up, looked at it more closely, and then rolled it into a fist again. A large sliver of glass was sticking out of his pinky just below the third knuckle. Ed pulled it free with his teeth, spat it casually aside, then did something which chilled Ralphs heart drew the side of his bloody fist first down his left cheek and then his right, leaving a pair of red marks. He reached into the elasticized pocket built into the wall on his left, pulled out a handmirror, and used it to check his makeshift warpaint. What he saw seemed to please him, because he smiled and nodded before returning the mirror to the pocket. Just remember what the dormouse said, Ed advised himself in his low, sighing voice, and then pushed in on the control wheel. The Cherokees nose dropped and the altimeter slowly began to unwind. Ralph could see Derry straight ahead now. The city looked like a handful of opals scattered across dark blue velvet. There was a hole in the side of the carton in the copilots seat. Two wires came out of it. They led into the back of a doorbell taped to the arm of Eds seat. Ralph supposed that as soon as he had a visual on the Civic Center and actually began his kamikaze run, Ed would settle one finger on the raised white button in the middle of the plastic rectangle. And just before the plane hit, he would push it. Dingdong, Avon calling. Break those wires, Ralph! Break them! An excellent idea with only one drawback he couldnt break so much as a strand of cobweb while he was on this level. That meant dropping back down to ShortTime country, and he was preparing to do just that when a soft, familiar voice on his right spoke his name. [Ralph.] To his right? That was impossible. There was nothing on his right but the copilots seat, the side of the aircraft, and leagues of twilit New England air. The scar along his arm had begun to tingle like a filament in an electric heater. [Ralph!] Dont look. Dont pay any attention at all. Ignore it. But he couldnt. Some great, bricklike force had come to bear on him, and his head began to turn. He fought it, aware that the airplanes angle of descent was growing steeper, but it did no good. [Ralph, look at me  dont be afraid.] He made one last effort to disobey the voice and was unable. His head went on turning, and Ralph suddenly found himself looking at his mother, who had died of lung cancer twentyfive years ago. 4 Bertha Roberts sat in her bentwood rocker about five feet beyond where the sidewall of the Cherokees cockpit had been, knitting and rocking back and forth on thin air a mile or more above the ground. The slippers Ralph had given her for her fiftieth birthday  lined with real mink, they had been, how goofy  were on her feet. A pink shawl was thrown around her shoulders. An old political button  WIN WITH WILLKIE! it said  held the shawl closed. Thats right, Ralph thought. She wore them as jewelry  it was her little affectation. Id forgotten that. The only thing that struck a wrong note (other than that she was dead and currently rocking at six thousand feet) was the bright red piece of afghan in her lap. Ralph had never seen his mother knit, wasnt even sure she knew how, but she was knitting furiously just the same. The needles gleamed and winked as they shuttled through the stitches. [Mother? Mom? Is it really you?] The needles paused as she looked up from the crimson blanket in her lap. Yes, it was his mother  the version Ralph remembered from his teens, anyway. Narrow face, high scholars brow, brown eyes, and a bun of saltandpepper hair rolled tightly at the nape of the neck. It was her small mouth, which looked mean and ungenerous . . . until it smiled, that was. [Why, Ralph Roberts! Im surprised that you even have to ask!] Thats not really an answer, though, is it? Ralph thought. He opened his mouth to say so and then decided it might be wiser  for the time being, at least  to keep quiet. A milky shape was now swimming in the air to her right. When Ralph looked at it, it darkened and solidified into the cherrystained magazine stand he had made her in woodshop during his sophomore year at Derry High. It was filled with Readers Digests and Life magazines. And now the ground far below her began to disappear into a pattern of brown and darkred squares that spread out from the rocker in a widening ring, like a pondripple. Ralph recognized it at once  the kitchen linoleum of the house on Richmond Street in Mary Mead, the one where hed grown up. At first he could see the ground through it, geometries of farmland and, not far ahead, the Kenduskeag flowing through Derry, and then it solidified.


A ghostly shape like a big milkweed puff became his moms old Angora cat, Futzy, curled up on the windowsill and looking out at the gulls circling above the old dump in the Barrens. Futzy had died around the time Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis had stopped making movies together. [That old man was right, boy. Youve no business messing into LongTime affairs. Pay attention to your mother and stay out of what doesnt concern you. Mind me, now.] Pay attention to your mother . . . mind me, now. Those words had pretty well summed up Bertha Robertss views on the art and science of childrearing, hadnt they? Whether it was an order to wait an hour after eating before taking a swim or to make sure that old thief Butch Bowers didnt put a lot of rotten potatoes at the bottom of the peck basket shed sent you to fetch, the prologue (Pay attention to your mother) and the epilogue (Mind me, now) were always the same. And if you failed to pay attention, if you failed to mind her, you had to face the Wrath of Mother, and God help you then. She picked up the needles and began to knit again, running off scarlet stitches with fingers that looked faintly red themselves. Ralph supposed that was just an illusion. Or maybe the dye wasnt completely colorfast, and some of it was coming off on his fingers. His fingers? What a silly mistake that was. Her fingers. Except . . . Well, there were little bunches of whiskers at the corners of her mouth. Long ones. Nasty, somehow. And unfamiliar. Ralph could remember a fine down on her upper lip, but whiskers? No way. Those were new. New? New? What are you thinking about? She died two days after Robert Kennedy was assassinated in Los Angeles, so what in the name of God can be new about her? Two converging walls had bloomed on either side of Bertha Roberts, creating the kitchen corner where she had spent so much time. On one of them was a painting Ralph remembered well. It showed a family at supper  Dad, Mom, two kids. They were passing the potatoes and the corn, and looked like they were discussing their respective days. None of them noticed that there was a fifth person in the room  a whiterobed man with a sandy beard and long hair. He was standing in the corner and watching them. CHRIST, THE UNSEEN VISITOR, the plaque beneath this painting read. Except the Christ Ralph remembered had looked both kind and a little embarrassed to be eavesdropping. This version, however, looked coldly thoughtful . . . evaluative . . . judgemental, perhaps. And his color was very high, almost choleric, as if he had heard something which had made him furious. [Mom? Are you] She put the needles down again on the red blanket  that oddly shiny red blanket  and raised a hand to stop him. [Mom me no Moms, Ralph  just pay attention and mind. Stay out of this! Its too late for your muddling and meddling. You can only make things worse.] The voice was right, but the face was wrong and becoming wronger. Mostly it was her skin. Smooth and unlined, her skin had been Bertha Robertss only vanity. The skin of the creature in the rocker was rough . . . more than rough, in fact. It was scaly. And there were two growths (or perhaps they were sores?) on the sides of her neck. At the sight of them, some terrible memory (get it off me Johnny oh please GET IT OFF) stirred far down in his mind. And Well, her aura. Where was her aura? [Never mind my aura and never mind about that fat old whore youve been running around with . . . although Ill bet Carolyn is just rolling in her grave.] The mouth of the woman (not a woman that thing is not a woman) in the rocker was no longer small. The lower lip had spread, puffed outward and downward. The mouth itself had developed a drooping sneer. A strangely familiar drooping sneer. (Johnny its biting me its BITING ME! ) Something horridly familiar about the bunches of whiskers bristling at the corners of the mouth, too. (Johnny please its eyes its black eyes) [Johnny cant help you, boy. He didnt help you then and he cant help you now.] Of course he couldnt. His older brother Johnny had died six years ago. Ralph had been a pallbearer at his funeral. Johnny had died of a heart attack, possibly as Random as the one which had felled Bill McGovern, and Ralph looked to the left, but the pilots side of the cockpit had also disappeared, and Ed Deepneau with it. Ralph saw the old combination gas and woodstove on which his mother had cooked in the house on Richmond Street (a job she had resented bitterly and done badly all her life) and the arch leading into the dining room. He saw their maple dining table. A glass pitcher stood in the center of it. The pitcher had been filled with a choke of lurid red roses. Each seemed to have a face . . . a bloodred, gasping face . . . But thats wrong, he thought. All wrong. She never had roses in the house  she was allergic to most blooms, and roses were the worst. She used to sneeze like crazy when she was around them. The only thing I ever saw her put on the dining room table was Indian Bouquet, and that wasnt anything but autumn grasses. I see roses because He looked back at the creature in the rocking chair, at red fingers which had now melted together into appendages that looked almost like fins. He regarded the scarlet mass which lay in the creatures lap, and the scar along his arm began to tingle again. What in Gods name is going on here? But he knew, of course; he only had to look from the red thing in the rocking chair to the picture hanging on the wall, the picture of the scarletfaced, malevolent Jesus watching the family eat their supper, to confirm it. He was not in his old house in Mary Mead, and he was not precisely in an aircraft over Derry, either. He was in the Court of the Crimson King. CHAPTER TWENTYNINE 1 Without thinking about why he was doing it, Ralph slipped a hand into his sweater pocket and loosely cupped one of Loiss earrings. His hand felt far away, something which belonged to someone else. He was realizing an interesting thing he had never been frightened in his life until now. Not once. He had thought hed been frightened, of course, but it had been an illusion  the only time hed even come close had been in the Derry Public Library, when Charlie Pickering stuck a knife into his armpit and said he was going to let Ralphs guts out all over the floor. That, however, was nothing but a mild moment of discomfort next to what he was feeling now. A green man came . . . he felt good, but I could be wrong. He hoped she wasnt; he most sincerely hoped she wasnt. Because the green man was about all he had left now. The green man, and Loiss earrings. [Ralph! Stop woolgathering! Look at your mother when shes talking to you! Seventy years old and you still act like you were sixteen, with a bad case of peckerrash!] He turned back to the redfinned thing slumped in the rocker. It now bore only a passing resemblance to his late mother. [Youre not my mother, and Im still in the airplane.] [Youre not, boy. Dont make the mistake of thinking you are. Take one step out of my kitchen and youre in for a very long fall.] [You might as well stop now. I can see what you are.] The thing spoke in a bubbly, choked voice that turned Ralphs spine to a narrow line of ice. [You dont. You may think you do, but you dont. And you dont want to. You dont ever want to see me with my disguises laid aside. Believe me, Ralph, you dont.] He realized with mounting horror that the motherthing had turned into an enormous female catfish, a hungry bottomfeeder with stubby teeth gleaming between its pendulous lips and whiskers which dangled almost to the collar of the dress it still wore. The gills in its neck opened and closed like razorcuts, revealing troubled red inner flesh. Its eyes had grown round and purplish, and as Ralph watched, the sockets began to slide away from each other. This continued until the eyes bulged from the sides rather than the front of the creatures scaly face. [Dont move so much as a single muscle, Ralph. Youll probably die in the explosion no matter what level youre on  the shockwaves travel here just as they do in any building  but that death will still be a great deal better than my death.] The catfish opened its mouth. Its teeth ringed a bloodcolored maw which looked full of strange guts and tumors. It seemed to be laughing at him. [Who are you? Are you the Crimson King?] [Thats Eds name for me  we ought to have our own, dont you think? Lets see. If you dont want me to be Mom Roberts, why not call me the Kingfish? You remember the Kingfish from the radio, dont you?] Yes, of course he did . . . but the real Kingfish had never been on Amos and Andy, and it hadnt really been a kingfish at all. The real Kingfish had been a queenfish, and it had lived in the Barrens. 2 On a summers day during the year when Ralph Roberts was seven he had hooked an enormous catfish out of the Kenduskeag while fishing with his brother John  this had been when it was still possible to eat what you caught down in the Barrens. Ralph had asked his older brother to take the convulsively flopping thing off his hook for him and put it in the bucket of fresh water they kept on the bank beside them. Johnny had refused, loftily citing what he called the Fishermans Creed good fishermen tie their own flies, dig their own worms, and unhook their own catches. It was only later that Ralph realized Johnny might have been trying to hide his own fear of the huge and somehow alien creature his kid brother had reeled out of the Kenduskeags muddy, pisswarm water that day. Ralph had at last brought himself to grasp the catfishs pulsing body, which was at the same time slick, scaly, and prickly. As he did, Johnny had added to his terror by telling him, in a low and ominous voice, to look out for the whiskers. Theyre poison. Bobby Therriault told me if one of em sticks inya, you could get paralyzed. Spend the rest of your life in a wheelchair. So be careful, Ralphie. Ralph had twisted the creature this way and that, trying to free the hook from its dark, wet innards without getting his hand too near its whiskers (not believing Johnny about the poison and at the same time believing him completely), exquisitely aware of the gills, the eyes, the fishy smell that seemed to shimmer its way more deeply into his lungs each time he inhaled. At last hed heard a gristly ripping from deep within the catfish and felt the hook start to slide free. Fresh streamlets of blood trickled from the corners of its flexing, dying mouth. Ralph gave a little sigh of relief  prematurely, as it turned out. The catfish gave a tremendous flap of its tail as the hook came out. The hand Ralph had been using to free it slipped, and all at once the catfishs bleeding mouth clamped shut on his first two fingers. How much pain had there been? A lot? Some? Maybe none at all? Ralph couldnt remember. What he did remember was Johnnys completely unfeigned shriek of horror and his own surety that the catfish was going to make him pay for taking its life by eating two fingers off his right hand. He remembered screaming himself, and shaking his hand, and begging Johnny to help him, but Johnny had been backing away, his face pale, his mouth a knotted line of revulsion. Ralph shook his hand in big, swooping arcs, but the catfish hung on like death, whiskers (poison whiskers put me in a wheelchair for the rest of my life) snapping and flapping against Ralphs wrist, black eyes staring. At last hed struck it against a nearby tree, breaking its back. It had dropped to the grass, still flopping, and Ralph had stamped on it with one foot, provoking the final horror. A spew of guts vomited from its mouth, and from the place where Ralphs heel had smashed it open had come a gluey torrent of bloody eggs. That was when he had realized that the Kingfish had really been the Queenfish, and only a day or two from roeing. Ralph had stared from this freakish mess to his own bloody, scaleencrusted hand, and then howled like a banshee. When Johnny touched his arm in an effort to calm him, Ralph had bolted. He hadnt stopped running until he got home, and hed refused to come out of his room for the rest of the day. It had been almost a year before hed eaten another piece of fish, and hed never had anything to do with catfish again. Until now, that was. 3 [Ralph!] That was Loiss voice . . . but distant! So distant! [You have to do something right away! Dont let it stop you!] Ralph now realized that what hed taken for an afghan in his mothers lap was actually a mat of bloody eggs in the lap of the Crimson King. It was leaning toward him over this throbbing blanket, its thick lips quivering in a parody of concern. [Something wrong, Ralphie? Where does it hurt? Tell Mother.] [Youre not my mother.] [No  I be the Queenfish! I be loud and I be proud! I got the walk and I got the talk! Actually, I can be whatever I want. You may not know it, but shapechanging is a timehonored custom in Derry.] [Do you know the green man Lois saw?] [Of course! I know all the neighborhood folks!] But Ralph sensed momentary puzzlement on that scaly face. The heat along his forearm cranked up another notch, and Ralph had a sudden realization if Lois were here now, she would hardly be able to see him. The Queenfish was putting out a pulsing, everbrightening glow, and it was gradually surrounding him. The glow was red instead of black, but it was still a deathbag, and now he knew what it was like to be on the inside, caught in a web woven from your sickest fears and most traumatic experiences. There was no way to retreat from it, and no way to cut through it, as he had cut through the deathbag which had surrounded Eds wedding ring. If Im going to escape, Ralph thought, Im going to have to do it by running forward so hard and fast I rip right out the other side. The earring was still in his hand. Now he shifted it so that the naked prong at the back was sticking out between the two fingers a catfish had tried to swallow sixtythree years ago. Then he said a brief prayer, not to God but to Loiss green man. 4 The catfish leaned further forward, a cartoon leer spreading across its noseless face. The teeth inside that flabby grin looked longer and sharper now. Ralph saw drops of colorless fluid beading the ends of the whiskers and thought, Poison. Spend the rest of your life in a wheelchair. Man, Im so scared. Scared to fucking death. Lois, screaming far away [Hurry, Ralph! YOU HAVE TO HURRY!] A little boy was screaming from somewhere a lot closer; screaming and waving his right hand, waving the fish clinging to the fingers buried inside the gullet of a pregnant monster that would not let go. The catfish leaned closer yet. The dress it wore rustled. Ralph could smell his mothers perfume, Saint Elena, mixing obscenely with the fishy, garbagey aroma of bottomfeeder. [I intend Ed Deepneaus errand to end in success, Ralph; I intend that the boy your friends told you about should die in his mothers arms, and I want to see it happen. Ive worked very hard here in Derry, and I dont feel thats too much to ask, but it means I have to finish with you right now. I] Ralph took a step deeper into the things garbagey stink. And now he began to see a shape behind the shape of Mother, behind the shape of the Queenfish. He began to see a bright man, a red man with cold eyes and a merciless mouth. This man resembled the Christ he had seen only moments ago . . . but not the one which had really hung in his mothers kitchen corner. An expression of surprise came into the lidless black eyes of the Queenfish . . . and into the cold eyes of the red man beneath. [What do you think youre doing? Get away from me! Do you want to spend the rest of your life in a wheelchair?] [I can think of worse things, pal  my days of playing first base are pretty definitely over.] The voice rose, becoming the voice of his mother when she was angry. [Pay attention to me, boy! Pay attention and mind me!] For a moment the old commands, given in a voice so eerily like his mothers, made him hesitate. Then he came on again. The Queenfish shrank back in the rocker, its tail flipping up and down below the hem of the old housedress. [JUST WHAT DO YOU THINK YOURE DOING?] [I dont know; maybe I just want to give your whiskers a tug. See for myself if theyre real.] And, exerting all of his willpower to keep from shrieking and fleeing, he reached out with his right hand. Loiss earring felt like a small, warm pebble closed within his fist. Lois herself seemed very close, and Ralph decided that wasnt surprising, considering how much of her aura hed taken on. Perhaps she was even a part of him now. The feeling of her presence was deeply comforting. [No, you dont dare! Youll be paralyzed!] [Catfish arent poisonous  that was the story of a tenyearold boy who might have been even more scared than I was.] Ralph reached for the whiskers with the hand concealing the metal thorn, and the massive, scaly head flinched away, as some part of him had known it would. It began to ripple and change, and its fearful red aura began to seep through. If sickness and pain had a color, Ralph thought, that would be it. And before the change could go any further, before that man he could now see  tall and coldly handsome with his blond hair and glaring red eyes  could step through the shimmer of the illusion it had cast, Ralph drove the sharp point of the earring into one black and bulging fisheye. 5 It made a terrible buzzing sound  like a cicada, Ralph thought  and tried to draw back. Its rapidly flipping tail produced a sound like a fan with a piece of paper caught in the blades. It slid down in the rocker, which was now changing into something that looked like a throne carved from dull orange rock. And then the tail was gone, the Queenfish was gone, and it was the Crimson King sitting there, his handsome face twisted into a snarl of pain and amazement. One of his eyes glared as red as the eye of a lynx in firelight; the other was filled with the fierce, splintered glow of diamonds. Ralph reached into the blanket of eggs with his left hand, ripped it away, and saw nothing but blackness on the other side of the abortion. The other side of the deathbag. The way out. [You were warned, you ShortTime son of a bitch! You think you can pull my whiskers? Well, lets see, shall we? Lets just see!] The Crimson King leaned forward again on its throne, its mouth yawning, its remaining eye blazing with red light. Ralph fought the urge to yank his nowempty right hand away. Instead he pistoned it forward toward the mouth of the Crimson King, which yawned wide to engulf it, as that longago catfish had done that day in the Barrens. Things  not flesh  first squirmed and jostled against his hand, then began to bite like horseflies. At the same time Ralph felt real teeth  no, fangs  sink into his arm. In a moment, two at the most, the Crimson King would bite through his wrist and swallow his hand whole. Ralph closed his eyes and was at once able to find that pattern of thought and concentration which allowed movement between the levels  his pain and his fear were no bar to that. Only this time his purpose was not to move but to trigger. Clotho and Lachesis had planted a boobytrap inside his arm, and the time had come to set it off. Ralph felt that sensation of blink inside his head. The scar on his arm immediately went whitehot and critical. That heat didnt burn Ralph but flew out from him in an expanding ripple of energy. He was aware of a titanic green flash, so bright that for one moment it was as if the Emerald City of Oz had exploded all around him. Something or someone was screaming. That high, jagged sound would have driven him mad if it had gone on for long, but it didnt. It was followed by a vast, hollow bang that made Ralph think of the time he had lit an M80 firecracker and tossed it into a steel culvert. A sudden rush of force blew past him in a fan of wind and fading green light. He caught a strange, skewed glimpse of the Crimson King, no longer handsome and no longer young but ancient and twisted and less human than the strangest creature to ever flop or hop its way along the ShortTime level of existence. Then something above them opened, revealing darkness shot through with conflicting swirls and rays of color. The wind seemed to blow the Crimson King up toward it, like a leaf in a chimneyflue. The colors began to brighten, and Ralph turned his face away, raising one hand to shield his eyes. He understood that a conduit had opened between the level where he was and the unimaginable levels stacked above it; he also understood that if he looked for long into that brightening glow, those (deadlights) swirling colors, then death would be not the worst thing that could happen to him but the best. He did not just squeeze his eyes shut; he squeezed his mind shut. A moment later everything was gone  the creature which had identified itself to Ed as the Crimson King, the kitchen in the old house on Richmond Street, his mothers rocking chair. Ralph was kneeling on thin air about six feet to the right of the Cherokees nose, his hands upraised as an oftbeaten child might raise his hands before the approach of a cruel parent, and when he looked between his knees, he saw the Civic Center and the adjacent parking lot directly below him. At first he thought his eyes were being fooled by an optical illusion, because the arcsodiums in the parking lot seemed to be spreading apart. They almost looked like a crowd of very tall, very skinny people which is starting to break up because the excitement, whatever it was, is over. And the lot itself seemed to be . . . well . . . expanding. Not expanding but getting closer, Ralph thought coldly. Hes going down. Hes started his kamikaze run. 6 For a moment Ralph was frozen in place, enchanted by the simple wonder of his position. He had become a mythical inbetween creature, clearly no god (no god could be as tired and terrified as he was right now) but clearly no such earthbound creature as a man, either. This was what it was really like to fly; to see the earth from above, with no border around it. This [RALPH!] Her scream was like a shotgun fired beside his ear. Ralph flinched from it, and the moment his gaze left the hypnotic sight of the ground swelling up toward him, he was able to move. He rose to his feet and walked back to the plane. He did this as easily and normally as a man walking down a hallway in his own home. No wind buffeted his face or blew his hair back from his brow, and when his left shoulder passed through the Cherokees propeller, the whirling blade harmed him no more than it would have harmed smoke. For a moment he saw Eds pallid, handsome face  the face of the highwayman whod come riding up to the old inn door in the poem which had always made Carolyn cry  and his previous feeling of mingled pity and regret was replaced by anger. It was difficult to become really infuriated with Ed  he was, after all, just another chesspiece being moved across the board  and yet the building he had aimed his airplane at was full of real people. Innocent people. Ralph saw something balky, childish, and willful about the dopey expression of disassociation on Eds face, and as he passed through the thin skin of the cockpit wall, Ralph thought, I think that on some level, Ed, you knew the devil had come in. I think you might even have been able to put him out again . . . didnt Mr C and Mr L say theres always a choice? If there is, you have to own a piece of this, goddam you. For a moment Ralphs head poked through the ceiling as it had done before, and he knelt again. Now the Civic Center filled the entire windshield of the plane and he understood that it was too late to stop Ed from doing something. He had pulled the doorbell free of the tape. He was holding it in his hand. Ralph reached into his pocket and gripped the remaining earring, once again holding it between his fingers with the prong sticking out. He curled his other hand into a tube around the wires running between the cardboard carton and the doorbell. Then he closed his eyes and concentrated, creating that flexing sensation in the middle of his head again. There was a sudden hollow, fluttery sensation in his stomach, and he had time to think Whoa! This is the express elevator! Then he was down on the ShortTime level where there were no gods or devils, no bald doctors with magic scissors and scalpels, no auras. Down where passing through walls and walking away from planecrashes was an impossibility. Down on the ShortTime level where he could be seen . . . and Ed, Ralph realized, was doing just that. Ralph? It was the drugged voice of a man just waking from his lifes soundest sleep. Ralph Roberts? What are you doing here? Oh, I was in the neighborhood and I thought Id drop in, Ralph said. Drag up a rock, so to speak. And with that, he closed his curled hand into a fist and tore the wires out of the box. 7 No! Ed shrieked. Oh no, dont, youll spoil everything! Yes indeed, Ralph thought, then reached over Eds lap to grab the Cherokees controlwheel. The Civic Center was now no more than twelve hundred feet below them, perhaps less. Ralph still didnt know for sure what was in the box strapped to the copilots chair, but he had an idea it was probably the plastique stuff the terrorists always used in the martial arts movies starring Chuck Norris and Steven Seagal. It was supposed to be fairly stable  not like the nitro in Clouzots Wages of Fear, certainly  but this was hardly the time to put his trust in the Gospel of Movieland. And even a stable explosive might go off without a detonator when dropped from a height of almost two miles. He jammed the controlwheel as far over to the left as he could. Below them, the Civic Center began to wheel sickeningly around, as if it had been mounted on the spindle of a gigantic top. No, you bastard! Ed yelled, and something that felt like the head of a small hammer struck Ralph in the side, almost paralyzing him with pain and making it all but impossible to breathe. His hand slid off the controlwheel as Ed hammered him again, this time in the armpit. Ed seized the wheel and yanked it savagely back over. The Civic Center, which had begun to slip toward the side of the windshield, began to rotate back toward dead center. Ralph clawed at the wheel. Ed placed the heel of his hand on Ralphs forehead and shoved him backward. Why couldnt you stay out of it? he snarled. Whyd you have to meddle? His teeth were bared, his lips pulled back in a jealous snarl. Ralphs appearance in the cockpit should have incapacitated him with shock but hadnt. Of course not, hes nuts, Ralph thought, and suddenly raised his interior voice in a panicked yell [Clotho! Lachesis! For Christs sake, help me!] Nothing. It didnt feel as if his shout were going anywhere. And why would it? He was back down on the ShortTime level, and that meant he was on his own. The Civic Center was only eight or nine hundred feet below them now. Ralph could see every brick, every window, every person standing outside  he could almost even tell which ones were carrying signs. They were looking up, trying to figure out what this crazy plane was doing. Ralph couldnt see the fear on their faces, not yet, but in another three or four seconds He launched himself at Ed again, ignoring the throb in his left side and driving his right fist forward, using his thumb to ride the prong of the earring out beyond his fingers as far as possible. The old Earring Gag had worked on the Crimson King, but Ralph had been higher then, and hed had the element of surprise more firmly in hand. He went for the eye this time, too, but Ed snapped his head away at the last moment. The prong drove into the side of his face just above the cheekbone. Ed swatted at it as if it were a gnat, holding on tightly to the controlwheel with his left hand as he did it. Ralph went for the wheel again. Ed lashed out at him. His fist connected above Ralphs left eye, driving him backward. A single loud tone, pure and silvery, filled Ralphs ears. It was as if there were a large tuning fork somewhere in between them, and someone had struck it. The world went as gray and grainy as a newsprint photograph. [RALPH! HURRY!] It was Lois, and now she was in terror. He knew why; time had all but run out. He had maybe ten seconds, twenty at most. He lunged forward again, this time not at Ed but at the picture of Helen and Nat that was taped above the altimeter. He snatched it, held it up . . . and then crumpled it between his fingers. He didnt know exactly what reaction hed hoped for, but the one he got exceeded his wildest hopes. GIVE THEM BACK! Ed screamed. He forgot about the control wheel and groped for the picture instead. As he did, Ralph again saw the man he had glimpsed on the day Ed had beaten Helen  a man who was desperately unhappy and afraid of the forces which had been set loose within him. There were tears not just in his eyes but running down his cheeks, and Ralph thought confusedly Has he been crying all along? GIVE THEM BACK! he bawled again, but Ralph was no longer sure he was the subject of that cry; he thought his former neighbor might be addressing the being which had stepped into his life, looked around itself to make sure it would do, and then simply taken it over. Loiss earring glittered in Eds cheek like a barbaric funerary ornament. GIVE THEM BACK, THEYRE MINE! Ralph held the crumpled photograph just beyond the reach of Eds waving hands. Ed lunged, the seatbelt bit into his gut, and Ralph punched him in the throat as hard as he could, feeling an indescribable mixture of satisfaction and revulsion as the blow landed on the hard, gristly protuberance of Eds Adams apple. Ed fell back against the cockpit wall, eyes bulging with pain and dismay and bewilderment, hands going to his throat. A thick gagging noise came from somewhere deep inside him. It sounded like some heavy piece of machinery in the process of stripping its gears. Ralph shoved himself forward over Eds lap and saw the Civic Center now leaping up toward the airplane. He turned the wheel all the way to the left again and below him  directly below him  the Civic Center again began to rotate toward the side of the Cherokees soontobedefunct windshield . . . but it moved with agonizing slowness. Ralph realized he could smell something in the cockpit  some faint aroma both sweet and familiar. Before he could think what it might be, he saw something that distracted him completely. It was the Hoodsie Ice Cream wagon that sometimes cruised along Harris Avenue, tinkling its cheery little bell. My God, Ralph thought, more in awe than in fear. I think Im going to wind up in the deep freeze, along with the Creamsicles and Hoodsie Rockets. That sweet smell was stronger, and as hands suddenly seized his shoulders, Ralph realized it was Lois Chasses perfume. Come up! she screamed. Ralph, you dummy, you have to He didnt think about it; he just did it. The thing in his mind clenched, the blink happened, and he heard the rest of what she had to say in that eerie, penetrating way that was more thought than speech. [ come up! Push with your feet!] Too late, he thought, but he did as she said nevertheless, planting his feet against the base of the radically canted instrument panel and shoving as hard as he could. He felt Lois rising up through the column of existence with him as the Cherokee shot through the last hundred feet between it and the ground, and as they zoomed upward, he felt a sudden blast of Loispower wrap itself around him and yank him backward like a bungee cord. There was a brief, nauseating sensation of flying in two directions at the same time. Ralph caught a final glimpse of Ed Deepneau slumped against the sidewall of the cockpit, but in a very real sense he did not see him at all. The thunderstruck yellowgray aura was gone.


Ed was also gone, buried in a deathbag as black as midnight in hell. Then he and Lois were falling as well as flying. CHAPTER THIRTY 1 Just before the explosion came, Susan Day, standing in a hot white spotlight at the front of the Civic Center and now living through the last few seconds of her fabulous, provocative life, was saying I havent come to Derry to heal you, hector you, or to incite you, but to mourn with you  this is a situation which has passed far beyond political considerations. There is no right in violence, nor refuge in selfrighteousness. I am here to ask that you put your positions and your rhetoric aside and help each other find a way to help each other. To turn away from the attractions of The high windows lining the south side of the auditorium suddenly lit up with a brilliant white glare and then blew inward. 2 The Cherokee missed the Hoodsie wagon, but that didnt save it. The plane took one final halfturn in the air and then screwed itself into the parking lot about twentyfive feet from the fence where, earlier that day, Lois had paused to yank up her troublesome halfslip. The wings snapped off. The cockpit made a quick and violent journey back through the passenger section. The fuselage blew out with the fury of a bottle of champagne in a microwave oven. Glass flew. The tail bent over the Cherokees body like the stinger of a dying scorpion and impaled itself in the roof of a Dodge van with the words PROTECT WOMENS RIGHT TO CHOOSE! stencilled on the side. There was a bright and bitter crunchclang that sounded like a dropped pile of scrap iron. Holy shi  one of the cops posted on the edge of the parking lot began, and then the C4 inside the cardboard box flew free like a big gray glob of phlegm and struck the remains of the instrument panel where several hot wires rammed into it like hypo needles. The plastique exploded with an earcrunching thud, flashfrying the Bassey Park racetrack and turning the parking lot into a hurricane of white light and shrapnel. John Leydecker, who had been standing under the Civic Centers cement canopy and talking to a State cop, was thrown through one of the open doors and all the way across the lobby. He struck the far wall and fell unconscious into the shattered glass from the harnessracing trophy case. At that, he was luckier than the man with whom he had been standing; the State cop was thrown into the post between two of the open doors and chopped in half. The ranks of cars actually shielded the Civic Center from the worst of the hammering, concussive blow, but that blessing would only be counted later. Inside, over two thousand people at first sat stunned, unsure of what they should do and even more unsure of what most of them had just seen Americas most famous feminist decapitated by a jagged chunk of flying glass. Her head went flying into the sixth row like some strange white bowling ball with a blonde wig pasted on it. They didnt erupt into panic until the lights went out. 3 Seventyone people were killed in the trampling, panicked rush to the exits, and the next days Derry News would trumpet the event with a fortyeightpoint scare headline, calling it a terrible tragedy. Ralph Roberts could have told them that, all things considered, they had gotten off lucky. Very lucky, indeed. 4 Halfway up the north balcony, a woman named Sonia Danville  a woman with the bruises of the last beating any man would ever give her still fading from her face  sat with her arms around the shoulders of her son, Patrick. Patricks McDonalds poster, showing Ronald and Mayor McCheese and the Hamburglar dancing the BootScootin Boogie just outside a drivethru window, was on his lap, but he had hardly done more than color the golden arches before turning the poster over to the blank side. It wasnt that he had lost interest; it was just that hed had an idea for a picture of his own, and it had come as such ideas often did to him, with the force of a compulsion. He had spent most of the day thinking about what had happened in the cellar at High Ridge  the smoke, the heat, the frightened women, and the two angels that had come to save them  but his splendid idea banished these disturbing thoughts, and he fell to work with silent enthusiasm. Soon Patrick felt almost as if he were living in the world he was drawing with his Crayolas. He was an amazingly competent artist already, only four years old or not (My little genius, Sonia sometimes called him), and his picture was much better than the coloritin poster on the other side of the sheet. What he had managed before the lights went out was work a gifted firstyear art student might have been proud of. In the middle of the postersheet, a tower of dark, sootcolored stone rose into a blue sky dotted with fat white clouds. Surrounding it was a field of roses so red they almost seemed to clamor aloud. Standing off to one side was a man dressed in faded blue jeans. A pair of gunbelts crossed his flat middle; a holster hung below each hip. At the very top of the tower, a man in a red robe was looking down at the gunfighter with an expression of mingled hate and fear. His hands, which were curled over the parapet, also appeared to be red. Sonia had been mesmerized by the presence of Susan Day, who was sitting behind the lectern and listening to her introduction, but she had happened to glance down at her sons picture just before the introduction ended. She had known for two years that Patrick was what the child psychologists called a prodigy, and she sometimes told herself she had gotten used to his sophisticated drawings and the PlayDoh sculptures he called the Clay Family. Perhaps she even had to some degree, but this particular picture gave her a strange, deep chill that she could not entirely dismiss as emotional fallout from her long and stressful day. Whos that? she asked, tapping the tiny figure peering jealously down from the top of the dark tower. Hims the Red King, Patrick said. Oh, the Red King, I see. And whos this man with the guns? As he opened his mouth to answer, Roberta Harper, the woman at the podium, lifted her left arm (there was a black mourning band on it) toward the woman sitting behind her. My friends, Ms Susan Day! she cried, and Patrick Danvilles answer to his mothers second question was lost in the rising storm of applause. Hims name is Roland, Mama. I dream about him, sometimes. Hims a King, too. 5 Now the two of them sat in the dark with their ears ringing, and two thoughts ran through Sonias mind like rats chasing each other on a treadmill Wont this day ever end, I knew I shouldnt have brought him, wont this day ever end, I knew I shouldnt have brought him, wont this day Mommy, youre scrunching my picture! Patrick said. He sounded a little out of breath, and Sonia realized she must be scrunching him, too. She eased up a little. A tattered skein of screams, shouts, and babbled questions came from the dark pit below them, where the people rich enough to pony up fifteendollar donations had been seated in folding chairs. A rough howl of pain cut through this babble, making Sonia jump in her seat. The thudding crump which had followed the initial explosion had pressed in painfully on their ears and shaken the building. The blasts which were still going on  cars exploding like firecrackers in the parking lot  sounded small and inconsequential in comparison, but Sonia felt Patrick flinch against her with each one. Stay calm, Pat, she told him. Something bads happened, but I think it happened outside. Because her eyes had been drawn to the bright glare in the windows, Sonia had mercifully missed seeing her heroines head leaving her shoulders, but she knew that somehow lightning had struck in the same place (shouldnt have brought him, shouldnt have brought him) and that at least some of the people below them were panicking. If she panicked, she and Young Rembrandt were going to be in serious trouble. But Im not going to. I didnt get out of that deathbox this morning just to panic now. Ill be goddamned if I will. She reached down and took one of Patricks hands  the one that wasnt clutching his picture. It was very cold. Do you think the angels will come to save us again, Mama? he asked in a voice that quivered slightly. Nah, she said. I think this time we better do it ourselves. But we can do that. I mean, were all right now, arent we? Yes, he said, but then slumped against her. She had a terrible moment when she was sure he had fainted and shed have to carry him from the Civic Center in her arms, but then he straightened up again. My books was on the floor, he said. I didnt want to leave without my books, especially the one about the boy who cant take off his hat. Are we leaving. Mama? Yes. As soon as people stop running around. Therell be lights in the halls, ones that run on batteries, even though the ones in here are out. When I say, were going to get up and walk  walk!  up the steps to the door. Im not going to carry you, but Im going to walk right behind you with both my hands on your shoulders. Do you understand, Pat? Yes, Mama. No questions. No blubbering. Just his books, thrust into her hands for safekeeping. He held onto the picture himself. She gave him a quick hug and kissed his cheek. They waited in their seats five minutes by her slow count to three hundred. She sensed that most of their immediate neighbors were gone before she got to a hundred and fifty, but she made herself wait. She could now see a little, enough for her to believe that something was burning fiercely outside, but on the far side of the building. That was very lucky. She could hear the warblewail of approaching police cars, ambulances, and firetrucks. Sonia got to her feet. Come on. Keep right in front of me. Pat Danville stepped into the aisle with his mothers hands pressed firmly down on his shoulders. He led her up the steps toward the dim yellow lights which marked the north balcony corridor, stopping only once as the dark shape of a running man hurtled toward them. His mothers hands tightened on his shoulders as she yanked him aside. Goddam righttolifers! the running man cried. Fucking selfrighteous turds! Id like to kill them all! Then he was gone and Pat began walking up the stairs again. She felt a calmness in him now, a centered lack of fear, that touched her heart with love, and with some queer darkness, as well. He was so different, her son, so special . . . but the world did not love people like that. The world tried to root them out, like tares from a garden. They emerged at last into the corridor. A few deeply shocked people wandered back and forth, eyes dazed and mouths agape, like zombies in a horror movie. Sonia hardly glanced at them, just got Pat moving toward the stairs. Three minutes later they exited into the fireshot night perfectly unscathed, and upon all the levels of the universe, matters both Random and Purposeful resumed their ordained courses. Worlds which had trembled for a moment in their orbits now steadied, and in one of those worlds, in a desert that was the apotheosis of all deserts, a man named Roland turned over in his bedroll and slept easily once again beneath the alien constellations. 6 Across town, in Strawford Park, the door of the Portosan marked MEN blew open. Lois Chasse and Ralph Roberts came flying out backwards in a haze of smoke, clutching each other. From within came the sound of the Cherokee hitting and then the plastique exploding. There was a flash of white light and the toilets blue walls bulged outward, as if some giant had hammered them with his fists. A second later they heard the explosion all over again; this time it came rolling across the open air. The second version was fainter, but somehow more real. Loiss feet stuttered and she thumped to the grass of the lower hillside with a cry which was partly relief. Ralph landed beside her, then pushed himself up to a sitting position. He stared unbelievingly at the Civic Center, where a fist of fire was now clenched on the horizon. A purple lump the size of a doorknob was rising on his forehead, where Ed had hit him. His left side still throbbed, but he thought maybe the ribs in there were only sprung, not broken. [Lois, are you all right?] She looked at him uncomprehendingly for a moment, then began to feel at her face and neck and shoulders. There was something so perfectly, sweetly Our Lois about this examination that Ralph laughed. He couldnt help it. Lois smiled tentatively back at him. [I think Im fine. In fact, Im quite sure I am.] [What were you doing there? You could have been killed!] Lois, appearing somewhat rejuvenated (Ralph guessed that the handy wino had had something to do with that) looked him in the eye. [I may be oldfashioned, Ralph, but if you think Im going to spend the next twenty years or so fainting and fluttering like the heroines best friend in those Regency romances my friend Minas always reading, you better pick another woman to chum around with.] He gaped for a moment, then pulled her to her feet and hugged her. Lois hugged back. She was incredibly warm, incredibly there. Ralph reflected for a moment on the similarities between loneliness and insomnia  how they were both insidious, cumulative, and divisive, the friends of despair and the enemies of love  and then he pushed those thoughts aside and kissed her. Clotho and Lachesis, who had been standing at the top of the hill and looking as anxious as workmen who have wagered their Christmas bonuses on a prizefight underdog, now rushed down to where Ralph and Lois stood with their foreheads once more pressed together, looking into each others eyes like lovestruck teenagers. From the far side of the Barrens, the sound of sirens rose like voices heard in uneasy dreams. The pillar of fire which marked the grave of Ed Deepneaus obsession was now too bright to look at without squinting. Ralph could hear the faint sound of cars exploding, and he thought of his car sitting abandoned somewhere out in the williwags. He decided that was okay. He was too old to drive. 7 Clotho [Are you both all right?] Ralph [Were fine. Lois reeled me in. She saved my life.] Lachesis [Yes. We saw her go in. It was very brave.] Also very perplexing, right, Mr L? Ralph thought. You saw it and you admire it . . . but I dont think you have any idea of how or why she could bring herself to do it. I think that, to you and your friend, the concept of rescue must seem almost as foreign as the idea of love. For the first time, Ralph felt a kind of pity for the little bald doctors, and understood the central irony of their lives they were aware that the ShortTimers whose existences they had been sent to prune lived powerful inner lives, but they did not in the least comprehend the reality of those lives, the emotions which drove them, or the actions  sometimes noble, sometimes foolish  which resulted. Mr C and Mr L had studied their ShortTime charges as certain rich but timid Englishmen had studied the maps brought back by the explorers of the Victorian Age, explorers who had in many cases been funded by these same rich but timid men. With their clipped nails and soft fingers the philanthropists had traced paper rivers upon which they would never ride and paper jungles through which they would never safari. They lived in fearful perplexity and passed it off as imagination. Clotho and Lachesis had drafted them, and had used them with a certain crude effectiveness, but they understood neither the joy of risk nor the sorrow of loss  the best they had been able to manage in the way of emotion was a nagging fear that Ralph and Lois would try to take on the Crimson Kings pet research chemist directly and be swatted like elderly flies for their pains. The little bald doctors lived long lives, but Ralph suspected that, brilliant dragonfly auras notwithstanding, they were gray lives. He looked at their unlined, oddly childish faces from the safe haven of Loiss arms and remembered how terrified of them he had been when he had first seen them coming out of May Lochers house in the early hours of the morning. Terror, he had since discovered, could not survive mere acquaintanceship, let alone knowledge, and now he had some of both. Clotho and Lachesis returned his gaze with an uneasiness Ralph found he had absolutely no urge to allay. It seemed very right to him, somehow, that they should feel the way they were feeling. Ralph [Yes, shes very brave and I love her very much and I think well make each other very happy until] He broke off, and Lois stirred in his arms. He realized with a mixture of amusement and relief that she had been half asleep. [Until what, Ralph?] [Until you name it. I guess that theres always an until when youre a ShortTimer, and maybe thats okay.] Lachesis [Well, I guess this is goodbye.] Ralph grinned in spite of himself, reminded of The Lone Ranger radio program, where almost every episode had ended with some version of that line. He reached out toward Lachesis and was sourly amused to see the little man recoil from him. Ralph [Wait a minute . . . lets not be so hasty, fellas.] Clotho, with a tinge of apprehension [Is something wrong?] [I dont think so, but after getting popped in the head, popped in the ribs, and then damned near roasted alive, I think I have a right to make sure that its really over. Is it? Is your boy safe?] Clotho, smiling and clearly relieved [Yes. Cant you feel it? Eighteen years from now, just before his death, the boy is going to save the lives of two men who would otherwise die . . . and one of those men must not die, if the balance between the Random and the Purpose is to be maintained.] Lois [Never mind all that. I just want to know if we can go back to being regular ShortTimers again.] Lachesis [Not only can, Lois, but must. If you and Ralph were to stay up here much longer, you wouldnt be able to go back down.] Ralph felt Lois press more tightly against him. [I wouldnt like that.] Clotho and Lachesis turned toward each other and a subtle, perplexed glance  how could anybody not like it up here? their eyes asked  passed between them before they turned back to Ralph and Lois. Lachesis [We really must be going. Im sorry, but] Ralph [Hold on, neighbors  youre not going anywhere yet.] They looked at him apprehensively while Ralph slowly pushed up the sleeve of his sweater  the cuff was now stiff with some fluid, perhaps catfish ichor, that he found he did not want to think about  and showed them the white, knotted line of scar on his forearm. [Put away the constipated looks, guys. I just want to remind you that you gave me your word. Dont forget that part of it.] Clotho, with obvious relief [You can depend on it, Ralph. What was your weapon is now our bond. The promise will not be forgotten.] Ralph was beginning to believe it really was over. And, crazy as it seemed, part of him regretted it. Now it was real life  life as it went on on the floors below this level  that seemed almost like a mirage, and he understood what Lachesis had meant when he told them that they would never be able to return to their normal lives if they stayed up here much longer. Lachesis [We really must go. Fare you well, Ralph and Lois. We will never forget the service you have rendered us.] Ralph [Did we ever have a choice? Did we really?] Lachesis, very softly [We told you so, didnt we? For ShortTimers there is always a choice. We find that frightening . . . but we also find it beautiful.] Ralph [Say  do you fellows ever shake hands?] Clotho and Lachesis glanced at each other, startled, and Ralph sensed some quick dialogue flashing between them in a kind of telepathic shorthand. When they looked back at Ralph, they wore identical nervous smiles  the smiles of teenage boys who have decided that if they cant find enough courage to ride the big rollercoaster at the amusement park this summer, they will never truly be men. Clotho [We have observed this custom many times, of course, but no  we have never shaken hands.] Ralph looked at Lois and saw she was smiling . . . but he thought he saw a shimmer of tears in her eyes, as well. He offered his hand to Lachesis first, because Mr L seemed marginally less jumpy than his colleague. [Put er there, Mr L.] Lachesis looked at Ralphs hand for so long that Ralph began to think he wasnt going to be able to actually do it, although he clearly wanted to. Then, timidly, he put out his own small hand and allowed Ralphs larger one to close over it. There was a tingling vibration in Ralphs flesh as their auras first mingled, then merged . . . and in that merging he saw a series of swift, beautiful silver patterns. They reminded him of the Japanese characters on Eds scarf. He pumped Lachesiss hand twice, slowly and formally, then released it. Lachesiss look of apprehension had been replaced by a large goony smile. He turned to his partner. [His force is almost completely unguarded during this ceremony! I felt it! Its quite wonderful!] Clotho inched his own hand out to meet Ralphs, and in the instant before they touched, Mr C closed his eyes like a man expecting a painful injection. Lachesis, meanwhile, was shaking hands with Lois and grinning like a vaudeville hoofer taking an encore. Clotho appeared to steel himself, then seized Ralphs hand. He flagged it once, firmly. Ralph grinned. [Take her easy, Mr C.] Clotho withdrew his hand. He seemed to be searching for the proper response. [Thank you, Ralph. I will take her any way I can get her. Correct?] Ralph burst out laughing. Clotho, now turning to shake hands with Lois, gave him a puzzled smile, and Ralph clapped him on the back. [You got it right, Mr C  absolutely right.] He slipped his arm around Lois and gave the little bald doctors a final curious look. [Ill be seeing you fellows again, wont I?] Clotho [Yes, Ralph.] Ralph [Well, thats fine. About seventy years from now would be good for me; why dont you boys just put it down on your calendar?] They responded with the smiles of politicians, which didnt surprise him much. Ralph gave them a little bow, then put his arms around Loiss shoulders and watched as Mr C and Mr L walked slowly down the hill. Lachesis opened the door of the slightly warped Portosan marked MEN; Clotho stood in the open doorway of WOMEN. Lachesis smiled and waved. Clotho lifted the longbladed scissors in a queer sort of salute. Ralph and Lois waved back. The bald doctors stepped inside and closed the doors. Lois wiped her streaming eyes and turned to Ralph. [Is that it? It is, isnt it?] Ralph nodded. [What do we do now?] He held out his arm. [May I see you home, madam?] Smiling, she clasped his forearm just below the elbow. [Thank you, sir. You may.] They left Strawford Park that way, returning to the ShortTime level as they came out on Harris Avenue, slipping back down to their normal place in the scheme of things with no fuss or bother  without, in fact, even being aware they were doing it until it was done. 8 Derry groaned with panic and sweated with excitement. Sirens wailed, people shouted from secondstorey windows to friends on the sidewalks below, and on every streetcorner people had clustered to watch the fire on the other side of the valley. Ralph and Lois paid no attention to the tumult and hooraw. They walked slowly up UpMile Hill, increasingly aware of their exhaustion; it seemed to come piling into them like softly thrown bags of sand. The pool of white light marking the Red Apple Stores parking lot seemed an impossible distance away, although Ralph knew it was only three blocks, and short ones, at that. To make matters worse, the temperature had dropped a good fifteen degrees since that morning, the wind was blowing hard, and neither of them was dressed for the weather. Ralph suspected this might be the leading edge of autumns first big gale, and that in Derry, Indian summer was over. Faye Chapin, Don Veazie, and Stan Eberly came hurrying down the hill toward them, obviously bound for Strawford Park. The fieldglasses Old Dor sometimes used to watch planes taxi, land, and take off were bouncing around Fayes neck. With Don, who was balding and heavy set, in the middle, their resemblance to a more famous trio was inescapable. The Three Stooges of the Apocalypse, Ralph thought, and grinned. Ralph! Faye exclaimed. He was breathing fast, almost panting. The wind blew his hair into his eyes and he raked it back impatiently. Goddam Civic Center blew up! Someone bombed it from a light plane! We heard theres a thousand people dead! I heard about the same, Ralph agreed gravely. In fact, Lois and I have just been down at the park, having a look. You can see straight across the valley from there, you know. Christ, I know that, Ive lived here all my damn life, havent I? Where do you think were going? Come on back with us! Lois and I were just headed up to her house to see what theyve got about it on TV. Maybe well join you later. Okay, we  jeeperscreepers, Ralph, whatd you do to your head? For a moment Ralph drew a blank  what had he done to his head?  and then, in an instant of nightmarish recall, he saw Eds snarling mouth and mad eyes. Oh no, dont, Ed had screamed at him. Youll spoil everything. We were running to get a better look and Ralph ran into a tree, Lois said. Hes lucky not to be in the hospital. Don laughed at that, but in the halfdistracted manner of a fellow who has bigger fish to fry. Faye wasnt paying attention to them at all. Stan Eberly was, however, and Stan didnt laugh. He was looking at them with close, puzzled curiosity. Lois, he said. What? Did you know youve got a sneaker tied to your wrist? She looked down at it. Ralph looked down at it. Then Lois looked up and gave Stan a dazzling, eyefrying smile. Yes! she said. Its an interesting look, isnt it? Sort of a . . . a lifesized charm bracelet! Yeah, Stan said. Sure. But he wasnt looking at the sneaker anymore; now he was looking at Loiss face. Ralph wondered how in hell they were going to explain how they looked tomorrow, when there were no shadows between the streetlights to hide them. Come on! Faye cried impatiently. Lets get going! They hurried off (Stan gave them one last doubtful glance over his shoulder as they went). Ralph listened after them, almost expecting Don Veazie to give out a nyucknyuck or two. Boy, that sounded so dumb, Lois said, but I had to say something, didnt I? You did fine. Well, when I open my mouth, something always seems to fall out, she said. Its one of my two great talents, the other being the ability to clean out an entire Whitmans Sampler during a twohour TV movie. She untied Helens sneaker and looked at it. Shes safe, isnt she? Yes, Ralph agreed, and reached for the sneaker. As he did, he realized he already had something in his left hand. The fingers had been clamped down so long that they were creaky and reluctant to open. When they finally did, he saw the marks of his nails pressed into the flesh of his palm. The first thing he was aware of was that, while his own wedding ring was still in its accustomed place, Eds was gone. It had seemed a perfect fit, but apparently it had slipped off his finger at some point during the last half an hour, just the same. Maybe not, a voice whispered, and Ralph was amused to realize that it wasnt Carolyns this time. This time the voice in his head belonged to Bill McGovern. Maybe it just disappeared. You know, poof. But he didnt think so. He had an idea that Eds wedding band might have been invested with powers that hadnt necessarily died with Ed. The Ring Bilbo Baggins had found and reluctantly given up to his grandson, Frodo, had had a way of going where it wanted to . . . and when. Perhaps Eds ring wasnt all that different. Before he could consider this idea further, Lois traded Helens sneaker for the thing in his hand a small stiff crumple of paper. She smoothed it out and looked at it. Her curiosity slowly changed to solemnity. I remember this picture, she said. The big one was on the mantel in their living room, in a fancy gold frame. It had pride of place. Ralph nodded. This must have been the one he carried in his wallet. It was taped to the instrument panel of the plane. Until I took it, he was beating me, and not even breathing hard while he did it. Grabbing his picture was all I could think of to do. When I did, his focus switched from the Civic Center to them. The last thing I heard him say was Give them back, theyre mine. And was he talking to you when he said it? Ralph stuck the sneaker into his back pocket and shook his head. Nope. Dont think so. Helen was at the Civic Center tonight, wasnt she? Yes. Ralph thought of how she had looked out at High Ridge  her pale face and smokereddened, watering eyes. If they stop us now, they win, shed said. Dont you see that? And now he did see. He took the picture from Loiss hand, crumpled it up again, and walked over to the litterbasket which stood on the corner of Harris Avenue and Kossuth Lane. Well get another picture of them sometime, one we can keep on our own mantel. Something not quite so formal. This one, though . . . I dont want it. He tossed the little ball of paper at the litterbasket, an easy shot, two feet at the most, but the wind picked that moment to gust and the crumpled photo of Helen and Natalie which had been taped above the altimeter of Eds plane flew away on its cold breath. The two of them watched it whirl up into the sky, almost hypnotized. It was Lois who looked away first. She glanced at Ralph with a trace of a smile curving her lips. Did I hear a backhand proposal of marriage from you, or am I just tired? she asked. He opened his mouth to reply and another gust of wind struck them, this one so hard it made them both wince their eyes shut. When he opened his, Lois had already started up the hill again. Anythings possible, Lois, he said. I know that now. 9 Five minutes later, Loiss key rattled in the lock of her front door. She led Ralph inside and shut it firmly behind them, closing out the windy, contentious night. He followed her into the living room and would have stopped there, but Lois never hesitated. Still holding his hand, not quite pulling him along (but perhaps meaning to do so if he began to lag), she showed him into her bedroom. He looked at her. Lois looked calmly back . . . and suddenly he felt the blink happen again. He watched her aura bloom around her like a gray rose. It was still diminished, but it was already coming back, reknitting itself, healing itself. [Lois, are you sure this is what you want?] [Of course it is! Did you think I was going to give you a pat on the head and send you home after all weve been through?] Suddenly she smiled  a wickedly mischievous smile. [Besides, Ralph  do you really feel like getting up to dickens tonight? Tell me the truth. Better still, dont flatter me.] He considered it, then laughed and drew her into his arms. Her mouth was sweet and slightly moist, like the skin of a ripe peach. That kiss seemed to tingle through his entire body, but the sensation was most concentrated in his mouth, where it felt almost like an electric shock. When their lips parted, he felt more excited than ever . . . but he also felt queerly drained. [What if I say I do, Lois? What if I say I do want to get up to dickens?] She stood back and looked at him critically, as if trying to decide whether he meant what he said or if it was just the usual male bluff and brag. At the same time her hands went to the buttons of her dress. As she began to slip them free, Ralph noticed a wonderful thing she looked younger again. Not forty by any stretch of the imagination, but surely no more than fifty . . . and a young fifty. It had been the kiss, of course, and the really amusing thing was he didnt think she had the slightest idea that she had added a helping of Ralph to her earlier helping of wino. And what was wrong with that? She finished her inspection, leaned forward, and kissed his cheek.