Part 3 (1/2)
It was, of course, the cruelest thing he could have said, the source of his power over me and the reason I was with him-other than the fact that I liked him, I mean. It was the thing I feared most, in general, no matter where I was.
”That bell ...” I said, thinking of the dog's head-cane, that deep and frozen voice, but thinking more, somehow, about my friend, rocketing away from us now at incomprehensible speed. Because that's what he seemed to be doing, to me.
”Wouldn't it be great?” said Peter. And then, unexpectedly, he grinned at me. He would never forget I was there, I realized. Couldn't. I was all he had.
He turned and walked straight across the gra.s.s. The Mack sisters and Mr. Andersz followed, all of them seeming to float in the long, wet green like seabirds skimming the surface of the ocean. I did not go with them. I had the feel of Jenny's fingers in mine, and the sounds of flapping paper and whirling leaves in my ears, and Peter's last, surprising smile floating in front of my eyes, and it was enough, too much, an astonis.h.i.+ng Halloween.
”This thing's freezing,” I heard Peter say, while his father and the Macks fanned out around him, facing the house and me. He was facing away, toward the trees. ”Feel this.” He held the tongue of the bell toward Kelly Mack, but she'd gone silent, now, watching him, and she shook her head.
”Ready or not,” he said. Then he reared back and rammed the bell-tongue home.
Instinctively, I flung my hands up to my ears, but the effect was disappointing, particularly to Peter. It sounded like a dinner bell, high, a little tinny, something that might call kids or a dog out of the water or the woods at bedtime. Peter slammed the tongue against the side of the bell one more time, dropped it, and the peal floated away over the Sound, dissipating into the salt air like seagull-cry.
For a few breaths, barely any time at all, we all stood where we were. Then Jenny Mack said, ”Oh.” I saw her hand snake out, grab her sister's, and her sister looked up, right at me, I thought. The two Macks stared at each other. Then they were gone, hurtling across the yard, straight across that wide-open white eye, flying toward the forest.
Peter whirled, looked at me, and his mouth opened, a little. I couldn't hear him, but I saw him murmur, ”Wow,” and a new smile exploded, one I couldn't even fathom, and he was gone, too, sprinting for the trees, pa.s.sing the Macks as they all vanished into the shadows.
”Uh,” said Mr. Andersz, backing, backing, and his expression confused me most of all. He was almost laughing. ”I'm so sorry,” he said. ”We didn't realize ...” He turned and chased after his son. And still, somehow, I thought they'd all been looking at me, until I heard the single, sharp thud from the porch behind me. Wood hitting wood. Cane-into-wood.
I didn't turn around. Not then. What for? I knew what was behind me. Even so, I couldn't get my legs to move, quite, not until I heard a second thud, closer, this time, as though the thing on the porch had stepped fully out of the house, making its slow, steady way toward me. Stumbling, I kicked myself forward, put a hand down in the wet gra.s.s and the mud closed over it like a mouth. When I jerked it free, it made a disappointed, sucking sort of sound, and I heard a sort of sigh behind me, another thud, and I ran, all the way to the woods.
Hours later, we were still huddled together in the Andersz's kitchen, wolfing down Ho Hos and hot chocolate. Jenny and Kelly and Peter kept laughing, erupting into cloudbursts of excited conversation, laughing some more. Mr. Andersz laughed, too, as he boiled more water and spooned marshmallows into our mugs and told us.
The man the bell had called forth, he said, was Mr. Paars's brother. He'd been coming for years, taking care of Mr. Paars after he got too sick to look after himself, because he refused to move into a rest-home or even his brother's home.
”The Lincoln,” Peter said, and Mr. Andersz nodded.
”G.o.d, poor man. He must have been inside when you all got there. He must have thought you were coming to rob the place, or vandalize it, and he went out back.”