Charles Halloway placed forth a map of the town and drew in the location of the carnival with a blunt pencil.

“Do we keep hiding out? No. With Miss Foley, and so many others involved, we just can’t. Well, then, how do we attack so we won’t be picked off first thing? What kind of weapons—”

“Silver bullets!” cried Will, suddenly.

“Heck, no!” snorted Jim. “They’re not vampires!”

“If we were Catholic, we could borrow church holy water and—”

“Nuts,” said Jim. “Movie stuff. It don’t happen that way in real life. Am I wrong, Mr. Halloway?”

“I wish you were, boy.”

Will’s eyes glowed fiercely. “Okay. Only one thing to do: trot down to the meadow with a couple gallons of kerosene and some matches—”

“That’s against the law!” Jim exclaimed.

“Look who’s talking!”

“Hold on!”

But everyone stopped right then.

Whisper.

A faint tide of wind flowed up along through the library corridors and into this room.

“The front door,” Jim whispered. “Someone just opened it.”

Far away, a gentle click. The draft that had for a moment stirred the boys’ trouser cuffs and blown the man’s hair, ceased.

“Someone just closed it.”

Silence.

Just the great dark library with its labyrinths and hedgerow mazes of sleeping books.

“Someone’s inside.”

The boys half rose, bleating in the backs of their mouths.

Charles Halloway waited, then said one word, softly:

“Hide.”

“We can’t leave you—”

“Hide.”

The boys ran and vanished in the dark maze. Charles Halloway then rigidly, slowly, breathing in, breathing out, forced himself to sit back down, his eyes on the yellowed newspapers, to wait, to wait, then again… to wait some more.

A shadow moved among shadows.

Charles Halloway felt his soul submerge.

It took a long time for the shadow and the man it escorted to come stand in the doorway of the room. The shadow seemed deliberate in its slowness so as to shingle his flesh and cheesegrate his steadily willed calm. And when at last the shadow reached the door it brought not one, not a hundred, but a thousand people with it to look in.

“My name is Dark,” said the voice.

Charles Halloway let out two fistfuls of air.

“Better known as the Illustrated Man,” said the voice. “Where are the boys?”

“Boys?” Will’s father turned at last to appraise the tall man who stood in the door.

The Illustrated Man sniffed the yellow pollen that whiffed up from the ancient books as quite suddenly Will’s father saw them laid out in full sight, leaped up, stopped, then began to close them, one by one, as casually as possible.

The Illustrated Man pretended not to notice.

“The boys are not home. The two houses are empty. What a shame, they’ll miss those free rides.”

“I wish I knew where they were.” Charles Halloway started carrying the books to the shelves. “Hell, if they knew you were here with free tickets, they’d shout for joy.”

“Would they?” Mr. Dark let his smile melt like a white and pink paraffin candy toy he no longer had appetite for. Softly, he said, “I could kill you.”

Charles Halloway nodded, walking slowly.

“Did you hear what I said?” barked the Illustrated Man.

“Yes.” Charles Halloway weighed the books, as if they were his judgment. “But you won’t kill now. You’re too smart. You’ve kept the show on the road a long time, being smart.”

“So you’ve read a few papers and think you know all about us?”

“No, not all. Just enough to scare me.”

“Be more scared then,” said the crowd of night-crawling illustrations locked under black suiting, speaking through the thin lips. “One of my friends, outside, can fix you so it seems you died of most natural heart failure.”

The blood banged at Charles Halloway’s heart, knocked at his temples, tapped twice at his wrists.

The Witch, he thought.

His lips must have formed the words.

“The Witch.” Mr. Dark nodded.

The other shelved the books, withholding one.

“Well, what have you there?” Mr. Dark squinted. “A Bible? How very charming, how childish and refreshingly old-fashioned.”

“Have you ever read it, Mr. Dark?”

“Read it! I’ve had every page, paragraph, and word read at me, sir!” Mr. Dark took time to light a cigarette and blow smoke toward the NO SMOKING sign, then at Will’s father. “Do you really imagine that books can harm me? Is naiveté really your armor? Here!”

And before Charles Halloway could move, Mr. Dark ran lightly forward and took the Bible. He held it in his two hands.

“Aren’t you surprised? See, I touch, hold, even read from it.”

Mr. Dark blew smoke on the pages as he riffled them.

“Do you expect me to fall away into so many Dead Sea scrolls of flesh before you? Myths, unfortunately, are just that. Life, and by life I could mean so many fascinating things, goes on, makes shift for itself, survives wildly, and I not the least wild among many. Your King James and his literary version of some rather stuffy poetic materials is worth just about this much of my time and sweat.”

Mr. Dark hurled the Bible into a wastepaper basket and did not look at it again.

“I hear your heart beating rapidly,” said Mr. Dark. “My ears are not so finely tuned as the Gypsy’s, but they hear. Your eyes jump beyond my shoulder. The boys hide out there in the warrens? Good. I would not wish for their escape. Not that anyone will believe their gibberings, in fact it’s good advertisement for our shows, people titillate, night-sweat, then come prowling down to look us over, lick their lips, and wonder about investing in our special securities. You came, you prowled, and it wasn’t just for curiosity. How old are you?”

Charles Halloway pressed his lips shut.

“Fifty?” purred Mr. Dark. “Fifty-one?” he murmured.

“Fifty-two? Like to be younger?”

“No!”

“No need to yell. Politely, please.” Mr. Dark hummed, strolling the room, running his hand over the books as if they were years to be counted. “Oh, it’s nice to be young really. Wouldn’t forty be nice, again? Forty’s ten years nicer than fifty, and thirty’s twenty years nicer by an incredible long shot.”

“I won’t listen!” Charles Halloway shut his eyes.

Mr. Dark tilted his head, sucked on his cigarette, and observed. “Strange, you shut your eyes, not to listen. Clapping your hands over your ears would be better—”

Will’s father clapped his hands to his ears, but the voice came through.

“Tell you what,” said Mr. Dark, casually, waving his cigarette. “If you help me within fifteen seconds I’ll give you your fortieth birthday. Ten seconds and you can celebrate thirty-five. A rare young age. A stripling, almost, by comparison. I’ll start counting by my watch and by God, if you should jump to it, lend a hand, I might just cut thirty years off your life! Bargains galore, as the posters say of it! Starting all over again, everything fine and new and glorious, all the things to be done and thought and savored again. Last chance! Here goes. One, Two. Three. Four—”

Charles Halloway hunched away, half crouched, propped hard against the shelves, grinding his teeth to drown the sound of counting.

“You’re losing out, old man, my dear old fellow,” said Mr. Dark. “Five. Losing. Six. Losing very much. Seven. Really losing. Eight. Frittering away. Nine. Ten. My God, you fool! Eleven. Halloway! Twelve. Almost gone. Thirteen! Gone! Fourteen! Lost! Fifteen! Lost forever!”

Mr. Dark put down his arm with the watch on it.

Charles Halloway, gasping, had turned away to bury his face in the smell of ancient books, the feel of old and comfortable leather, the taste of funeral dust and pressed flowers.

Mr. Dark stood in the door now, on his way out.

“Stay there,” he directed. “Listen to your heart. I’ll send someone to fix it. But, first, the boys…”