“First, explain to me how you can remember Harry if he was never a janitor at LHS and never bought a Fatburger from you in his whole life. Second, explain to me why you don’t remember Mike Michaud visiting the diner when that picture says he did.”

“You don’t know for a fact that Harry Dunning’s not still in town,” Al said. “In fact, you don’t know for sure he’s not still janitoring at Lisbon High.”

“It’d be a hell of a coincidence if he was. I changed the past big-time, Al—with some help from a guy named Bill Turcotte. Harry wouldn’t have gone to live with his aunt and uncle in Haven, because his mother didn’t die. Neither did his brother Troy or his sister, Ellen. And Dunning never got near Harry himself with that hammer of his. If Harry still lives in The Falls after all those changes, I’d be the most surprised guy on earth.”

“There’s a way to check,” Al said. “I’ve got a laptop computer in my office. Come on back.” He led the way, coughing and holding onto things. I carried my cup of coffee with me; he left his behind.

Office was far too grand a name for the closet-sized cubbyhole off the kitchen. It was hardly big enough for both of us. The walls were papered with memos, permits, and health directives from both the state of Maine and the feds. If the people who passed on rumors and gossip about the Famous Catburger had seen all that paperwork—which included a Class A Certification of Cleanliness following the last inspection by the State of Maine Restaurant Commission—they might have been forced to rethink their position.

Harry’s MacBook sat on the sort of desk I remember using in the third grade. He collapsed into a chair of about the same size with a grunt of pain and relief. “High school’s got a website, doesn’t it?”

“Sure.”

While we waited for the laptop to boot, I wondered how many emails had piled up during my fifty-two-day absence. Then I remembered I’d actually been gone only two minutes. Silly me. “I think I’m losing it, Al,” I said.

“I know the feeling. Just hang on, buddy, you’ll—wait, here we go. Let’s see. Courses . . .

summer schedule . . . faculty . . . administration . . . custodial staff.”

“Hit it,” I said.

He massaged the touch pad, muttered, nodded, clicked on something, then stared into the computer screen like a swami consulting his crystal ball.

“Well? Don’t keep me hanging.”

He turned the laptop so I could look. LHS CUSTODIAL STAFF, it said. THE BEST IN

MAINE! There was a photograph of two men and a woman standing at center court in the gymnasium. They were all smiling. They were all wearing Lisbon Greyhounds sweatshirts. None of them was Harry Dunning.

4

“You remember him in his life as a janitor and as your student because you’re the one who went down the rabbit-hole,” Al said. We were back in the diner again, sitting in one of the booths. “I remember him either because I’ve used the rabbit-hole myself or just because I’m near it.” He considered. “That’s probably it. A kind of radiation. The Yellow Card Man’s also near it, only on the other side, and he feels it, too. You’ve seen him, so you know.”

“He’s the Orange Card Man now.”

“What are you talking about?”

I yawned again. “If I tried to tell you now, I’d make a total mess of everything. I want to drive you home, then go home myself. I’m going to get something to eat, because I’m hungry as a bear—”

“I’ll scramble you up some eggs,” he said. He started to rise, then sat back down with a thump and began to cough. Each inhale was a hacking wheeze that shook his whole body.

Something rattled in his throat like a playing card in the spokes of a bicycle wheel.

I put my hand on his arm. “What you’ll do is go back home, take some dope, and rest. Sleep if you can. I know I can. Eight hours. I’ll set the alarm.” He stopped coughing, but I could still hear that playing card rattling in his throat. “Sleep.

The good kind. I remember that. I envy you, buddy.”

“I’ll be back at your place by seven tonight. No, let’s say eight. That’ll give me a chance to check a few things on the internet.”

“And if everything looks jake?” He smiled faintly at this pun . . . which I, of course, had heard at least a thousand times.

“Then I’ll go back again tomorrow and get ready to do the deed.”

“No,” he said. “You’re going to undo the deed.” He squeezed my hand. His fingers were thin, but there was still strength in his grip. “That’s what this is all about. Finding Oswald, undoing his fuckery, and wiping that self-satisfied smirk off his face.” 5

When I started my car, the first thing I did was reach for the stubby Ford gearshift on the column and punch for the springy Ford clutch with my left foot. When my fingers closed around nothing but air and my shoe thumped on nothing but floormat, I laughed. I couldn’t help it.

“What?” Al asked from his place in the shotgun seat.

I missed my nifty Ford Sunliner, that was what, but it was okay; soon I’d buy it again.

Although since next time I’d be shorter of funds, at least to start with (my deposit at the Hometown Trust would be gone, lost in the next reset), I might dicker a little more with Bill Titus.

I thought I could do that.

I was different now.

“Jake? Something funny?”

“It’s nothing.”

I looked for changes on Main Street, but all the usual buildings were present and accounted for, including the Kennebec Fruit, which looked—as usual—about two unpaid bills away from financial collapse. The statue of Chief Worumbo still stood in the town park, and the banner in the window of Cabell’s Furniture still assured the world that WE WILL NOT BE UNDERSOLD.

“Al, you remember the chain you have to duck under to get back to the rabbit-hole, don’t you?”

“Sure.”

“And the sign hanging from it?”

“The one about the sewer pipe.” He was sitting like a soldier who thinks the road ahead may be mined, and every time we went over a bump, he winced.

“When you came back from Dallas—when you realized you were too sick to make it—was that sign still there?”

“Yeah,” he said after a moment’s reflection. “It was. That’s kind of funny, isn’t it? Who takes four years to fix a busted sewer pipe?”

“Nobody. Not in a millyard where trucks are coming and going all day and all night. So why doesn’t it attract attention?”

He shook his head. “No idea.”

“It might be there to keep people from wandering into the rabbit-hole by accident. But, if so, who put it there?”