"That'd be great if I could quote that from the book and maybe photograph a couple of the old pictures for my report,'' said Duane.

The millionaire sighed as. if in response to the spreading ocean of Communist domination on the screen. Walter Cron-kite's voice boomed as loud as the Tom and Jerry cartoon. "Young man, there is no book. What Doctor Priestmann willed to me amounted to a mass of unrelated, uncollated, and unmarked materials. Several cartonsful, if I remember correctly. I assure you I did not keep them."

"Could you tell me where you donated them ..." began Duane.

"I did not donate them!" said Mr. Ashley-Montague, his voice rising almost to a shout. "I burned them. I supported the good professor's researches, but I had no use for them. I assure you, there is no mystery volume which will conclude your report. Quote me, young man. The bell was a mistake . . . one of many white elephants grandfather brought back from his honeymoon tour of Europe ... it was removed from Old Central sometime around the turn of the century, stored in a warehouse . . . somewhere in Chicago, I believe . . . and melted down for bullets or somesuch in 1917 when we entered the war. Now, that is all."

The 20th Century piece had ended, the assistant was hurriedly putting on the large first reel of Hercules, and several heads turned to look up at the bandstand as Mr. Ashley-Montague's voice boomed through the relative silence.

"If I could just ..." began Duane.

"There is no 'just,' " hissed the millionaire. "There is no more conversation, young man. There is no bell. Now that is all." He gestured toward the bandstand steps with what Dale thought was a rather feminine swish of his wrist. Another gesture brought the assistant over-the movie now starting with a shouted leader countdown from the crowd-and Duane was staring at a six-foot-tall man with his sleeves rolled up. The assistant could have been a butler, a bodyguard, or a flunky from one of Mr. A.-M.'s movie theaters for all Dale knew.

Duane seemed to shrug and turn away, ambling down the stairs at a much slower speed than Dale would have used if an adult had shouted at him. Realizing that he was inconspicuous in the back corner of the bandstand while hidden by darkness, Dale nonetheless vaulted the railing and landed in the grass four feet below, almost stumbling onto Uncle Henry and Aunt Lena as he landed.

He ran to catch up to Duane, but the heavier boy had left the park and was strolling down Broad Avenue, his hands in his pockets, whistling a tune and evidently heading for the ruins of the old Ashley place two blocks south. Dale was no longer afraid of the night-that nonsense was past-but he didn't really want to go walking in that darkness under the old elms down there. Besides, the music and dubbed dialogue was swelling behind him and he wanted to watch Hercules.

Dale turned back to the park, figuring that if he didn't talk to Duane later that night then . . . well . . .he'd talk to him sometime in the next few days. There was no hurry. It was summer.

Duane walked west on Broad Avenue, too agitated to pay attention to the Hercules movie. Leaf-shadow lay heavy on the street. Streetlights along lanes running to the south were obscured by branches and leaves. To the north there was a single row of small homes, their undecorated lawns sprawling into one another and devolving into weeds where the train tracks curved a bit south and then swept off into the cornfields where the road ended. Only the old Ashley-Montague place, what people still called the Ashley Mansion, lay down that final dark lane.

Duane stared at the curved driveway, now turned into a tunnel by overhanging branches and untended shrubbery. Little remained of the place except the charred remnants of two columns and three chimneys, a few blackened timbers tumbled into the rat-infested cellar. Duane knew that Dale and the other kids often made a game of riding down that lane, sweeping past the front porch, leaning far out to touch the columns or porch steps without dismounting or slowing. But it was very dark-not even fireflies illuminated the bram-bled depths of the circular drive. The noise and light and crowds of the Free Show were two blocks behind and made more distant by intervening trees.

Duane was not afraid of the dark. Not really. But he had no interest in walking down that lane tonight. Whistling, he turned south along a gravel path to intersect the new streets where Chuck Sperling lived.

Behind him, in the darkness where the driveway was most overgrown, something stirred, moved branches, and scuttled around the periphery of a fountain long forgotten amidst the weed and ruin.

Sunday, the twelfth of June, was warm and hazy with cloud cover that turned the sky into an inverted gray bowl. It was eighty degrees by eight a.m, into the nineties by noon. The Old Man was up early and out in the fields, so Duane put off reading The New York Times until after some work was done.

He was walking the rows of beans back behind the barn, pulling the stalks of pioneer corn invading there, when he saw the car turn into the long drive. At first he thought it was Uncle Art, but then he realized that it was a smaller white car. Then he saw the red bubble on top.

Duane came out of the fields, mopping his face with the tail of his open shirt. It wasn't Barney's constable car; the green letters on the driver's side door read creve coeur county sheriff. A man with a lean, tanned face with eyes hidden by reflecting aviator's sunglasses said, "Mr. McBride here, son?"

Duane nodded, walked to the edge of the beanfield, put two fingers in his mouth, and whistled loudly. He could see the distant silhouette of his father pause, look up, and begin walking in. Duane half expected Wittgenstein to come hobbling from the barn.

The sheriff was out of his car now: a big man, Duane noticed, at least six foot four. Perhaps more. He'd put on his broad-brimmed county mountie hat now and the full effect of the man's height, lantern jaw, sunglasses, gun belt, and leather boots made Duane think of a recruiting poster. The effect was only slightly marred by the half-moons of perspiration soaked through the khaki shirt under the arms.

"Something wrong?'' asked Duane, wondering if Mr. Ashley-Montague had somehow sicced this cop on him. The millionaire had been visibly upset the night before, and hadn't been at the Free Show when Duane returned to get a ride home with Uncle Henry and Aunt Lena.

The sheriff nodded. "Afraid there is, son."

Duane stood there, sweat dripping from his own chin, until the Old Man strode down the last thirty feet of row.

"Mr. McBride?" said the sheriff.

The Old Man nodded and made a swipe at his sweaty face with a kerchief, leaving a muddy streak in gray stubble. "That's right. Now if this is about that goddamn telephone thing, I told Ma Bell ..."

"No, sir. There's been an accident."

The Old Man froze as if he'd been slapped. Duane watched his father's face, seeing the second of hesitation and then the impact of certainty there. Only one person alive would carry the Old Man's name on an In Case of Emergency card in his billfold.

"Art," said the Old Man. It was not a question. "Is he dead?"

"Yessir." The sheriff adjusted his sunglasses at almost the same instant that Duane touched his middle finger to the bridge of his own glasses.

"How?" The Old Man's eyes seemed to be focused on something in the fields behind the sheriff. Or on nothing.

"Car accident. 'Bout an hour ago."

"Where?" The Old Man was nodding slightly, as if receiving expected news. Duane was familiar with the nod from when they listened to news on the radio or when the Old Man was talking about corruption in politics.

"Jubilee College Road," said the sheriff, his voice firm but not as flat as the Old Man's. "Stone Creek Bridge. About two miles from ..."