I REMEMBER, said Bill Door, WHEN YOU WERE A PART OF ME.
The Death of Rats squeaked again.
Bill Door fumbled in the pockets of his overall. He’d put some of his lunch in there. Ah, yes.
I EXPECT, he said, THAT YOU COULD MURDER A PIECE OF CHEESE?
The Death of Rats took it graciously.
Bill Door remembered visiting an old man once—only once—who had spent almost his entire life locked in a cell in a tower for some alleged crime or other, and had tamed little birds for company during his life sentence. They crapped on his bedding and ate his food, but he tolerated them and smiled at their flight in and out of the high barred windows. Death had wondered, at the time, why anyone would do something like that.
I WON’T DELAY YOU, he said. I EXPECT YOU’VE GOT THINGS TO DO, RATS TO SEE. I KNOW HOW IT IS.
And now he understood.
He put the figure back on the beam, and lay down in the hay.
DROP IN ANY TIME YOU’RE PASSING.
Bill Door stared at the darkness again.
Sleep. He could feel her prowling around. Sleep, with a pocketful of dreams.
He lay in the darkness and fought back.
Miss Flitworth’s shouting jolted him upright and, to his momentary relief, still went on.
The barn door slammed open.
“Bill! Come down quick!”
He swung his legs onto the ladder.
WHAT IS HAPPENING, MISS FLITWORTH?
“Something’s on fire!”
They ran across the yard and out onto the road. The sky over the village was red.
“Come on!”
BUT IT IS NOT OUR FIRE.
“It’s going to be everyone’s! It spreads like crazy on thatch!”
They reached the apology for a town square. The inn was already well alight, the thatch roaring star-ward in a million twisting sparks.
“Look at everyone standing around,” snarled Miss Flitworth. “There’s the pump, buckets are everywhere, why don’t people think?”
There was a scuffle a little way as a couple of his customers tried to stop Lifton from running into the building. He was screaming at them.
“The girl’s still in there,” said Miss Flitworth. “Is that what he said?”
YES.
Flames curtained every upper window.
“There’s got to be some way,” said Miss Flitworth. “Maybe we could find a ladder—”