y, I know you're here!" shouted Jim suddenly, savagely, dashing upstairs. "Come on out, you!"
Will waited for him to search and drag slowly back down. As Jim reached the bottom of the steps, they both heard the music blowing through the front door with the smell of fresh rain and ancient grass.
The carousel calliope, among the hills, piping the "Funeral March" backwards.
Jim opened the door wider and stood in the music, as one stands in the rain.
"The merry-go-round. They fixed it!"
Will nodded. "She must've heard the music, gone out at sunrise. Something went wrong. Maybe the carousel wasn't fixed right. Maybe accidents happen all the time. Like to the lightning-rod man, him in-side-out and crazy. Maybe the carnival likes accidents, gets a kick out of them. Or maybe they did something to her on purpose. Maybe they wanted to know more about us, our names, where we live, or wanted her to help them hurt us. Who knows what? Maybe she got suspicious or scared. Then they just gave her more than she ever wanted or asked for."
"I don't understand--"
But now, in the doorway, in the cold rain, there was time to think of Miss Foley afraid of mirror mazes, Miss Foley alone not so long ago at the carnival, and maybe screaming when they did what they finally did to her, around and around, around and around, too many years, more years than she had ever dreamed of shucked away, rubbing her raw, leaving her naked small, alone, and bewildered because unknown-even-to-herself, around and around, until all the years were gone and the carousel rocked to a halt like a roulette wheel, and nothing gained and all lost and nowhere for her to go, no way to tell the strangeness, and nothing to do but ... weep under a tree, alone, in the autumn rain....
Will thought this. Jim thought it, and said:
"Oh, the poor ... the poor ..."
"We got to help her, Jim. Who else would believe? If she tells anyone, 'I'm Miss Foley!' 'Get away!' they'd say, 'Miss Foley's left town, disappeared! Go on, little girl!' Oh, Jim, I bet she's pounded a dozen doors this morning, wanting help, scared people with her screaming and yelling, then run off, gave up, and hid under that tree. Police are probably looking for her now, but so what? it's just a wild girl crying and they'll lock her away and she'll go crazy. That carnival, boy, do they know how to punish so you can't hit back. They just shake you up and change you so no one ever knows you again and let you run free, it's okay, go ahead, talk, 'cause folks are too scared of you to listen. Only we hear, Jim, only you and me, and right now I feel like I just ate a cold snail raw."
They looked back a last time at the shadows of rain crying on the windows inside the parlor where a teacher had often served them cookies and hot chocolate and waved to them from the window and moved tall through the town. Then they stepped out and shut the door and ran back toward the empty lot.
"We got to hide her, until we can help--"
"Help?" panted Jim. "We can't help ourselves!"
"There's got to be weapons, right in front of us, we're just too blind--"
They stopped.
Beyond the thump of their own hearts, a greater heart thumped. Brass trumpets wailed. Trombones blared. A herd of tubas made an elephant charge, alarmed for unknown reasons.
"The carnival!" gasped Jim. "We never thought! It can come right into town. A parade! Or that funeral I dreamt about, for the balloon?"
"Not a funeral and only what looks like a parade but's a search for us, Jim, for us, or Miss Foley, if they want her back! They can march down any old street, fine and dandy, and spy as they go, drum and bugle! Jim, we got to get her before they--"
And breaking off, they flung themselves down an alley, but stopped suddenly, and leaped to hide in some bushes.
At the far end of the alley, the carnival band, animal wagons, clowns, freaks and all, banged and crashed between them and the empty lot and the great oak tree.
It must have taken five minutes for the parade to pass. The rain seemed to move on away, the clouds moving with them. The rain ceased. The strut of drums faded. The boys loped down the alley, across the street, and stopped by the empty lot.
There was no little girl under the tree.
They circled it, looked up in it, not daring to call a name.
Then, very much afraid, they ran to hide themselves somewhere in the town.
Chapter 33
THE PHONE rang.
Mr. Halloway picked it up.
"Dad, this is Willy, we can't go to the police station, we may not be home today, tell Mom, tell Jim's mom."
"Willy, where are you?"