It

‘I haven’t seen them,’ Richie said. ‘They’re probably down there, hanging out. Singing two-part harmony. «Sh-boom, sh-boom . . . yada-da-da-da-da-da . . . you look like a dream, shweetheart.'»
Stan Uris made throwing-up noises.
‘He’s just jealous,’ Richie said to Mike. ‘Jews can’t sing.’
‘Buh-buh-buh — ‘
‘»Beep-beep, Richie,»‘ Richie said for him, and they all laughed.
They started toward the Barrens again, Mike and Bill pushing their bikes. Conversation was brisk at first, but then it lagged. Looking at Bill, Eddie saw an uneasy look on his face, and he thought that maybe the quiet was getting to him, too. He knew Richie had meant it as a joke, but it really did seem that everyone in Derry had gone to Bar Harbor for the day . . . to somewhere. Not a car moved on the street; there wasn’t a single old lady pushing a carrier full of groceries back to her house or apartment.
‘Sure is quiet, isn’t it?’ Eddie ventured, but Bill only nodded.
They crossed to the Barrens side of Kansas Street, and then they saw Ben and Beverly, running toward them, shouting. Eddie was shocked by Beverly’s appearance; she was usually so neat and clean, her hair always washed and tied back in a pony-tail. Now she was streaked with what looked like every kind of gluck in the universe. Her eyes were wide and wild. There was a scratch on one cheek. Her jeans were caked with crap and her blouse was torn.
Ben fell behind her, puffing, his stomach wobbling.
‘Can’t go down in the Barrens,’ Beverly was panting. ‘The boys . . . Henry . . . Victor . . . they’re down there somewhere . . . the knife . . . he has a knife . . . ‘
‘Sluh-slow down,’ Bill said, taking charge at once in that effortless, almost unconscious way of his. He glanced at Ben as he ran up, his cheeks flushed bright, his considerable chest heaving.
‘She says Henry’s gone crazy, Big Bill,’ Ben said.
‘Shit, you mean he used to be sane? ‘ Richie asked, and spat between his teeth.
‘Sh-Shut uh –up, Ruh-Richie,’ Bill said, and then looked back at Beverly. ‘Teh-Tell,’ he said. Eddie’s hand crept into his pocket and touched his aspirator. He didn’t know what all this was, but he already knew it wasn’t good.
Forcing herself to speak as calmly as possible, Beverly managed to get out an edited version of the story — a version that began with Henry, Victor, and Belch catching up to her on the street. She didn’t tell them about her father — she was desperately ashamed of that.
When she was finished Bill stood silent for a moment, hands in his pockets, chin down, Silver’s handlebars leaning against his chest. The others waited, throwing frequent glances at the railing that ran along the edge of the dropoff. Bill thought for a long time, and no one interrupted him. Eddie became aware, suddenly and effortlessly, that this might be the final act. That was how the day’s silence felt, wasn’t it? The feeling that the whole town had up and left, leaving only the deserted husks of buildings behind.
Richie was thinking about the picture in George’s album that had suddenly come to life.
Beverly was thinking about her father, how pale his eyes had been.
Mike was thinking about the bird.
Ben was thinking about the mummy, and a smell like dead cinnamon.
Stan Uris was thinking of bluejeans, black and dripping, and hands as white as wrinkled paper, also dripping.
‘Cuh-Cuh-Come oh-oh-on,’ Bill said at last. ‘W –We’re going d-d-down.’
‘Bill — ‘ Ben said. His face was troubled. ‘Beverly said Henry was really crazy. That he meant to kill — ‘
‘Ih-It’s nuh-not theirs,’ Bill said, gesturing at the green dagger-shaped slash of the Barrens to their right and below them — the underbrush, the choked groves of trees, the bamboo, the glint of water. ‘Ih-Ih-It’s not their pruh-pruh-hopperty,’ He looked around at them, his face grim. ‘I’m t-t-tired of b-being scuh-schuh-hared by them. We b-b-beat them in the ruh-rockfight, and if we h-h-have to beat them a-a-again, we’ll duh-duh-do it.’
‘But Bill,’ Eddie said, ‘what if it’s not just them?
Bill turned to Eddie, and with real shock Eddie saw how tired and drawn Bill’s face was –there was something frightening about that face, but it wasn’t until much, much later, as an adult drifting toward sleep after the meeting at the library, that he understood what that frightening thing was: it was the face of a boy driven close to the brink of madness, a boy who was perhaps ultimately no more sane or in control of his own decisions than Henry was. Yet the essential Bill was still there, looking out of those haunted scarified eyes . . . an angry, determined Bill.
‘Well,’ he said, ‘whuh-whuh –what