It

to t-t-try and fuh-hinish w-what w-w-w-we stuh-harted.’
Beverly saw Mr Ross getting up, looking at her, folding his paper, and simply going into his house. They won’t see, they won’t hear, they won’t know. And my father
(take those pants off slutchild)
had meant to kill her.
Mike thought of lunch with Bill. Bill’s mother had been off in her own dreamy world, seeming not to see either of them, reading a Henry James novel while the boys made sandwiches and gobbled them standing at the counter. Richie thought of Stan’s neat but utterly empty house. Stan had been a little surprised; his mother was almost always home at lunch time. On the few occasions when she wasn’t, she left a note saying where she could be reached. But there had been no note today. The car was gone, and that was all. ‘Probably went shopping with her friend Debbie,’ Stan said, frowning a little, and had set to work making egg-salad sandwiches. Richie had forgotten about it. Until now. Eddie thought of his mother. When he had gone out with his Parcheesi board there had been none of the usual cautions: Becareful, Eddie, get under cover if it rains, Eddie, don’t you dare play any rough games, Eddie. She hadn’t asked if he had his aspirator, hadn’t told him what time to be home, hadn’t
warned him against ‘those rough boys you play with.’ She had simply gone on watching her soap-opera story on TV, as if he didn’t exist.
As if he didn’t exist.
A version of the same thought went through all of the boys’ minds: they had, at some point between getting up this morning and lunch-time, simply become ghosts.
Ghosts.
‘Bill,’ Stan said harshly, ‘if we cut across? Through the Old Cape?’
Bill shook his head. ‘I don’t thuh-thuh-hink s-s-so. We’d g-g-get c-c-caught in the buh-buh-bam-b-b-boo . . . the quh-quh-quick-m-mud . . . or there’d b-b-be ruh-ruh-real p-p-p-pirahna fuh-fuh –fish in the K –K-Kenduskeag . . . o-o-or suh –suh-homething e-e-else.’
Each had his or her own different vision of the same end. Ben saw bushes which suddenly became man-eating plants. Beverly saw flying leeches like the ones that had come out of that old refrigerator. Stan saw the mucky ground in the bamboo vomiting up the living corpses of children caught in there by the fabled quickmud. Mike Hanlon imagined small Jurassic reptiles with horrid sawteeth suddenly boiling out of the cleft of a rotten tree, attacking them, biting them to pieces. Richie saw the Crawling Eye oozing down on top of them as they ran under the railroad trestle. And Eddie saw them climbing the Old Cape embankment only to look up and see the leper standing at the top, his sagging flesh acrawl with beetles and maggots, waiting for them.
‘If we could get out of town somehow . . . ‘ Richie muttered, then winced as thunder shouted a furious negative from the sky. More rain fell — it was still only squalling, but soon it would begin to come down seriously, in sheets and torrents. The day’s hazy peace was now utterly gone, as if it had never been at all. ‘We’d be safe if we could just get out of this fucking town.’
Beverly began: ‘Beep-b — ‘ And then a rock came flying out of the shaggy bushes and struck Mike on the side of the head. He staggered backward, blood flowing through the tight cap of his hair, and would have fallen if Bill hadn’t caught him.
‘Teach you to throw rocks!’ Henry’s voice floated mockingly to them.
Bill could see the others looking around, wild-eyed, ready to bolt in six different directions. And if they did that, it really would be over.
‘B-B-Ben!’ he said sharply.
Ben looked at him. ‘Bill, we gotta run. They — ‘
Two more rocks flew out of the bushes. One struck Stan on the upper thigh. He yelled, more surprised than hurt. Beverly sidestepped the second. It struck the ground and rolled through the clubhouse trapdoor.
‘D-D-Do you r-r-ruh-remember the f-f-first duh-day you c-c-came d-down here?’ Bill shouted over the thunder. ‘The d-d-d-day schuh-hool l-let ow-out?’
‘Bill — ‘ Richie shouted.
Bill thrust a shushing hand at him; his eyes remained fixed on Ben, pinning him to the spot.
‘Sure,’ Ben said, miserably trying to look in all directions at once. The bushes were now wavering and dancing wildly, their motion nearly tidal.
‘The druh-druh-drain,’ Bill said. ‘The p-p-pumping –stuh-hation. Thah-that’s where we’re suh-suh-hup posed to g-g-go. Take us there!’
‘But — ‘
‘Tuh-tuh-take us th-there!’
A fusillade of rocks whizzed out of the bushes and