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here with only a corpse.
Empty devils.
If he had ever heard a more terrible phrase, he couldn’t remember it. But it made sense . . . if you
had seen the Overlook for what it really was. That place had been full of devils, but at least they had
been dead devils. He didn’t think that was true of the woman in the tophat and her friends.
You still owe a debt. Pay it.
Yes. He had left the little boy in the sagging diaper and the Braves t-shirt to fend for himself. He
would not do that with the girl.
4
Dan waited at the nurses’ station for the funeral hack from Geordie & Sons, and saw the covered
gurney out the back door of Rivington One. Then he went to his room and sat looking down at
Cranmore Avenue, now perfectly deserted. A night wind blew, stripping the early-turning leaves from
the oaks and sending them dancing and pirouetting up the street. On the far side of the town
common, Teenytown was equally deserted beneath a couple of orange hi-intensity security lights.
Go to your friends. The ones who know what you are.
Billy Freeman knew, had almost from the first, because Billy had some of what Dan had. And if
Dan owed a debt, he supposed Billy did, too, because Dan’s larger and brighter shining had saved
Billy’s life.
Not that I’d put it that way to him.
Not that he’d have to.
Then there was John Dalton, who had lost a watch and who just happened to be Abra’s pediatrician.
What had Dick said through Eleanor Ooh-La-La’s dead mouth? It all comes around.
As for the thing Abra had asked for, that was even easier. Getting it, though . . . that might be a
little complicated.
When Abra got up on Sunday morning, there was an email message from dtor36@nhmlx.com.
5
Abra: I have spoken to a friend using the talent we share, and am convinced that you are in danger. I want to speak about
your situation to another friend, one we have in common: John Dalton. I will not do so unless I have your permission. I believe
John and I can retrieve the object you drew on my blackboard.
Have you set your burglar alarm? Certain people may be looking for you, and it’s very important they not find you. You
must be careful. Good wishes and STAY SAFE. Delete this email.
Uncle D.
She was more convinced by the fact of his email than its content, because she knew he didn’t like
communicating that way; he was afraid her parents would snoop in her mail and think she was
exchanging notes with Chester the Molester.
If they only knew about the molesters she really had to worry about.
She was frightened, but also—now that it was bright daylight and there was no beautiful lunatic in
a tophat peering in the window at her—rather excited. It was sort of like being in one of those loveand-horror
supernatural novels, the kind Mrs. Robinson in the school library sniffily called
“tweenager porn.” In those books the girls dallied with werewolves, vampires—even zombies—but
hardly ever became those things.