"Shut up," said Dale. He could hear the music from the Free Show now, bright and tinny: a Warner Brothers cartoon. The elm-covered tunnel of Broad was behind them, only a few lights showing in the big Victorian homes set far back from the street. First Presbyterian, the Stewart family's church, glowed pale and empty on the corner across from the post office.

"What's that?" whispered Lawrence, stopping and clutching his bag of popcorn.

"Nothing. What?" said Dale, stopping with his brother.

There was a rustling, sliding, screeching from the darkness in and above the elms.

"It's nothing," said Dale, tugging at Lawrence to get moving. "Birds." Lawrence still wouldn't move and Dale paused to listen again. "Bats."

Dale could see them now: dark shapes flitting across the paler gaps between the leaves, winged shadows visible against the white of First Prez as they darted to and fro. "Just bats." He tugged at Lawrence's hand.

His brother refused to move. "Listen," he whispered.

Dale considered slugging him, kicking him right in the seat of his Levi's, or grabbing him by one oversized ear and dragging him the last block to the Free Show. Instead, he listened.

Leaves rustling. The manic scales of a cartoon soundtrack dulled by distance and humid air. The leathery flap of wings. Voices.

Instead of the near-ultrasonic chirp of bats scanning the way ahead, the sound in the motion-filled darkness around them was the screech of small, sharp voices. Cries. Shrieks. Curses. Obscenities. Most of the sounds teetered on the brink of actually being words, the maddeningly audible but not-quite-distinct syllables of a shouted conversation in an adjoining room. But two of the sounds were quite clear.

Dale and Lawrence stood frozen on the sidewalk, clutching their bags of popcorn and staring upward, as bats shrieked their names in consonants that sounded like teeth scraping across blackboards. Far, far away, the amplified voice of Porky Pig said, "Th-th-th-that's all, folks!"

"Run!" whispered Dale.

Jim Harlen had orders not to go to the Free Show; his mother was gone-off to Peoria on another date-and while she said that he was old enough to stay home without a baby-sitter, he was not allowed to go out. Harlen made up his bed with his ventriloquist's dummy turned with its face to the wall and a bunched-up pair of jeans to extend the legs under the cover, just in case she got home before him and checked in on him. She wouldn't. She never got home before one or two o'clock in the morning.

Harlen grabbed a couple of Butterfingers from the cupboard for his movie snack, got his bike out of the shed, and tore off down Depot Street. He'd been watching Gunsmoke on TV, and it'd gotten dark sooner than he'd planned for. He didn't want to miss the cartoon.

The streets were empty. Harlen knew that anyone old enough to be able to drive but young enough not to be so stupid as to hang around to watch Lawrence Welk or the Free Show had left for Peoria or Galesburg hours ago. He'd sure as hell not hang around Elm Haven on a Saturday night when he got older.

Jim Harlen didn't plan on hanging around Elm Haven much longer in any event. Either his mother would marry one of those greasers she was dating-probably some garage mechanic who sank all his money into suits-and Harlen would be moving to Peoria, or else he'd run away in a year or two. Harlen envied Tubby Cooke. The fat kid had been about as bright as the 25-watt bulb Harlen's mom kept lit on the back porch, but he'd known enough to get the hell away from Elm Haven. Of course, Harlen didn't get hit the way Tubby probably did-based on how drunk his old man was most of the time and how stupid his ma looked-but Harlen had his own problems.

He hated his mother's taking her old name back, leaving him stranded with his father's last name when he wasn't even allowed to mention his dad in front of her. He hated her being gone every Friday and Saturday, all dressed up in the low-cut peasant blouses and sexy black dresses that made Harlen feel funny . . . sort of like his mom was one of those women in the magazines he kept hidden in the back of his closet. He hated it when she smoked, leaving the lipstick rings around the butts of the cigarettes in the ashtrays, making him imagine that same lipstick on the cheeks of greasers Harlen didn't even know ... on their bodies. He hated it when she had too much to drink and tried to hide it, acting the perfect lady-but Harlen could always tell by the precise diction, the slow movements, and the way she got all sloppy and tried to hug him.

He hated his mother. If she hadn't been such a ... Har-len's mind skittered around the word "whore" ... if she'd just been a better wife, then his father wouldn't have had to start dating that secretary he'd run away with.

Harlen headed down Broad Avenue, pedaling hard and wiping his eyes with an angry swipe of his sleeve. Something white moving between the big old homes on the left side of the street made him glance, look again, and then bring his low bike into a sweeping, gravel-sliding stop.

Somebody was moving into the alley between wide yards. Harlen caught another glimpse of a short, wide body, pale arms, and pale dress before the figure was swallowed by the darkness in the alley. Shit, it's Old Double-Butt. The alley ran between her big old house and the boarded-up pink Victorian that had belonged to Mrs. Duggan.

What the hell is Old Double-Butt doing slinking down the alley? Harlen almost put it out of his mind and headed off toward the Free Show, but then he remembered he was supposed to be following the teacher.

That stuffs bull. O'Rourke's dipped in donkey shit if he thinks I'm going to follow this old dinosaur around town all the time. I didn't see him or any of the others out following their people around this afternoon. Mike's hot stuff at giving orders . . . all those other idiots love to do what he says . . . but I'm too big for that baby shit.

But what was Mrs. D. doing going down the alley after dark?

Taking out the garbage, stupid.

But the garbage pickup wasn't until Tuesday. And she hadn't been carrying anything. In fact, she'd been all dressed up ... probably in that fancy pink dress she'd worn the last day before Christmas break. Not that the old battle-ax had given them a real party-just thirty minutes to pass around presents to the people whose name they'd drawn for Secret Santa.

Where the hell's she going?

Wouldn't O'Rourke be surprised if Jim Harlen was the only one in their piss-ant Bike Patrol who actually found out something about the people they were supposed to be following. Like maybe Old Double-Butt was doing it with Dr. Roon or creepy Van Syke while everybody was off at the Free Show.

The thought made Harlen sort of sick.

He pedaled across the street, dumped his bike behind the bushes on Mrs. Duggan's side of the alley, and peered around the shrubs. The pale form was just visible, already almost all the way down the alley to where it ran into Third Avenue.

Harlen crouched there a second, decided that the bike would make too much noise on the cinders and gravel, and started off on foot, moving from shadow to shadow, keeping near the high fences, avoiding garbage cans so as not to make noise. He thought of dogs barking and remembered that the only dog in a backyard along here would be Dexter, who belonged to the Gibsons, but Dexter was old and they treated him like a child. He'd probably be indoors watching Lawrence Welk with them.

Old Double-Butt crossed Third, passed the boardinghouse where Roon had his apartment on the third floor, and went across onto the playground on the south side of Old Central.

Shit, thought Harlen, she's just going to get something in the school. Then he remembered she couldn't. When he'd gotten back into town that afternoon from their dipshitty trip out to the Cave, he and Dale and the others had noticed that somebody'd boarded up the windows on the first floor of Old Central-probably to protect them from kids like Harlen who hated the place-and there were chains and padlocks on both the north and south doors.