Dex Graham left Howard at the Cantwell house and made his own way home, over the younger man’s protests. “Makes sense,” he told Howard. “Right now there’s chaos. In the morning there’ll be soldiers everywhere, and they might be curious about a wounded man.”

“You can make it?”

“Yes.”

At least he thought he could. He took it street by street. Pain, and the dizziness that rode with it, came in tidal movements of ebb and flood. He was only dimly aware of the sound of sirens, the distant flicker of firelight.

He reached his apartment after an eternity of footsteps. The stairs seemed at a steeper angle than he remembered; he whispered small encouragements to himself as he climbed.

He locked his apartment door behind him and left the lights off. Now you can rest, he thought, and reached for the bed as darkness took him.

Among those who had witnessed the strange phenomenon above the burning Gulf station, reports were mixed.

Soldiers reported seeing what they described variously as Ialdaboath, Samael, a Demiurge, or the Father of Grief.

Civilian witnesses in the neighboring houses claimed they had seen God or, like Tom Stubbs, the Devil.

Only Howard Poole connected that visitation in the sky with Alan Stern, and Howard didn’t file a report.

By morning, everything east of Oak stank of smoke and diesel fuel.

CHAPTER TEN

If Dex woke with the sun in his eyes and the knowledge that time had passed—too little or too much time, he wasn’t sure which. The events of the night had been large and significant and he dreaded the returning memory. He tried to roll onto his side but a starburst of pain prevented him. He tried again, more slowly, and discovered he was stuck to the bed.

He peeled away the bloody sheet from the shirttail bandage Howard had wound for him and managed to sit up. He didn’t remember loosening the tourniquet, but he must have done so. That instinct had saved him a close encounter with gangrene, he thought—at least, so far. He was thirsty, feverish, and appallingly weak.

He went to the sink in a drunkard’s stumble. He poured a glass of water. Sip it, he thought. From the medicine cupboard, four aspirin. One two three four.

He was scheduled to hold classes between ten and twelve and it seemed to Dex he really ought to try to be there, as impossible as it might seem at the moment. The soldiers or the Bureau could be keeping an eye on his movements; he didn’t want to draw attention to himself by staying home. The Proctors might be looking for a wounded man. Better not to appear wounded. The trick would be to avoid collapsing in the street.

He examined himself in the bathroom mirror. When the storefront window blew in he had been turned away from it; his face wasn’t cut, though his back, when he worked his shirt loose, seemed to have been flayed nearly skinless. The cuts weren’t as bad as they looked, fortunately; only a lacework of shallow lacerations after he sponged the scabbed blood away. But not pleasant.

His arm…

Well, he was able to move it, though the effort cost him dearly. Wait until the aspirin takes hold, he told himself. The aspirin would help, at least a little… though a mere four Bayers, under the circumstances, might be a spit in the wind. As for the wound itself, he didn’t want to risk disturbing the makeshift bandage. He didn’t want to bleed again. Of course, it would have to be changed; it might already be infected. But later. This afternoon, say. When he could faint at leisure.

He put on plausible work clothes a cautious step at a time. The bandage bulked conspicuously under a clean shirt, but the sport coat disguised it.

Could he walk the five blocks to JFK High? He guessed so. He felt disoriented, but it was probably no worse than the disorientation of a bad case of the flu. The aspirin might at least take the fever down. Two classes: he could handle that.

The walk passed in a series of curiously static tableaux. Here was the front door of the apartment block, open on a cold November morning. Here was the sidewalk arrayed before him like a flickering alabaster river. Here, the soldier on the corner with his high-collared black uniform and expressionless face, eyes tracking Dex as he passed.

Here, much later, the school. Ancient brick Victoriana. Small high windows. The big door.

The corridors were dirty and smelled of sour milk. They were abandoned nowadays except for a few stalwarts, student and faculty. Dex felt more lucid here, soothed by the bleak familiarity of the building. The aspirin had not done much for the pain or the fever but seemed to allow him to rise a distance above these things. He nodded at Emmy Jackson, who was still manning the reception desk. The principal, Bob Hoskins, hailed him as he approached his classroom.

“Damn cold,” Hoskins said. “The power’s off again. As you no doubt noticed. Some idiot blew up the Gulf station last night and the Proctors are so PO’d they cut the electricity. For a full week, somebody said. If you can imagine anything so petty.”

Dex said, “Have they caught anyone?”

“No. Which is precisely what’s bothering them, in my opinion. If they had some poor soul to hang I’m sure they’d be delighted.” He squinted at Dex. “Are you all right?”

“Flu.”

“Well, there’s plenty of it going around. You sure you can manage? You look awfully pale.”

“I’ll be okay.”

“Well. Knock off early if you have to.” Hoskins sighed. “I don’t know how much longer we’ll be here anyway. It’s like minding an empty store. Sad but true.”

The classroom was as cold as the rest of the building. Dex had left his notes at home and doubted his ability to lecture coherently for forty minutes. When his first students shuffled in, wrapped in shabby winter coats, he declared a study session and assigned them a chapter to read—three hectographed pages on America in World War I. “When you’re done you can talk among yourselves.”

The time passed. He sat at the big desk and pretended to grade assignments. The assignments were real, and he kept them in front of him and remembered to turn a page now and again, but the words were unintelligible. The printed or handwritten letters had developed lives of their own; they bobbled over the paper like loose balloons.

The urge to put his head down and sleep was powerfully strong, and by the end of his second class he was afraid he would simply nod off—his head was inclining when the bell rang. Students shuffled out, some looking at him oddly. Shelda Burmeister, a studious girl in high-powered corrective lenses and a torn turquoise sweater, paused at his desk until the others were gone. “Mr. Graham?”

“Yes?” He swiveled the weighty beam of his attention toward her. “What is it, Shelda?”

“I think you cut yourself.” She nodded at the desktop. He looked down. Blood had traveled down his left arm and pooled just beyond the cuff of his coat. About a tablespoon, he thought. “I guess I did,” he said. “I mean, cut myself. Thank you, Shelda.”

“Will you be all right?”

“Yes. Go on. I’m fine.”

She left. He stood up. More blood trickled down the wounded arm. Now he was conscious of the distasteful warmth of it. He held the cuff closed and moved to the door. Maybe he could clean up in the staff men’s room, change the bandage…

The door opened before he reached it and Linneth Stone stepped into the classroom. She was fresh and impossibly radiant in a white blouse, gray skirt. He looked at her with some confusion.

“Dex? I know we didn’t have an appointment. But the afternoon was free and I thought—Dex? My God, what happened?”