The Midnight Circus, стр. 21
Atkinson’sdistress had now reached such a pitch that his body was shaken byviolent convulsions. I seized him bythe shoulders only to feel him slump into my arms.
“God will not allowthat, my son,” I said.
Isettled him back down against the pillows and saw that the tranquilityof death had overcome him at last. But my own newfound tranquility wasforever shattered.
Ithad never occurred to me that there might be more than one kind ofResurrection. But what Atkinson, in his dying horror, had proposed wasexactly that—a devil’s resurrection. It was an unsettling, hideous,corrupting thought.
Iwould never, I supposed, finish that sermon now.
Night Wolves
WHEN WE MOVED into the old house on Brown’s End,
Iknew the night wolves would move with us. And the bear. They had livedin every bedroom I’d ever had—the one in Allentown and the one inPhoenix and the one in Westport.
Thewolves lived under my bed, the bear in my closet. Theyonly came out at night.
Iknew—I absolutely knew—that if I got out of bed in the middleof the night, I was a goner. You couldn’t begin to imagine how big thatbear was or how many teeth those wolves had. You couldn’timagine. But I could.
SoI put the bear trap I had made out of Legos and paper clips in front ofthe closet. And I put the wolf trap I had built out of my brotherJensen’s broken pocketknife and the old Christmas tree stand at thefoot of my bed. And I kept the night-light on, even though I was tenwhen we moved to Brown’s End.
Thatmeant, of course, that no one dared come into my room in the dark, notMom or Jensen, or even Dad, though we rarely saw him since he gotmarried to Kate. And none of my friends stayed overnight.
Itwas safer that way.
Ofcourse the minute it got to be light outside, the wolves and beardisappeared. I never did figure out where they went. And then I couldgo to the bathroom. Or get a new book from my bookcase. Or sit on thefloor to put on my socks. Or anything.
Whichmeant winters were tough, especially now that we were living in thenorth, the dawn coming so late and all.
InPhoenix once, when I was eight, I was sick to my stomach and I just hadto go to the bathroom. I waited and waited until it was almost toolate, then made a dash over the foot of my bed. I managed to get out ofthe room in one big leap, my heart pounding so loud it sounded like Ihad a rock band inside. But I had to spend the rest of the night curledup in the tub because I could hear the wolves sniffing and snufflingaround the bathroom door.
Sowhen we moved to Brown’s End without my dad, I expected the wolves andthe bear. I just didn’t expect the ghost.
Iheard it on the very first night, a kind of low sobbing: ooh-wooo-oooooooo.
Thewolves heard it, too, and it made them nervous. They rushed aroundunder my bed, growling and scratching all night, trying to get pastthe trap.
Thenext night the bear heard it, too. He thrashed aroundso in the closet that when dawn came and I opened the closet door, mybest sweater and my confirmation suit had fallen to the floor.
Butthe third night, the low sobbing turned into a cry that came fromacross the hall in the room where my mom slept. And then I was reallyscared.
“Mom!”I called out. I usually didn’t like to do that for fear of remindingthe wolves and bear that I was in the room with them. Then a littlelouder I called out, “Mom?”
Shedidn’t wake up and call back that everything was all right.
Sothen I did something I never do. I called to Jensen, who wasin the next room. Ever since Phoenix we’d had our own rooms. I hated todo that because he always teases me anyway, calling me a baby forneeding a night-light. A baby! He was only eleven himself.
ButJensen didn’t wake up, either. In fact I could hear him snoring. If Icould only snore like that, I bet there wouldn’t be any wolves or beararound my room.
Itried to sleep, but the ghost’s sobbing came again.
Iput the pillow over my head but somehow that made it worse.
Istayed that way until dawn. I didn’t sleep much.
“Doyou suppose this house is haunted?” I asked at breakfast, before weheaded off to our new school.
Jensensnorted into his cereal. But Mom put her head to one side andconsidered me for a long while.
“Yeah,haunted,” Jensen said. “By the ghosts of wolves. And a big ugly closetbear.” I had made the mistake of telling the family about them when Iwas littler. And back whenwe were a family, Dad had teased me—and so had Jensen.
“Jensen. . . ,” Mom warned.
SoI didn’t bring it up again. Not at breakfast and not at dinner, either.But when we went to bed that night, I borrowed two pieces of cottonfrom Mom’s dresser and stuck them in my ears. Then I brushed my teeth,went to the bathroom, and jumped into bed. It was when I hit the bedthe first time at night that the wolves knew it was time to wake up.And the bear.
Momcame in and kissed me good night. She turned on the night-light andturned off the overhead.
“Leavethe door open,” I reminded her. Not that she ever needed reminding.
AndI lay down and quickly fell asleep.
Itwas well past midnight that I woke. The wolves and bear were quiet. Itwas the ghost sobbing loudly in Mom’s room that woke me. I wassurprised it hadn’t wakened her. But then she didn’t hear the wolves orbears, either. She said that since I did, I’m a hero every time I gotinto bed. I know I’m no hero—but I’d sure like to be.
Theghost went on and on and I began to wonder if it was dangerous. Badenough that Dad was gone. If