The boys, below, grew colder.
Now the old and terribly-wise-with-nightmare eye was so wide and so deep and so alive all to itself in that smashed porcelain face that there at the bottom of the eye somewhere the evil nephew peered along and out at the freaks, internes, police, and…
Will.
Will saw himself, saw Jim, two little pictures posed in reflection on that single eye. If the old man blinked, the two images would be crushed by his lid!
The Illustrated Man on his knees, turned at last and gentled all with his smile.
“Gentlemen, boys, here indeed is the man who lives with lightning!
The second policeman laughed; this motion shook his hand off his holster.
Will shuffled to the right.
The old spittle-eye followed sucking at him with its emptiness.
Will squirmed left.
As did the phlegm that was the old man’s gaze, while his chill lips peeled wide to shape, reshape an echoed gasp, a flutter. From deep below the old man bounced his voice ricocheting off the dank stone walls of his body until it fell out his mouth:
“…welcome…mmmmmm…”
The words fell back in.
“well…cummm…mmmm…”
The policemen nudged each other with identical smiles.
“No!” cried Will, suddenly. “That’s no act! He was dead! He”d die again if you cut the power — !”
Will slapped his own hand to his mouth.
0 Lord, he thought, what am I doing? I want him alive, so he’ll forgive us, let us be! But, oh Lord, even more I want him dead, I want them all dead, they scare me so much I got hairballs big as cats in my stomach!
“I’m sorry…he whispered.
Don’t be!” cried Mr Dark.
The freaks made a commotion of blinks and glares. What next from the statue in the cold sizzling chair? The old old man’s one eye gummed itself. The mouth collapsed, a bubble of yellow mud in a sulphur bath.
The Illustrated Man banged the switch a notch grinning wildly at no one. He thrust a steel sword in the old man’s empty glove-like hand.
A drench of electricity prickled from the sere music-box tines of the ancient stubbled cheeks. That deep eye showed swift as a bullet hole. Hungry for Will, it found and ate of his image. The lips steamed:
“I…sssaw…the…boysssssss…ssssneak into… hee tent…tttttt…”
The desiccated bellows refilled, then pin-punctured the swamp air out in faint wails:
“…We…rehearsing…sssso I thought…play…thissss trick…pretend to be…dead.”
Again the pause to drink oxygen like ale, electricity like wine.
“…let myself fall…like…I…wasssss…dying…The…boysssssssss…ssscreaming…ran!”
The old man husked out syllable on syllable.
“Ha.” Pause. “Ha.” Pause. “Ha.”
Electricity hemstitched the whistling lips.
The Illustrated Man coughed gently. “This act, it tires Mr Electrico…”
“Oh, sure.” One of the policemen started. “Sorry.” He touched his cap. “Fine show.”
“Fine,” said one of the internes.
Will glanced swiftly to see the interne’s mouth, what it looked like saying this, but Jim stood in the way.
“Boys! A dozen free passes!” Mr Dark held them out. “Here!”
Jim and Will didn’t move.
“Well?” said one policeman.
Sheepishly, Will reached up for the flame-coloured tickets, but stopped as Mr Dark said, “Your names?”
The officers winked at each other.
“Tell him, boys.”
Silence. The freaks watched.
“Simon,” said Jim. “Simon Smith.
Mr Dark’s hand, holding the tickets, constricted.
“Oliver,” said Will. “Oliver Brown.”
The Illustrated Man sucked in a mighty breath. The freaks inhaled! The vast ingasped sigh might have, seemed to, stir Mr Electrico. His sword twitched. Its tip leaped to spark-sting Will’s shoulder, then sizzle over in blue-green explosions at Jim. Lightning shot Jim’s shoulder.
The policemen laughed.
The old old man’s one wide eye blazed.
“I dub thee…asses and foolssssss…I dub…thee…Mr Sickly…and…Mr Pale… !”
Mr Electrico finished. The sword tapped them.
“A…sssshort…sad life…for you both!”
Then his mouth slit shut, his raw eye glued over. Containing his cellar breath, he let the simple sparks swarm his blood like dark champagne.
“The tickets,” murmured Mr Dark. “Free rides. Free rides. Come any time. Come back. Come back.”
Jim grabbed, Will grabbed the tickets.
They jumped, they bolted from the tent.
The police, smiling and waving all around, followed at their leisure.
The internes, not smiling, like ghosts in their white suits, came after.