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low whisper.
    “Something weird is going on,” Lindy added.
    Mrs. Powell yawned and closed her book. “What’s wrong?”
    “It’s about Mr. Wood,” Kris said. “He’s been doing a lot of strange things.”
    “Huh?” Mrs. Powell’s eyes opened wide. She looked pale and tired under the harsh light from the reading lamp.
    “He was strangling Slappy,” Lindy reported. “And this afternoon, he said some really gross things. And—”
    “Stop!” Mrs. Powell ordered, raising one hand. “Just stop.”
    “But, Mom—” Kris started.
    “Give me a break, girls,” their mother said wearily. “I’m tired of your silly competitions.”
    “You don’t understand,” Lindy interrupted.
    “Yes, I do understand,” Mrs. Powell said sharply. “You two are even competing with those ventriloquist dummies.”
    “Mom, please!”
    “I want it to stop right now,” Mrs. Powell insisted, tossing the book onto her bed table. “I mean it. I don’t want to hear another word from either of you about those dummies. If you two have problems, settle it between yourselves.”
    “Mom, listen—”
    “And if you can’t settle it, I’ll take the dummies away. Both of them. I’m serious.” Mrs. Powell reached above her head and clicked off the reading light, throwing the room into darkness. “Good night,” she said.
    The girls had no choice but to leave the room. They slunk down the hall in silence.
    Kris hesitated at the doorway to their bedroom. She expected to find Mr. Wood strangling Slappy again. She breathed a sigh of relief when she saw the two dummies on the bed where they had been left.
    “Mom wasn’t too helpful,” Lindy said dryly, rolling her eyes. She picked up Slappy and started to arrange him in the chair in front of the window.
    “I think she was asleep and we woke her up,” Kris replied.
    She picked up Mr. Wood and started toward the chair with him—then stopped. “You know what? I think I’m going to put him in the closet tonight,” she said thoughtfully.
    “Good idea,” Lindy said, climbing into bed.
    Kris glanced down at the dummy, half-expecting him to react. To complain. To start calling her names.
    But Mr. Wood grinned up at her, his painted eyes dull and lifeless.
    Kris felt a chill of fear.
    I’m becoming afraid of a stupid ventriloquist’s dummy, she thought.
    I’m shutting him up in the closet tonight because I’m afraid.
    She carried Mr. Wood to the closet. Then, with a groan, she raised him high above her head and slid him onto the top shelf. Carefully closing the closet door, listening for the click, she made her way to her bed.
    She slept fitfully, tossing on top of the covers, her sleep filled with disturbing dreams. She awoke to find her nightshirt completely twisted, cutting off the circulation to her right arm. She struggled to straighten it, then fell back to sleep.

    She awoke early, drenched in sweat. The sky was still dawn-gray outside the window.
    The room felt hot and stuffy. She sat up slowly, feeling weary, as if she hadn’t slept at all.
    Blinking away the sleep, her eyes focused on the chair in front of the window.
    There sat Slappy, exactly where Lindy had placed him.
    And beside him sat Mr. Wood, his arm around Slappy’s shoulder, grinning triumphantly at Kris as if he had just pulled off a wonderful joke.

 
    11

    “Now, Mr. Wood, do you go to school?”
    “Of course I do. Do you think I’m a dummy?”
    “And what’s your favorite class?”
    “Wood shop, of course!”
    “What project are you building in shop class, Mr. Wood?”
    “I’m building a girl dummy! What else? Ha-ha! Think I want to spend the rest of my life on your lap?!”
    Kris sat in front of the dressing table mirror with Mr. Wood on her lap, studying herself as she practiced her routine for the school concert.
    Mr. Wood had been well-behaved for two days. No frightening, mysterious incidents. Kris was beginning to feel better. Maybe everything would go okay from now on.
    She leaned close