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vomited.
    When her stomach was empty, she dry-heaved, and after an eternity the spasms stopped.
    By the Blessed Virgin, was there no way out of this?
    She and Jimmy were caught in a nightmare.
    She fastened her pants, adjusted her shirt.
    What in God's name were they going to do? There had to be a way out - besides . .
    . that way. The way Brian would offer them.
    She looked back at the car. Brian's white face was still visible.
    She couldn't see Jimmy or the others, the shadows in the car were too thick.
    But Brian's face was as visible as the full moon on a clear summer night. And when the lightning flashed, it seemed unreal, like some sort of leather mask.
    She considered running, but felt if she did they would take it out on Jimmy.
    No, she had to go back.
    She pushed out of the wet brush and walked back to the car, watching Brian's face all the way.
    God, that face, that pasty-white face, looking out of the car at the night.
    SIX
    October 30, 2:14 A.M.
    The goblins were back; nightmare riders galloping hell-bent for leather through a dismal brainstorm of painful memories. Faces livid with scars, eyes dangling on stalks against cheeks with grey-green complexions.
    Becky awoke, balls of sweat the size of BBs ran off her face and breasts, gathered in her pubic thatch. Her nightgown clung to her. Her hair was damp.
    She rolled from beneath the covers, careful not to awaken Monty who slept (and she envied this) like a petrified tree. Head in hands, she sat on the edge of the bed and wished she smoked.
    After a moment, she got up, found her way to the dark living room. She went to the window, moved the curtains aside, looked out at the lake.
    The rain had dried up and left the night-land polished. The lake was calm, glistening with the moon's silver; an almost full moon. Normally, she would have found beauty in it, but not tonight; it reminded her of a dead, bleached eye.
    A gentle wind brewed up, came down through the pines, sighed loud enough for her to hear, pushed lightly through the lake and rolled it; shook the windowpane with a noise like dry, rattling bones.
    It passed on.
    It was cold in the house. Becky shivered. It was as if the scythe of the Reaper had passed over the cabin and spared them, but touched them with its chill.
    An image came to her of the scythe swinging back. But the thought did not hold.
    She turned her eyes back to the lake, to the short wooden dock sticking out into the water like a dark tongue—like Clyde's tongue when the shirt strips had done their work.
    Beads of moisture condensed on the glass, flowed down in mercurylike globs . . .
    the color of blood.
    The glass went smoky-dark, like an obsidian mirror. The bloody drops stood out against it in bold relief, oozed down the glass slowly...
    And then there were the eyes. Huge eyes; like infernal jack-o'-lantern eyes.
    And there was a sound; a growling noise like a hungry night beast.
    And this beast with the glowing eyes and growling stomach was moving fast toward her, and there were things in its head, things behind the jack-o'-lantern—eyes.
    No, it was not a beast, not glowing eyes. It was . . .
    Nothing now.
    No beads of blood.
    No beast or thing that looked like a beast.
    Just the wind out there with the pines, the water and the boiled-egg moon.
    Becky sagged, stumbled away from the window. She put a hand on the arm of the couch, kept herself from toppling. Her nightgown was damper if than ever; shaped around her breasts and pulled up between her legs like a clutching hand— Clyde's hand .
    God, don't think that. He's dead. He's not some kind of boogeyman.
    Or is he? she thought suddenly.
    She sat down on the couch and shivered. The room was freezing. She was damp, and there was the icy touch of fear about her.
    Get a grip on yourself, old girl. You're starting to go Flip City.
    Starting?
    After a moment she padded to the kitchen, drank a glass of water.
    Goblins, she thought. Why goblins? Why the eyes? The growling?
    All of that couldn't