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I
don’t understand,’ Walter Haxalt replied. ‘I didn’t mean to offend you in any
way.’
    Tm talking
about this restaurant, Le Reposoir ,’
said Charlie. ‘Mrs Foss back at the Iron Kettle warned me against visiting it.
Those two good old boys on the bench there said they’d never heard of it, when
they obviously had. And your pet deputy here did everything he could to tell me
that I wouldn’t be welcome. Now you.’
    Walter Haxalt
said nothing. Clive the deputy stroked his moustache as if it were a small
furry pet.
    ‘What I want to
know is what’s so darned off-putting about this place?’ Charlie appealed.
Walter Haxalt’s refusal to reply was quickly defusing his temper, and making
him feel embarrassed. ‘Is the food really that bad?’
    Walter Haxalt
stood up straight. ‘I’m sorry, Mr McLean, I don’t think that Alien’s Corners
can really give you the kind of welcome you expect. My suggestion is that you
drive right on to Bethlehem. There’s a good New England-style restaurant there.
They serve home-made hams and excellent boiled beef.’
    Martin said,
‘Dad, come on. Please.’
    Charlie
hesitated, biting his lip. Then he twisted the key in the ignition again, so
violently that he made the starter-motor screech. He was just about to pull
away from the kerb, however, when he glimpsed something moving behind the maple
trees on the far side of the green. It could have been nothing more than a
cloud shadow, or a wind-blown sheet of newspaper. It had vanished in an instant.
But Charlie was sure that he had seen a small figure, dressed in grubby white. A figure with the body of an infant and the fully developed head of
a man.

CHAPTER THREE
    T hey drove north-westwards out of Alien’s Corners past two rows of
white wooden houses.
    They saw nobody
at all, nobody walking by the roadside, no other cars. After a quarter of a
mile, they were back amongst the woods again, surrounded by the rusting funeral
of yet another lost summer. Although it was still early, the sun had already dropped
below the treeline, and glittered at them tantalizingly, always out of reach
behind the branches.
    Charlie said
nothing for a while, but when Martin reached forward to switch on the tape
player, he took hold of his wrist and said, ‘Not now. I want to talk.’
    Martin folded
his arms and sat back in his seat.
    ‘I want to know
where you found that card.’
    Martin
shrugged. ‘I picked it up at that Iron Kettle place.’
    ‘Where? I didn’t see any cards there.’
    ‘I found it on
the floor.’
    Charlie lowered
his sun visor. ‘You’re not telling me the truth, Martin. I don’t know why, but
you’d better start explaining yourself pretty darned quick, otherwise this trip
is over here and now and you go off to the Harrisons.’
    Martin said,
‘It’s the truth, Dad. I found it.’
    ‘We were
talking about Le Reposoir and you
just happened to find one of their cards? For Christ’s sake, what do you take
me for?’
    Martin sulkily
lowered his head.
    ‘It’s over,
have you got that?’ Charlie told him. ‘Tomorrow I’m going to call the Harrisons
and then I’m going to drive you right back to New York.’
    Martin said
nothing. ‘Have you got that?’ Charlie repeated. ‘Yes, I’ve got it,’ said
Martin, in his best ‘anything-to-keep-the-old-man-quiet’ voice.
    Charlie slowed down
as they approached a steeply sloping intersection with a sign saying Washington
in one direction and Bethlehem in the other. He stopped the car by the side of
the road and opened up his map. ‘This should be Quassapaug Road right here.’
    He took a right,
and cautiously steered the Oldsmobile up a tight corkscrew gradient, under
overhanging oaks and American beeches. The sun danced behind the leaves.
Somewhere behind the thicket fence of tree trunks, there were creamy clouds and
pale blue sky; but here in the woods, C harlie began to feel strangely
imprisoned and claustrophobic.
    ‘All right,
admitted, I haven’t been much of