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Hurry."
    "All right, Mr. Cassidy," I said.
    I called Enoch. He didn't answer. I called again. Silence.
    Mr. Cassidy started to cry. It shocked me, and then I felt kind of sorry for him. He just didn't understand, after all. I know what Enoch can do to you when he whispers that way. First he coaxes you, and then he pleads, and then he threatens—
    "You'd better obey him," I told Mr. Cassidy. "Has he told you who to kill?"
    Mr. Cassidy didn't pay any attention to me. He just cried. And then he took out the jail keys and opened up the cell next to mine. He went in and locked the door.
    "I won't," he sobbed. "I won't, I won't!"
    "You won't what?" I asked.
    "I won't kill Doctor Silversmith at the hotel and give Enoch his head. I'll stay here, in the cell, where I'm safe! Oh you fiend, you devil—"
    He slumped down sideways and I could see him through the bars dividing our cells, sitting all hunched over while his hands tore at his hair.
    "You'd better," I called out. "Or else Enoch will do something. Please, Mr. Cassidy—oh, hurry—"
    Then Mr. Cassidy gave a little moan and I guess he fainted. Because he didn't say anything more and he stopped clawing. I called him once but he wouldn't answer.
    So what could I do? I sat down in the dark corner of my cell and watched the moonlight. Moonlight always makes Enoch wild.
    Then Mr. Cassidy started to scream. Not loud, but deep down in his throat. He didn't move at all, just screamed.
    I knew it was Enoch, taking what he wanted—from him.
    What was the use of looking? You can't stop him, and I had warned Mr. Cassidy.
    I just sat there and held my hands to my ears until it was all over.
    When I turned around again, Mr. Cassidy still sat slumped up against the bars. There wasn't a sound to be heard.
    Oh yes, there was! A purring. A soft, faraway purring. The purring of Enoch, after he has eaten. Then I heard a scratching. The scratching of Enoch's claws, when he frisks because he's been fed.
    The purring and the scratching came from inside Mr. Cassidy's head.
    That would be Enoch, all right, and he was happy now.
    I was happy, too.
    I reached my hand through the bars and pulled the jail keys from Mr. Cassidy's pocket. I opened my cell door and I was free again.
    There was no need for me to stay now, with Mr. Cassidy gone. And Enoch wouldn't be staying, either. I called to him.
    "Here, Enoch!"
    That was as close as I've ever come to really seeing Enoch—a sort of a white streak that came flashing out of the big red hole he had eaten in the back of Mr. Cassidy's skull.
    Then I felt the soft, cold, flabby weight landing on my own head once more, and I knew Enoch had come home.
    I walked through the corridor and opened the outer door of the jail.
    Enoch's tiny feet began to patter on the roof of my brain.
    Together we walked out into the night. The moon was shining, everything was still, and I could hear, ever so softly, Enoch's happy chuckling in my ear.

Catnip
     
     
     
    R ONNIE S HIRES STOOD BEFORE the mirror and slicked back his hair. He straightened his new sweater and stuck out his chest. Sharp! Had to watch the way he looked, with graduation only a few weeks away and that election for class president coming up. If he could get to be president then, next year in high school he'd be a real wheel. Go out for second team or something. But he had to watch the angles—
    Ma came out of the kitchen, carrying his lunch. Ronnie wiped the grin off his face. She walked up behind him and put her arms around his waist.
    "Hon, I only wish your father were here to see you—"
    Ronnie wriggled free. "Yea, sure. Say, Ma."
    "Yes?"
    "How's about some loot, huh? I got to get some things today."
    "Well, I suppose. But try to make it last, son. This graduation costs a lot of money, seems to me."
    "I'll pay you back someday." He watched her as she fumbled in her apron pocket and produced a wadded-up dollar bill.
    "Thanks. See you." He picked up his lunch and ran outside. He walked along, smiling and