Halfway to the house, a furrow caught at Saul's toes. As he sprawled, Ann gasped. “You can't count that, Elliot. He tripped.”

“Of course he tripped. He should count on tripping.”

“Get up, Saulie,” Herbie, his older brother, screamed from the garage where he stood with Josephine Dawkins, one pail of eggs between them. “Get up and run! This corner here! You can make it!”

The boy heaved to his feet, and threw his body forward again. Plunkett could hear him sobbing. He reached the cellar steps—and literally plunged down.

Plunkett pressed the stopwatch and the second hand halted. Three minutes thirteen seconds.

He held the watch up for his wife to see. “Thirteen seconds, Ann.”

Her face wrinkled.

He walked to the house. Saul crawled back up the steps, fragments of unrecovered breath rattling in his chest. He kept his eyes on his father.

“Come here, Saul. Come right here. Look at the watch. Now, what do you see?”

The boy stared intently at the watch. His lips began twisting; startled tears writhed down his stained face. “More—more than three m-minutes, poppa?”

“More than three minutes, Saul. Now, Saul—don't cry, son; it isn't any use—Saul, what would have happened when you got to the steps?”

A small voice, pitifully trying to cover its cracks: “The big doors would be shut.”

“The big doors would be shut. You would be locked outside. Then—what would have happened to you? Stop crying. Answer me!”

“Then, when the bombs fell, I'd—I'd have no place to hide. I'd burn like the head of a match. An'—an' the only thing left of me would be a dark spot on the ground, shaped like my shadow. An'—an'—”

“And the radioactive dust,” his father helped with the catechism.

“Elliot—” Ann sobbed behind him. “I don't—”