"Pig food! Pig food!" Jeremiah shrieked gleefully, and threw two ears of corn into the pen. The pig finished everything in its trough and went for the corn.

"Pig food!" He carried an armload of corn to the pen. The pig reared back on its hind legs, screaming, as he approached, but began gobbling the corn as soon as the boy moved back toward the corncrib, its eyes frenzied and wide.

He brought over four more armfuls. "Eat till you burst, fat pig," Jeremiah whispered, the image in his head still vibrating quietly. The pig snorted and stomped and ate and searched for more food and ate it.

"Till you burst."

And then the pig moaned, a low, keening sound, and sniffed at the half-eaten ear of corn at its feet, and shuddered. It lay its head in the mud, and with a great thump, its massive body followed. The pig kicked twice in the air with its hind legs, panted, moaned, twisted its neck so that its head faced Jeremiah, and died. Its eyes were open. They stared vacantly at the boy. Jeremiah screamed.

Inside the house, his father stumbled off the couch, shaking himself awake and growling, "What'd he do now? Snotty little pup, prob'ly bothering with that hog again."

He had killed it. Through his screams, a part of Jeremiah realized with utter coldness and clarity that he had done something— something with his mind— to cause the occurrence in the pigpen.

His father saw the pig, started to drag its immense corpse out of the mud, then stopped.

"I think I'm going to take care of you first," he said. He ran for Jeremiah, but the boy didn't move. He was still thinking of the pig and the strange, unearthly image that had come into his sight, the killing picture. He had seen death, and death had been created.

He hardly felt his father's rough hand grab hold of his arm and whirl him around. Then the big hand headed straight for his face and jolted it back. The sting brought involuntary tears to his eyes. His father hit him again.