“Will, please…”
Will looked at Jim now, with the library books in his hands.
“We been to the library. Ain’t that enough?”
Jim shook his head. “Carry these for me.”
He handed Will his books and trotted softly off under the hissing whispering trees. Three houses down he called back: “Will? Know what you are? A darn old dimwit Episcopal Baptist!”
Then Jim was gone.
Will seized the books tight to his chest. They were wet from the hands.
Don’t look back! he thought.
I won’t! I won’t!
And looking only toward home, he walked that way.
Quickly.
Chapter 7
Halfway home, Will felt a shadow breathing hard behind him.
“Theatre closed?” said Will, not looking back.
Jim walked in silence beside him for a long while and then said, “Nobody home.”
“Swell!”
Jim spat. “Darn Baptist preacher, you!”
And around the corner a tumbleweed slithered, a great cotton ball of pale paper which bounced, then clung shivering to Jim’s legs.
Will grabbed the paper, laughing, pulled it off, let it fly! He stopped laughing.
The boys, watching the pale throwaway rattle and flit through the trees, were suddenly cold.
“Wait a minute…” said Jim, slowly.
All of a sudden they were yelling, running, leaping. “Don’t tear it! Careful!”
The paper fluttered like a snare drum in their hands.
“COMING, OCTOBER TWENTY-FOURTH!”
Their lips moved, shadowing the words set in rococo type.
“Cooger and Dark’s…”
“Carnival!”