Cold Fire

shoe down across the front of his shin, as hard as she could, to make him feel it through his sock. Jim cried out in pain as the ground shifted under them, and Holly looked down in horror at the rupturing earth. But the burrowing stopped simultaneously with his sharp cry. The ground didn't open. Nothing erupted from it or sucked them down.

Shaking, Holly stepped back from the ripped sod and cracked earth on which she had been standing.

Jim looked at her, aghast. “It wasn't me. It can't have been.”

* * *

Back in the car, Jim slumped in his seat.

Holly folded her arms on the steering wheel, put her forehead on her arms.

He looked out the side window at the park. The giant mole trail was still there. The sidewalk was cracked and tumbled. The bench lay on its side.

He just couldn't believe that the thing beneath the park had been only a figment of his imagination, empowered only by his mind. He had been in control of himself all his life, living a Spartan existence of books and work, with no vices or indulgences. (Except a frighteningly convenient forgetfulness, he thought sourly.) Nothing about Holly's theory was harder for him to accept than that a wild and savage part of him, beyond his conscious control, was the only real danger that they faced.

He was beyond ordinary fear now. He was no longer perspiring or shivering. He was in the grip of a primal terror that left him rigid and Dry-Ice dry.

“It wasn't me,” he repeated.

“Yes, it was.” Considering that she believed he'd almost killed her, Holly was surprisingly gentle with him. She did not raise her voice; it was softened by a note of great tenderness.

He said, “You're still on this split-personality kick.”

“Yes.”

“So it was my dark side.”

“Yes.”

“Embodied in a giant worm or something,” he said, trying to hone a sharp edge on his sarcasm, failing. “But you said The Enemy only broke through when I was sleeping, and I wasn't sleeping, so even if I am The Enemy, how could I have been that thing in the park?”

“New rules. Subconsciously, you're getting desperate. You're not able to control that personality as easily as before. The closer you're forced to the truth, the more aggressive The Enemy's going to become in order to defend itself.”

“If it was me, why wasn't there an alien heartbeat like before?”

“That's always just been a dramatic effect, like the bells ringing before The Friend put in an appearance.” She raised her head from her arms and looked at him. “You dropped it because there wasn't time for it. I was reading that plaque, and you wanted to stop me as fast as you could. You needed a distraction. Let me tell you, babe, it was a lulu.”

He looked out the window again, toward the windmill and the lectern that held the information about The Black Windmill.

Holly put a hand on his shoulder. “You were in a black despair after your parents died. You needed to escape. Evidently a writer named Arthur Willott provided you with a fantasy that fit your needs perfectly. To one extent or another, you've been living in it ever since.”

Though he could not admit it to her, he had to admit to himself that he was groping toward understanding, that he was on the brink of seeing his past from a new perspective that would make all of the mysterious lines and angles fall into a new and comprehensible shape. If selective amnesia, carefully constructed false memories, and even multiple personalities were not indications of madness but only the hooks he had used to hold on to sanity — as Holly insisted — then what would happen to him if he let go of those hooks? If he dug up the truth about his past, faced the things he had refused to face when he had turned to fantasy as a child, would the truth drive him mad this time? What was he hiding from?

“Listen,” she said, “the important thing is that you shut it down before it reached us, before it did any harm.”

“My shin hurts like hell,” he said, wincing.

“Good,” she said brightly. She started the engine.

“Where are we going now?” he asked;

“Where else? The library.”

* * *

Holly parked on Copenhagen Lane in front of the small Victorian house that served as the New Svenborg library.

She was pleased that her hands were not shaking, that her voice was level and calm, and that she had been able to drive from Tivoli Gardens without weaving all over the road. After the incident in the park, she was amazed that her pants were still clean. She had been reduced to raw terror — a pure, intense emotion untainted by any other. Diluted now, it was still with her, and she knew it would remain with her until they were out of these spooky old woods — or dead. But she was determined not to reveal the depth of her fear to Jim, because he had to be worse off than she was. After all, it was his life that was turning out to be a collage of flimsy lies. He needed to lean on her.

As she and Jim went up the front walk to the porch (Jim limping), Holly noticed he was studying the lawn around him, as if he thought something might start burrowing toward them.

Better not, she thought, or you'll have two bleeding shins.

But as she went through the front door, she wondered if a jolt of pain would work a second time.

In the paneled foyer, a sign announced NONFICTION SECOND FLOOR. An arrow pointed to a staircase on her right.

The foyer funneled into a first-floor hallway off which lay two large rooms. Both were filled with bookshelves. The chamber on the left also contained reading tables with chairs and a large oak desk.

The woman at the desk was a good advertisement for country living: flawless complexion, lustrous chestnut hair, clear hazel eyes. She looked thirty-five but was probably twelve years older.

The nameplate in front of her said ELOISE GLYNN.

Yesterday, when Holly had wanted to come into the library to see if the much-admired Mrs. Glynn was there, Jim had insisted that she would be retired, that she had been “quite old” twenty-five years ago, when in fact she obviously had been fresh out of college and starting her first job.

By comparison with previous discoveries, this was onlya minor surprise. Jim hadn't wanted Holly to come into the library yesterday, so he'd simply lied. And from the look on his face now, it was clear that Eloise Glynn's youth was no surprise to him either; he had known, yesterday, that he was not telling the truth, though perhaps he had not understood why he was lying.

The librarian did not recognize Jim. Either he had been one of those kids who left little impression or, more likely he had been telling the truth when he'd said he had not been to the library since he'd left for college eighteen years ago.

Eloise Glynn had the bouncy manner and attitude of a girls' sports coach that Holly remembered from high school. “Willott?” she said in answer to Holly's question. “Oh, yes, we've got a truckload of Willott.” She bounced up from her chair. “I can show you right where he's at.” She came around her desk, stepping briskly, and Holly and Jim across the hall to the other large room. “He was local, as I'm sure you know. Died a decade ago, but two-thirds of his books are still in print.” She stopped in front of the young-adult section and made a sweeping gesture with one hand to indicate two three-foot shelves of Willott titles. “He was a productive man, Artie Willott, so busy that beavers hung their heads in shame when he walked by.”

She grinned at Holly, and it was infectious. Holly grinned back at her. “We're looking for The Black Windmill.”

“That's one of his most popular titles, never met a kid didn't love it.” Mrs. Glynn plucked the book off the shelf almost without looking to see where it was, handed it to Holly. “This for your kid?”

“Actually for me. I read about it on the plaque over in Tivoli Gardens.”

“I've read the book,” Jim said. “But she's curious.”

With Jim, Holly returned to the main room and sat at the table farthest from the desk. With the book