27

Tom's Room

Here there were no star charts, skulls, exotic fish; no photographs of magicians, only of Tom and his father on horseback, sitting in a rowboat with fishing poles, toting shotguns across a Montana field. The only other, picture was a reproduction of one of the Blue Period Picasso's sad-faced acrobats. One side of the room held a built-in desk and a rank of shelves: after returning from Ventnor, both boys had eaten dinner with Tom's parents and then gone into the bedroom to study.

At ten-thirty Del said his eyes hurt and closed his books and flopped down onto the guest bed.

'You're going to flunk, math.'

'I don't care.' He burrowed deeper into the white pillowcase. 'I'm not like Dave Brick.'

'Well, if you don't care, then I don't either. But the exams start on Wednesday.' Tom looked interrogatively over his shoulder, but his friend's small form still lay face down on the guest bed. Suffering seemed to come from him in waves; for a second this emotion pouring from his friend confused itself in Tom's mind with bereavement, and he thought that he would be unable to keep from crying. Hartley Flanagan had gone through dinner like a man concentrating on a mountain several miles off. There had been another long session with his doctor that afternoon. All Tom's instincts told him that soon his mother or his father would say that they had to have a long talk: after the talk, nothing would remain unchanged. Tom stared at the wall before him, almost seeing his own face looking back from the cream-painted plaster, a face about to record an alteration, a shock; he saw himself ten, twenty years hence, as isolated as Skeleton Ridpath.

As isolated as Del - that suddenly came to him.

He turned around, pushing his books back with his elbows. 'Don't you think you ought to talk about it?'

Del relaxed slightly. 'I don't know.'

'I damn near bit my tongue in half on the bus, but I knew you wouldn't want to talk there.'

Del shook his head.

'And we couldn't talk during dinner.'

'No.' He rolled over and looked up at Tom.

'Well, we've been sitting in here for three hours. You read some of those pages four times. You look terrible. I'm so tired I could drop off right here. Isn't it about time?'

'Time for what?'

'For you to tell me about that guy.'

'I don't know anything about him, so I can't.'

'Come off it. That can't be true.'

'It is true. Why do you think I'd know anything about him?' Del brought up his knees and dropped his head onto them. To Tom he looked as though he were decreasing in size, knotting himself up into a disappearing bundle.

'Because… ' Tom plunged on, now unsure of himself. 'Because I think it was that guy you talk about all the time. Your uncle.'

'Can't be.' Del was still huddling into himself.

'You say.'

Del looked up. 'You want to talk about my Uncle Cole? Okay. He's in New England. I know he's in New England. He's studying.'

'Studying magic?'

'Sure. Why not? That's what he d-s. And that's where he is. Why didn't you know? Because you never asked. Because you never seemed that interested before.' His face trembled.

'Hey, Del… ' Now Tom was in a morass. 'I didn't… I didn't know what… ' I didn't know what you would tell me. And from that first day, heard Bud Copeland's warning: Take care, Red. 'Well, sure, I was interested,' he lamely said.

'Yeah, you and Skeleton.' Del dropped his head onto his knees again. 'Everything's changing,' he said in a muffled voice.

'Well…?'

'Just changing. I think everything should always be the same. Then you'd always know… '

Where you were. What was going to happen.

Del lowered his legs and sat absolutely upright on the bed. 'I get this feeling,' he said. He was as rigid as an Indian on a bed of nails. 'Did you ever read Frankenstein or The Narrative of A. Gordon Pym? No? I get this feeling I'm headed toward something like the end of those books - ice all around, everything all white, freezing or boiling, it d-sn't matter, no… towers of ice. No way out - nothing. Just towers of ice. And something real bad coming… '

'Sure,' Tom said. 'And then a prince will come along and say the magic words and three ravens will give you the magic tokens and a fish will carry you on his back.' He tried to smile.

'No. Like what Mr. Thorpe says if someone can't answer a question. Hic vigilans somniat. He dreams awake. That's how I am. Like I'm dreaming, not living. I don't believe anything that's happening to me. How would you like to try living with Tim and Valerie Hillman?'

'I didn't think… '

'You're right. That's not what we were talking about.'

'Okay. So let's go back to the towers of ice and the prince and the three ravens and the magic fish.'

'By all means, let us leave the Hillmans behind. I have an idea.'

'It's about time.'

'You were talking about rescue. Prince - ravens - that stuff.'

'I guess. Sure. I guess.'

'Why don't you come to visit Cole Collins with me over Christmas? I'm supposed to go see him. Come with me. Then you could meet him.'

Tom felt an extraordinary mix of emotions, fear and pleasure and dread and anticipation, protectiveness and weakness: He looked at Del, and wanted to embrace him. He saw Del all alone in an Arctic landscape. Then he thought of his father and said, 'I can't. I just can't. I'm sorry.'

It took him a second to realize that Del was crying.

'Sometime I will. I will, Del. Jesus, stop that. Let's do some card tricks or something - that shuffle you were showing me.'

'I don't have to be awake to shuffle cards,' Del said. 'Whatever you want, Master.'