The Captive Page 0,32

you make a bomb out of a pumpkin?

"Okay," Doug hissed at last. "That's enough." He swarmed back over the fence. Chris started to climb over too, but just at that moment there was a frenzied barking and a large black dog with wiry legs appeared.

"Help!" squawked Chris. He was caught hanging over the top of the fence. The Doberman had him by the boot and was worrying it furiously, snarling. A man exploded out of the booth and began yelling at them and shaking his fist.

"Help! Help!" Chris shouted. He started to giggle and then yelped, "Ow! He's takin' my foot off! Ow! Help!"

Doug, his strange slanted eyes glittering wildly, rushed back to the jeep. "Gonna kill that dog," he said breathlessly. "Where's that army pistol?"

"Hold on, Max! Hold him till I get my shotgun!" the man was yelling.

"Ow! He's chewin' on me! It hurts, man!" Chris bellowed.

"Don't kill him," Cassie pleaded frantically, catching Doug by the arm. All she needed was for him and the pumpkin man to start shooting at each other. Doug continued ransacking the litter on the jeep's floor. "Don't kill the dog! We can just give him this," Cassie said, suddenly inspired. She snatched up a Dunkin' Donuts bag with several stale doughnuts in it. While Doug was still looking for a gun, she ran back to the fence.

"Here, doggy, nice doggy," she gasped. The dog snarled. Chris continued bellowing; the pumpkin man continued yelling. "Good dog," Cassie told the Doberman desperately. "Good boy, here, look, doughnuts, see? Want a doughnut?" And then, surprising herself completely, she shouted, "Come here! NOW."

At the same time, she did-she didn't know what. She did... something... with her mind. She could feel it going out of her like a blast of heat. It hit the dog and the dog let go of Chris's foot, hind legs collapsing. Belly almost on the ground, it slunk over to the fence and crouched.

Cassie felt tall and terrible. She said, "Good dog," and tossed the doughnut bag over the fence. Chris was scrambling over in the other direction, almost falling on his head. The dog lay down and whined pitifully, ignoring the doughnuts.

"Let's go," Chris yelled. "Come on, Doug! We don't need to kill anybody!"

Between them, he and Cassie bundled the protesting Doug into the jeep and Chris drove off. The pumpkin-seller ran after them with his shotgun, but when they reached the road he gave up the chase.

"Ow," Chris said, shaking his foot and causing the jeep to veer.

Doug muttered to himself.

Cassie leaned back and sighed.

"Okay," Chris said cheerfully, "now let's go to the Witch Dungeon."

The Salem Witch Dungeon Museum looked like a house from the outside. Chris and Doug seemed to know the layout well, and Cassie followed them around the house, where they slipped in a back entrance.

Through a doorway Cassie glimpsed what seemed to be a small theater. "That's where they do the witch trials," Chris said. "You know, like a play for the tourists. Then they take 'em down here."

A flight of narrow stairs plunged down into darkness.

"Why?" Cassie said.

"It's the dungeon. They give 'em a tour. We hide in the corners and jump up and yell when they get close. Some of 'em practically have heart attacks," Doug said, with his mad grin.

Cassie could see how that might happen. As they made their way down the stairs it got darker and darker. A dank, musty odor assaulted her nostrils and the air felt very cool.

A narrow corridor stretched forward into the blackness, which was broken only by tiny lights at long intervals. Small cells opened out from either side of the corridor. The whole place had a heavy, underground feel to it.

It's like the boiler room, Cassie thought. Her feet stopped moving.

"Come on, what's wrong?" Doug whispered, turning around. She could barely see him.

Chris came back to the foot of the stairs and looked into her face. "We don't have to go in there yet," he said. "We can wait here till they start to come down."

Cassie nodded at him gratefully. It was bad enough standing on the edge of this terrible place. She didn't want to go in until she absolutely had to.

"Or ..." Chris seemed to be engaging in some prodigious feat of thought. "Or... we could just leave, you know."

"Leave now? Why?" Doug demanded, running back.

"Because ..." Chris stared at him. "Because... because I say so!"

"You? Who cares what you say?" Doug returned in a whispering shout and the two of them began to