and looking at the terminal, still wondering what they were going to do about Mr Toomy, when Bethany tugged at the back of her blouse.
"Dinah is talking in her sleep, or something. I think she might be delirious. Can you come?"
Laurel came. Rudy Warwick was sitting across from Dinah, holding one of her hands and looking at her anxiously.
"I dunno," he said worriedly. "I dunno, but I think she might be going."
Laurel felt the girl's forehead. It was dry and very hot. The bleeding had either slowed down or stopped entirely, but the girl's respiration came in a series of pitiful whistling sounds. Blood was crusted around her mouth like strawberry sauce.
Laurel began, "I think - " and then Dinah said, quite clearly, "You have to hurry before they all decide you're not coming and leave."
Laurel and Bethany exchanged puzzled, frightened glances.
"I think she's dreaming about that guy Toomy," Rudy told Laurel. "She said his name once."
"Yes," Dinah said. Her eyes were closed, but her head moved slightly and she appeared to listen. "Yes I will be," she said. "If you want me to, I will. But hurry. I know it hurts, but you have to hurry."
"She is delirious, isn't she?" Bethany whispered.
"No," Laurel said. "I don't think so. I think she might be... dreaming."
But that was not what she thought at all. What she really thought was that Dinah might be
(seeing)
doing something else. She didn't think she wanted to know what that something might be, although an idea whirled and danced far back in her mind. Laurel knew she could summon that idea if she wanted to, but she didn't. Because something creepy was going on here, extremely creepy, and she could not escape the idea that it did have something to do with
(don't kill him... we need him)
Mr Toomy.
"Leave her alone," she said in a dry, abrupt tone of voice. "Leave her alone and let her
(do what she has to do to him)
sleep."
"God, I hope we take off soon," Bethany said miserably, and Rudy put a comforting arm around her shoulders.
11
Craig reached the conveyor belt and fell onto it. A white sheet of agony ripped through his head, his neck, his chest. He tried to remember what had happened to him and couldn't. He had run down the stalled escalator, he had hidden in a little room, he had sat tearing strips of paper in the dark... and that was where memory stopped.
He raised his head, hair hanging in his eyes, and looked at the glowing girl, who now sat cross-legged in front of the rubber strips, an inch off the conveyor belt. She was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen in his life; how could he ever have thought she was one of them?
"Are you an angel?" he croaked.
Yes, the glowing girl replied, and Craig felt his pain overwhelmed with joy. His vision blurred and then tears - the first ones he had ever cried as an adult - began to run slowly down his cheeks. Suddenly he found himself remembering his mother's sweet, droning, drunken voice as she sang that old song.
"Are you an angel of the morning? Will you be my angel of the morning?"
Yes - I will be. If you want me to, I will. But hurry. I know it hurts, Mr Toomy, but you have to hurry.
"Yes," Craig sobbed, and began to crawl eagerly along the luggage conveyor belt toward her. Every movement sent fresh pain jig-jagging through him on irregular courses; blood dripped from his smashed nose and shattered mouth. Yet he still hurried as much as he could. Ahead of him, the little girl faded back through the hanging rubber strips, somehow not disturbing them at all as she went.
"Just touch my cheek before you leave me, baby," Craig said. He hawked up a spongy mat of blood, spat it on the wall where it clung like a huge dead spider, and tried to crawl faster.
12
To the east of the airport, a large cracking, rending sound filled the freakish morning. Bob and Albert got to their feet, faces pallid and filled with dreadful questions.
"What was that?" Albert asked.
"I think it was a tree," Bob replied, and licked his lips.
"But there's no wind!"
"No," Bob agreed. "There's no wind."
The noise had now become a moving barricade of splintered sound. Parts of it would seem to come into focus... and then drop back again just before identification was possible. At one moment Albert could swear he