She brushed the last of the sand off her fingers and watched for whatever had moved to move again.
A hard gust of wind came through the grass, making it hiss as the stalks rubbed against one another.
After perhaps a minute, during which the only motion was the bending of the grass, she decided to chance standing up.
As she did so the thing she'd seen moving chose precisely the same moment to also stand upright, so that the pair of them, Candy and the stranger, rose like two swimmers emerging from a shallow sea.
Candy let out a yelp of shock at the sight of the stranger. And then, once the shock had worn off, she started to laugh. The man—whoever he was—was wearing some kind of Halloween mask, or so it seemed. What other explanation could there be for his freakish appearance? His left eye was round and wild, while his right was narrow and sly, and his mouth, framed by a black mustache and beard, was downturned in misery.
But none of this was as odd as what sprouted from the top of his head. There were large downy ears, and above them two enormous antlers, which would have resembled those of a stag except that there were seven heads (four on the left horn, three on the right) growing from them. Heads with eyes, noses and mouths.
They weren't, she realized now, static, nor were they made of rubber and papier-mвchй. In short, it was not a mask the man was wearing. These heads sprouting from the antlers were alive , and they were all staring at Candy the way their owner was staring at her: eight pairs of eyes all studying her with the same manic intensity.
She was speechless. But they were not. After a moment of silence the heads erupted into wild chatter, their manner highly agitated. Candy had no doubt about the subject of conversation. One minute the heads were looking at her, then they were facing one another, their volume rising as they attempted to out-talk one another.
The only mouth that wasn't moving was that of the man himself. He simply studied Candy, his wild and sly expression slowly becoming one of tentative enquiry.
Finally, he decided to approach her. Candy let out a little gasp of fear, and in response he raised his long-fingered hands as though to keep her from running away. The heads, meanwhile, were still chattering to one another.
"Be quiet !" he ordered them. "You're frightening the lady!"
All but one of the heads (the middle of the two on his right horn, a round-faced, sour individual) responded to his order. But this one kept talking.
"Keep your distance from her, John Mischief," the head advised its big brother. "She may look harmless, but you can't trust them. Any of them."
"I said hush up , John Serpent," the man said. "And I mean it."
The head made a face and muttered something under its breath. But it finally stopped talking.
"What's your name?" John Mischief asked Candy.
"Me?" Candy said, as though there was anybody else in the vicinity to whom the question might be directed.
"Oh Lordy Lou!" another of the heads remarked. "Yes,you, girl ."
"Be polite, John Sallow," John Mischief said, reaching up (without taking his eyes off Candy) and lightly slapping the short-tempered head for its offense.
Then, having hushed his companion, John Mischief said: "I do apologize for my brother, lady."
Then—of all things—he bowed to her.
It was not a deep bow. But there was something about the simple courtesy of the gesture that completely won Candy over. So what if John Mischief had seven extra heads; he'd bowed to her and called her lady . Nobody had ever done that to her before.
She smiled with improbable delight.
And the impish man called John Mischief, along with five of his seven siblings, smiled back.
"Please," he said. "I don't wish to alarm you, lady. Believe me, that is the very last thing I wish to do. But there is somebody in this vicinity by the name of Shape."
"Mendelson Shape," the smallest of the heads said.
"As John Moot says: Mendelson Shape ."
Before Candy could deal with any more information she needed a question answered. So she asked it.
"Are you all called John?" she said.
"Oh yes," said Mischief. "Tell her, brothers, left to right. Tell her what we are called."
So they did.
"John Fillet."
"John Sallow."
"John Moot."
"John Drowze."
"John Pluckitt."
"John Serpent."
"John Slop."
"And I'm the head brother," the eighth wonder replied. "John Mischief."
"Yes, I heard that part. I'm Candy Quackenbush."
"I am extremely pleased to make your acquaintance," John Mischief said.
He sounded completely sincere in this, and with good reason. To judge by his appearance, things had not gone well for him—or them —of late.
Mischief's striped blue shirt was full of holes and there were stains on his loosely knotted tie, which were either food or blood; she guessed the latter. Then there was his smell. He was less than sweet, to say the least. His shirt clung to his chest, soaked with pungent sweat.
"Have you been running from this man Shape?" Candy said.
"She's observant," John Pluckitt said appreciatively. "I like that. And young, which is good. She can help us, Mischief."
"Either that or she can get us in even deeper trouble," said John Serpent.
"We're as deep as we can get," John Slop observed. "I say we trust the girl, Mischief. We've got absolutely nothing to lose."
"What are they all talking about?" Candy asked Mischief.
"Besides me."
"The harbor," he replied.
"What harbor?" Candy said. "There's no harbor here. This is Minnesota. We're hundreds of miles from the ocean. No, thousands."
"Perhaps we're thousands of miles from any ocean you are familiar with, lady," said John Fillet, with a gap-toothed smile. "But there are oceans and oceans. Seas and seas."
"What on earth is he talking about?" Candy asked Mischief.
John Mischief pointed toward the tower that stood sixty or seventy yards from where they stood.
"That, lady, is a lighthouse," he said.
"No," said Candy, with a smile. The idea was preposterous. "Why would anybody—"
"Look at it," said John Drowze. "It is a lighthouse ."
Candy studied the odd tower again.
Yes, she could see that indeed it could have been designed as a lighthouse. There were the rotted remains of a staircase, spiraling up the middle of it, leading to a room at the top, which might have housed a lamp. But so what?
"Somebody was crazy," she remarked.
"Why?" said John Slop.
"Oh, come on," said Candy. "We've been through this. We're in Minnesota. There is no sea in—"
Candy stopped mid-sentence. Mischief had put his hand to his mouth, hushing her.
As he did so all of his brothers looked off in one direction or another. A few were sniffing the air, others tasting it on their lips. Whatever they did and wherever they looked, they all came to the same conclusion, and together they murmured two words.
"Shape's here ," they said.
6. THE LADY ASCENDS
Mischief instantly grabbed candy's arm and pulled her down into the long grass. His eyes were neither wild nor sly now. They were simply afraid. His brothers, meanwhile, were peering over the top of the grass in every direction, and now and then exchanging their own fearful looks. It was most peculiar for Candy to be with one person, and yet be in the company of a small crowd.
"Lady," Mischief said, very softly, "I wonder if you would dare something for me?"
"Dare?"
"I would quite understand if you preferred not. This isn't your battle. But perhaps Providence put you here for a reason."
"Go on," Candy said.
Given how unhappy and purposeless she'd been feeling in the last few hours (no, not hours: months, even years), she was happy to listen to anybody with a theory about why she was here.
"If I could distract Mendelson Shape's attention away from you for long enough, maybe you could get to the lighthouse, and climb the stairs? You carry far less weight than I, and the stairs may support you better."
"What for?"
"What do you mean: what for?"
"Well, once I've climbed the stairs—"
"She wants to know what she does next," John Slop said.
"That's simple enough, lady," said John Fillet.
"When you get to the top," said John Pluckitt, "you must light the light !'
Candy glanced up at the ruined tower: at the spiraling spire of its staircase, and the rotting boards of its upper floor. She couldn't imagine the place was in working order, not in its present state.
"Doesn't it need electricity?" she said. "I mean, I can't even see a lamp."
"There's one up there, we swear," said John Moot. "Please trust us. We may be desperate, but we're not stupid. We wouldn't send you on a suicide mission."
"So how do I make this lamp work?" Candy asked. "Is there an on-off switch?"
"You'll know how to use it the moment you set eyes on it," Mischief said. "Light's the oldest game in the world ."
She looked at them, her gaze going from face to face. They looked so frightened, so exhausted. "Please, lady," said Mischief. "You're our only chance now."