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Gabe leads the way back through the ruined fence When I get Dove to the fence, she pulls back, held by thea barrier, and for a brief, terrible moment, I think I’ll have to leave her behind I cluck, softly, and she finally steps over the broken boards In front of the house, I see headlights, and now there’s Tommy Falk with half his face illuestures hurriedly for Finn to get in

Gabe appears beside me with a lead rope "Hold it out the "

"But --"

"Now"

And just as he says that, I hear the same cluck that I heard earlier, only now it comes from somewhere in the paddock where we just were Distantly, I hear it echo back through thesound I clip the lead onto Dove’s halter and scramble into the car Tommy Falk’s already behind the wheel, and Gabe slams the door after hihts reflected in the round Beside us, Dove trots and then canters I roll up theto leave just enough rooh To thefollowed, taking care to make it easy for Dove to keep up with us -- and the intensity of it makes me remember, suddenly, that I saw him on the beach just earlier today

The car is silent and hot; the heater was turned up all the way and no one’s thought to turn it down The entire car smells, not unpleasantly, of the inside of a new shoe Beside me, in the backseat, Finn is insensible because of Puffin

The only thing that’s said is when Gabe turns his face to Tommy and asks, "Your place?"

Tommy says, "Not with the pony Has to be Beech’s"

Then Finn pinches me and points out the frontJust illuhts is a dead sheep It’sout all the way fro its torn body, even after we have left it far behind That could have been us Tommy and Gabe don’t co, actually They sit in gri out s and co a word

Tommy doesn’t take the road to Skarmouth as I expected, but rather the one toward Hastoway He slows at the crossroads but doesn’t stop, and both he and Gabe peer anxiously out in all directions until we get going once lass, toup

"I could ride her and follow you," I say

Gabe’s voice leaves no roo out of this car until we’re well clear"

And then there’s silence again, nothing but night and stone walls and the rain

"Finn," Gabe says, finally, his voice raised to be heard over the sound of the engine "This stor will it last?"

Finn’s eyes are bright in the backseat, and he’s so incredibly pleased to have been asked that it hurts ht and to"

"Long enough," says Tommy

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

PUCK

Tommy Falk takes us to the Grattons’ house, which is near Hastoway, though how near I can’t be sure, because everything looks the sahts Beech ainst the wind, and shows s his torch around to reveal a little four-stall stable with a low ceiling and no electric lights One of the stalls is occupied by da who stretches his head over the unbarred stall door when Dove corateful hello, but I put her in the stall next to him anyway I want to spend er while Beech stands there illuht So I just pat her neck and tell Beech thank you He grunts and points back toward the house with his flashlight

Back in the house, Gabe and Peg Gratton are talking easily while Tommy Falk peers under the lid of a pot on the stove I don’t see Finn

The kitchen itself reminds me of the butcher shop, if the butcher shop was made into a house Despite the dark outside, the kitchen is all bright ashed walls and pots and knives hung up on thee of clean whiteness isn’t at all diminished by the fact that the floor is filthy with footprints There are knickknacks on a half-dozen shelves, but they’re entirely different from our sort of knickknacks: crude wooden statues that could be either horses or deer, a broorass with a red ribbon tied around it, a piece of lilass figurines or char landscapes dotted with sheep and cheerful women that Muly and wonderfully of whatever is cooking on the stove

"They’ll have your rooht, I can see that Beech has grown into a great, ruddy creature who clearly takes after his father He looks a little like he’s made of wood, and because wood is fairly inflexible, it takes hie his expression When he does, it’s not pleased

"They never will," Beech replies

"And where, then, would you like thee to see her in this context, not in the butcher’s as so er with a knife She is ser curls are still unruly as ever I’o around and around about where ill sleep, and I realize that soone must have been spent here Maybe a lot of it It makes me realize we’ve come here because this is where Gabe feels safe It e and sad, like we’ve been replaced with another fa his hands, of course," Gabe says "It may be decades"

I feel weird about that, too, the rather free adht it was so only Connollys knew about Gabe didn’t say it like he wasfun of Finn, but it feels like it

"Where is the toilet?"

Toestures toward the stairs on the other side of the kitchen It’s like it’s everyone’s house, not just the Grattons’ Feeling sulky, I head out of the room There’s a tiny, dark hallith three doors off it up at the top of the stairs, but only one of the from underneath it I knock There’s no response until I say Finn’s name and then, after a pause, the door opens It’s a tiny rooh for a tub and a toilet and a washbasin if they’re very good friends and don’tshoulders, and Finn sits on the toilet with the lid down There are big manly footprints on the small tiles of the floor