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“I know that phrase,” Stuart said “Where does it come from? Sounds deliciously creepy Love it”

“Title of a short story,” said Reuben, “and haunting words”

“Go further back,” said Felix, sh the old Douay-Rheims Bible”

“Right,” said Reuben “Of course” Reuben quoted from memory, “ ‘But wild beasts shall rest there, and their houses shall be filled with serpents, and ostriches shall dwell there, and the hairy ones shall dance there: And owls shall answer one another there, in the houses thereof, and sirens in the temples of pleasure’ ”

A little approving laugh cah as well

“Oh, you so love it when the genius here recognizes some arcane quote or word, don’t you?” said Stuart “The literary prodigy strikes again! Reuben, the star of the Morphenkindergarten class”

“Take a lesson froon “He reads, he rees He thinks He meditates He advances!”

“Oh, couy He came off the cover of Gentlemen’s Quarterly”

“Sigh,” said Reuben “I should have left you out there in the wilds of Santa Rosa after you mauled your stepfather”

“No, you shouldn’t have,” said Stuart, “but you know I’,things like that? You have a card catalog in your head?”

“I have a computer in my head, just like you do,” said Reuben “My dad’s a poet And he used to read Isaiah out loud to me when I was a kid”

“Isaiah!” said Stuart in a deep voice “No Maurice Sendak or Winnie the Pooh? But then of course you were destined to grow up to be a Man Wolf, so the usual rules didn’t apply”

Reuben srowl of disapproval

“Morphenkindergarten,” said Margon “I think I rather like that”

Felix was paying not the slightest attention He was looking again at his Christrams and lists

Reuben was beginning to see this festival, and he warmed to it the way he’d warmed to this house as soon as he’d come to know it

“Isaiah!” Stuart continued to scoff “And you godless immortals dance in a circle because Isaiah said to do it?”