June sighed and brushed her hair back from her eyes automatically as she marked her place in her geometry book with one finger and looked through the dining-room door at Dubby lying on the front-room couch.
"Dubby, please,"she pleaded. "You promised your mother that you"d be quiet tonight. How can you get over your cold if you bounce around making so much noise?"
Dubby"s fever-bright eyes peered from behind his tented knees where he was holding a tin truck which he hammered with a toy guitar.
"I am quiet, June. It"s the truck that made the noise.
See?" And he banged on it again. The guitar splintered explosively and Dubby blinked in surprise. He was wavering between tears at the destruction and pleased laughter for the awful noise it made. Before he could decide, he began to cough, a deep-chested, pounding cough that shook his small body unmercifully.
"That"s just about enough out of you, Dubby," Said June firmly, clearing the couch of toys and twitching the covers straight with a practiced hand. "You have to go to your room in just fifteen minutes anywaya"or right now if you don"t settle down. Your mother will be calling at seven to see if you"re okay. I don"t want to have to tell her you"re worse because you wouldn"t be good. Now read your book and keep quiet. I"ve got work to do."
There was a brief silence, broken by Dubby"s sniffling and June"s scurrying pencil. Then Dubby began to chant: "Shrimp boatses running a dancer tonight Shrimp boatses running a dancer tonight Shrimp boatses running a dancer tonight SHRIMP BOATses RUNning a DANcer toNIGHTa""
"Dub-by!" called June, frowning over her paper at him.
"That"s not noise," protested Dubby. "It"s singing.
Shrimp boatsesa"" The cough caught him in mid-phrase and June busied herself providing Kleenexes and comfort until the spasm spent itself.
"See?" she said. "Your cough thinks it"s noise."
"Well, what can I do, then?" fretted Dubby, bored by four days in bed and worn out by the racking cough that still shook him. "I can"t sing and I can"t play. I want something to do."
"Well," June searched the fertile pigeonholes of her babysitter"s repertoire and came up with an idea that Dubby had once originated and dearly loved.
"Why not play-like? Play-like a zoo. I think a green giraffe with a mop for a tail and roller skates for feet would be nice, don"t you?"
Dubby considered the suggestion solemnly. "If he had egg beaters for ears," he said, overly conscious as always of ears, because of the trouble he so often had with his own.
"Of course he does," said June. "Now you play-like one."
"Mine"s a lion," said Dubby, after mock consideration.
"Only he has a flag for a taila"a pirate flaga"and he wears yellow pajamas and airplane wings sticking out of his back and his ears turn like propellers."
"That"s a good one," applauded June. "Now mine is an eagle with rainbow wings and roses growing around his neck.
And the only thing he ever eats is the song of birds, but the birds are scared of him and se he"s hungry nearly all the timea"pore ol"iggle."
Dubby giggled. "Play-like some more," he said, settling back against the pillows.
"No, it"s your turn. Why don"t you play-like by yourself now? I"ve just got to get my geometry done."
Dubby"s face shadowed and then he grinned. "Okay."
June went back to the table, thankful that Dubby was a nice kid and not like some of the brats she had met in her time. She twined both legs around the legs of her chair, running both hands up through her hair.
She paused before tackling the next problem to glance in at Dubby. A worry nudged at her heart as she saw how pale and fine-drawn his features were. It seemed, every time she came over, he was more nearly transparent.
She shivered a little as she remembered her mother saying, "Poor child.
He"ll never have to worry about old age.
Have you noticed his eyes, June? He has wisdom in them now that no child should have. He has looked too often into the Valley."
June sighed and turned to her work.
The heating system hummed softly and the out-of-joint day settled into a comfortable accustomed evening.
Mrs. Warren rarely ever left Dubby because he was ill so much of the time, and she practically never left him until he was settled for the night. But today when June got home from school, her mother had told her to call Mrs. Warren.
"Oh, June," Mrs. Warren had appealed over the phone, "could you possibly come over right now?"
"Now?" asked June, dismayed, thinking of her hair and nails she"s planned to do, and the tentative date with Larryanne to hear her new alb.u.m.
"I hate to ask it," said Mrs. Warren. "I have no patience with people who make last-minute arrangements, but Mr. Warren"s mother is very ill again and we just have to go over to her house. We wouldn"t trust Dubby with anyone but you. He"s got that nasty bronchitis again, so we can"t take him with us. I"ll get home as soon as I can, even if Orin has to stay. He"s home from work right now, waiting for me. So please come, June!"
"Well . . ." June melted to the tears in Mrs. Warren"s voice. She could let her hair and nails and alb.u.m go and she could get her geometry done at the Warren"s place. "Well, okay. I"ll be right over."
"Oh, bless you, child," cried Mrs. Warren. Her voice faded away from the phone. "Orin, she"s cominga"" and the receiver clicked.
"June!" He must have called several times before June began to swim back up through the gloomy haze of the new theorem.
"Joo-un!" Dubby"s plaintive voice reached down to her and she sighed in exasperation. She had nearly figured out how to work the problem.
"Yes, Dubby," The exaggerated patience in her voice signaled her displeasure to him.
"Well," he faltered. "I don"t want to play-like anymore.
I"ve used up all my thinkings. Can I make something now?
Something for true?"
"Without getting off the couch?" asked June cautiously, wise from past experience.
"Yes," grinned Dubby.
"Without my to-ing and fro-ing to bring you stuff?" she questioned, still wary.
"Uh-huh," giggled Dubby.
"What can you make for true without anything to make it with?" June asked skeptically.
Dubby laughed. "I just thought it up>" Then all in one breath, unable to restrain his delight: "It"s-really-kinda-like-play-like, but-I"m going-to-make something-that-isn"t-like-anything-real-so it"ll-be-for-true, cause it-won"the-play-like-anything-that"s-real!"
"Huh? Say that again," June challenged. "I bet you can"t do it."
Dubby was squirming with excitement. He coughed tentatively, found it wasn"t a prelude to a full production and said: "I can"t say it again, but I can do it, I betcha. Last time I was sick, I made up some new magic words. They"re real good. I betcha they"ll work real good like anything."
"Okay, go ahead and make something," said June. "Just so it"s quiet."
"Oh, it"s real quiet," said Dubby in a hushed voice.
"Exter quiet. I"m going to make a Noise-eater."
"A Noise-eater?"
"Uh-huh!" Dubby"s eyes were shining. "It"ll eat up all the noises. I can make lotsa racket then, *cause it"ll eat it all up and make it real quiet for you so"s you can do your jommety."
"Now that"s right thunkful of you, podner," drawled June.
"Make it a good one, because little boys make a lot of noise."
"Okay," And Dubby finally calmed down and settled back against his pillows.
The heating system hummed. The old refrigerator in the kitchen cleared its throat and added its chirking throb to the voice of the house. The mantel clock tocked firmly to itself in the front room. June was absorbed in her homework when a flutter of movement at her elbow jerked her head up.
"Dubby!" she began indignantly.
"Shh!" Dubby pantomimed, finger to lips, his eyes wide with excitement. He leaned against June, his fever radiating like a small stove through his pajamas and robe. His breath was heavy with the odor of illness as he put his mouth close to her ear and barely whispered.
"I made it. The Noise-eater. He"s asleep now. Don"t make a noise or he"ll get you."
"I"ll get you, too," said June. "Play-like is play-like, but you get right back on that couch!"
"I"m too scared," breathed Dubby. "What if I cough?"
"You will cough if youa"" June started in a normal tone, but Dubby threw himself into her lap and m.u.f.fled her mouth with his small hot hand. He was trembling.
"Don"t! Don"t!" he begged frantically. "I"m scared. How do you un-play-like? I didn"t know it"d work so good!"
There was a choonk and a slither in the front room. June strained her ears, alarm stirring in her chest.
"Don"t be silly," she whispered. "Play-like isn"t for true. There"s nothing in there to hurt you."
A sudden succession of musical pings startled June and threw Dubby back into her arms until she recognized Mrs. Warren"s bedroom clock striking seven o"clocka"early as usual.
There was a soft, drawn-out slither in the front room and then silence.
"Go on, Dubby. Get back on the couch like a nice child.
We"ve played long enough."
"You take me."
June herded him ahead of her, her knees b.u.mping his reluctant back at every step until he got a good look at the whole front room. Then he sighed and relaxed.
"He"s gone," he said normally.
"Sure he is, " replied June. "Play-like stuff always goes away." She tucked him under his covers. Then, as if hoping to brush his fearsa"and hersa"away, by calmly discussing it, "What did he look like?"
"Well, he had a body like Mother"s vacuum cleanera"the one that lies down on the floora"and his legs were like my sled, so he could slide on the floor, and had a nose like the hose on the cleaner, only he was able to make it long or short when he wanted to."
Dubby, overstrained, leaned back against his pillows.
The mantel clock began to boom the hour deliberately.
"And he had little eyes like the light inside the refrigeratora""
June heard a choonk at the hall door and glanced up.
Then, with fear-stiffened lips, she continued for him, "And ears like TV antennae because he needs good ears to find the noises." And watched, stunned, as the round metallic body glided across the floor on shiny runners and paused in front of the clock that was deliberating on the sixth stroke.
The long, wrinkly trunklike nose on the front of the thing flashed upward. The end of it shimmered, then melted into the case of the clock. And the seventh stroke never began. There was a soft sucking sound and the nose dropped free. On the mantel, the hands of the clock dropped soundlessly to the bottom of the dial.
In the tight circle of June"s arms, Dubby whimpered. June clapped her hand over his mouth. But his shoulders began to shake and he rolled frantic imploring eyes at her as another coughing spell began. He couldn"t control it.
June tried to m.u.f.fle the sound with her shoulder, but over the deep hawking convulsions, she heard the choonk and slither of the creature and screamed as she felt it nudge her knee.
Then the long snout nuzzled against her shoulder and she heard a soft hiss as it touched the straining throat of the coughing child. She grabbed the horribly vibrating thing and tried to pull it away, but Dubby"s cough cut off in mid-spasm.
In the sudden quiet that followed she heard a gurgle like a straw in the bottom of a soda gla.s.s and Dubby folded into himself like an empty laundry bag. June tried to straighten him against the pillows, but he slid laxly down.
June stood up slowly. Her dazed eyes wandered trancelike to the clock, then to the couch, then to the horrible thing that lay beside it. Its glowing eyes were blinking and its ears shifting planesa"probably to locate sound.
Her mouth opened to let out the terror that was constricting her lungs, and her frantic scream coincided with the shrill clamor of the telephone. The Eater hesitated, then slid swiftly toward the repeated ring. In the pause after the party line"s four identifying rings it stopped, and June clapped both hands over her mouth, her eyes dilated with paralyzed terror.
The ring began again. June caught Dubby up into her arms and backed slowly toward the front door.
The Eater"s snout darted out to the telephone and the ring stilled without even an after-resonance.
The latch of the front door gave a rasping click under June"s trembling hand. Behind her, she heard the choonk and horrible slither as the Eater lost interest in the silenced telephone. She whirled away from the door, staggering off balance under the limp load of Dubby"s body. She slipped to one knee, spilling the child to the floor with a thump. The Eater slid toward her, pausing at the hall door, its ears tilting and moving.
June crouched on her knees, staring, one hand caught under Dubby. She swallowed convulsively, then cautiously withdrew her hand. She touched Dubby"s bony little chest. There was no movement. She hesitated indecisively, then backed away, eyes intent on the Eater.
Her heart drummed in her burning throat. Her blood roared in her ears. The starchy krunkle of her wide skirt rattled in the stillness. The fibers of the rug murmured under her knees and toes. She circled wider, wider, the noise only loud enough to hold the Eater"s attentiona"not to attract him to her. She backed guardedly into the corner by the radio. Calculatingly, she reached over and clicked it on, turning the volume dial as far as it would go.
The Eater slid tentatively toward her at the click of the switch. June backed slowly away, eyes intent on the creature.
The sudden insane blare of the radio hit her an almost physical blow. The Eater glided up close against the vibrating cabinet, its snout lifting and drinking in the horrible cacophony of sound.
June lurched for the front door, wrenching frantically at the doork.n.o.b.
She stumbled outside, slamming the door behind her.
Trembling, she sank to the top step, wiping the cold sweat from her face with the underside of her skirt.
She shivered in the sharp cold, listening to the raucous outpouring from the radio that boomed so loud it was no longer intelligible.