“It’s hard to believe,” someone said.
Iris von Lillienfeld leaned on her fence. It was true. Monsters never looked like monsters. They were always ordinary people. That’s how they got away with evil as long as they did. Iris was suddenly beat. She could use, on this night, a stiff drink.
The Mayor, in the shadow, watched it all. He dare not close his eyes now. He wanted to see, be it hell or high water, which way he was going. And he was going. This had all been too much for his old soldier’s bones. Surely, though, it had been worth it. To go out in a bright flame of glory. For he was going. It had all been too much. A hero’s death. Yes, what better way. Perhaps a little sooner than he’d expected … but for the worthiest of causes. He moved himself and shifted his insides until the great pain lessened. One comfort: he would live on in his offspring. That was something. Quite something. He thought of Natasha underneath the screened porch. She would look for him. Sadly. And Stan. How his dear friend Stan would miss him. He wouldn’t want to go on for much longer like this at any rate. And he’d had a fine life. A long life. Up and down these old roads and the sidewalks raised up at the seams from good roots. Strong roots. Well. This night without him would be fine over old Richmond Hill. Very black and right dotty with stars. Ah, see that. Here came Claire looking for him. She cocked her head as she came over closer. “Oh, no,” she whispered softly and she fell to his side and stroked his brave warrior’s fur.
They watched together as the hollering ambulance drove the others away and then the quiet rose up with the moon until all of it seemed only terrible. Claire held him close to her then and she started to sing, any song come to mind, just the cheer of her mettle against any fear of faint heart.
He still realized the house … and the scents of the family within, growing farther and farther away now. “She wheeled a wheelbarrow,” she sang, “through streets broad and narrow. Singing cockles and mussels. Alive alive-o.”
And over the street in the pale sturgeon’s moon, with the grace of his ancestor’s, stood Lü the Wanderer, the old Siamese. He stretched and he walked through the web that had been there. “Singing cockles and mussels,” Claire sang. “Alive alive-o,” she sang to his bright open eyes.