“You a friend of Tucker’s?” Mister Leland spoke in spite of himself, but did not believe this last statement any more than he believed this man was the General. Still, the man did not sound like he was lying.

“Yes. Look.” The man reached into his pocket, and Mister Leland’s heart jumped—more money!—but the man had pulled out only a piece of paper. “It’s a letter from him. He was a very good friend of mine.” The man grew sad after he said this.

“He was?” They were standing quite close to him now; he looked down at them with the piece of paper extended in his right hand. The flies seemed to drone a great deal louder. “You know why he done it?”

“What did he do?”

And then he could not keep it back any longer because he wanted very much to find out what this man knew. “Why, he burned down his house and killed his animals and all.”

The man only stared at him; he did not believe. “My father was right! Is that what he did?”

“That’s what he done—really.” Still the man looked as if he did not believe it. Mister Leland added, “He done all that two days ago.”

“Two days ago?”

Mister Leland decided the man did not hear very well, not that he did not believe. He asked him to repeat everything. “Uh-huh, I seen it myself. He just burned down his house and shot his animals and—”

“Blood squirted out of them like water out of a pricked balloon,” Walter chimed in.

“Hush, Walter.” Mister Leland squeezed his hand and felt the little boy jump in pain. “Really he did those things.” He turned to the man.

“I believe you.” The man nodded.

“It’s the truth.” Walter chimed in again.

“Hush, Walter.”

“Tell me about it, will you please?” The man looked very sad.

Mister Leland unraveled the tale of salt and killing and burning and the clock (he did not forget it this time) and the sparks going up and disappearing in the sky. But even when he had finished, the man looked no less sad, no less disbelieving. “You a friend of his—really?”

The man nodded his head and looked so very strange that Mister Leland thought it would be best to get away from him as quickly as possible. “We got to go now. Good-by.” He immediately started for the Highway—that would be the safest way to go home because the man might follow them into the woods—and did not hear the man answer: “Yes, good-by.”

When they got to the Highway, he turned to Walter, let his hand go, and yelled very loudly, “Let’s race!”

“I don’t feel like it.”

He leaned toward his ear. “That’ll be our reason to run. He can still catch us and he looks dangerous.”

“All right, let’s race.” Walter looked back over his shoulder.