At any moment the boys, looking up, expected the slain tower face, hands, numerals, guts, to groan, slide, and tumble in a grinding avalanche of brass intestines and iron meteor showers, down, down upon the lawn, heaping, rumbling, burying them in minutes, hours, years, and eternities.

But there was only silence and the clock, a mindless ghost, hanging in the sky with limp, dead hands, saying naught, doing nothing. Silence and yet another long silence, while all about lights blinked on in houses, bright winks stretching out into the country, and people began to come out on porches and wonder at the darkening sky.

Douglas stared up, all drenched with sweat, and was about to speak when:

‘I did it!’ cried Tom.

‘Tom!’ cried Doug. ‘We! All of us did it. But, good grief, what did we do?’

‘Before it falls on us,’ said Tom, ‘we’d better run.’

‘Who says?’ said Douglas.

‘Sorry,’ said Tom.

‘Run!’ cried Doug.

And the victorious army ran away into the night.

Chapter Twenty-Five

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

It was the middle of the night and Tom still couldn’t sleep.

Doug knew this because several times he heard Tom’s bedclothes fall to the floor, as if he were tossing and turning, and each time he heard the sound of the sheets and coverlet being reassembled.

At about two in the morning Doug went down to the icebox and brought a dish of ice cream up to Tom, which, he figured, might cause Tom to speak more freely.

Tom sat up in bed and hardly touched the ice cream. He sat there staring at it as it melted and then said, ‘Doug, an awful thing has happened.’

‘Yeah, Tom,’ said Doug.

‘We thought if we stopped the big courthouse clock we might stop the old people from holding on to – stealing – our time. But nothing’s been stopped, has it?’

‘No, sir,’ said Doug.