But then, from one of the desks, Mr. Worthington stood, staring at them in shock. “Julius!” he yelled. There was a tinge of panic in his voice.

Pickering emerged from his office, hurrying over. He visibly blanched when he saw the boy. “Mr. Gianopuolos.”

“I thought we were still in Georgia.”

Worthington and Pickering looked at each other. Kyle saw with not a small degree of satisfaction that they were both frightened.

“How long ago was Georgia?” the boy asked. “How many banks ago?”

He did not wait for an answer but strode toward the wall on the left side of the room that the bank shared with Brave New World. With his authoritative air and the deference he was shown, Theo might have been an adult, a little person, but it was clear that he was not. He was a child. That knowledge had never been in question, and for the first time Kyle wondered why.

Theo was striding directly over to the antique European-looking cabinet against the wall, the one that corresponded to the site where Kyle had heard tapping. And whispering. The framed photograph on the wall above the cabinet, he noticed now, looked a little bit like Theo. It wasn’t him, but it could have been a relative. His father, perhaps. They both had similarly swarthy skin and slightly foreign features.

“Kyle.”

Above the ambient bank noise, he heard the familiar whisper, his name spoken far more loudly than usual, and he could tell from the look on everyone else’s face that they’d heard it, too. But when the whisper came again, and he saw his son’s expression, he had a sudden intuition and asked, “What did that voice say?”

Nick was pale. “My name.”

They’d all heard their own names.

The boy had reached the cabinet, and without preamble, he opened it, pulling off its single shelf a small primitive statuette the approximate size of a half-gallon milk carton. It was a hideous figure, a homemade object constructed from animal fur, moldy cloth and household debris. The head, perched atop a spindly neck, was far too large for the body and was crowned with jagged triangular pieces of metal. There were two legs and three arms, all of them rubbery and wiggly. The form was instinctually abhorrent to him, and next to him Jen stammered fearfully, “That’s what I dreamed about.”

Nick looked haunted. “It’s the shadow,” he breathed. “The one in our house. I saw it in the library at school, too.”

What can that mean? Kyle wondered.

Holding it aloft, Theo turned to face them.

“No!” Mr. Worthington sprang forward as if to grab the figure out of the boy’s hands, but Hank blocked the man, shoving him roughly to the side.

“Don’t even think about it,” the deputy warned.

“What is that thing?” the sheriff asked. His voice was unexpectedly subdued.