Watch seemed dazed. He was wandering among the tombstones as if looking for his own grave. His clothes were slightly torn—mainly around the collar and at the hem of his pants. But he still had on his four watches and his thick glasses. He didn’t seem to notice them, although they weren’t far above, maybe only a hundred feet. Adam couldn’t help noticing how pale his friend’s skin was.

“We have to save him,” Cindy called softly.

“That may not be a good idea,” Bum said. “He might be beyond saving.”

Sally turned to Adam. “What do you want to do?” she asked gently.

Adam felt choked with sorrow. “I sure don’t want to leave him down there with all those monsters. But—”

“Yeah?” Sally said. “But what?”

Adam shook his head. “You know the situation. What do you think?”

Sally peered down into the cemetery. Watch had stopped and was just staring off into space. His eyes, seen through his thick glasses, appeared normal. But he was not standing as he usually did.

“There’s something wrong with him,” Sally said finally.

“I don’t care,” Cindy said. “He’s still our friend. We can’t abandon him.”

“Not so loud,” Sally warned. “He might hear us.”

“We might want to call down to him,” Bum said. “See how he reacts.”

“No,” Adam said. “If we shout to him, the other Cold People might hear, too. At least right now, if we want to rescue him, he’s alone.”

“It’s risky,” Bum said. “We don’t know how strong he is now. He could destroy us all.”

Adam was grim. “Yeah. And we can’t use our flamethrowers on him.”

“But if he’s changed,” Sally said, “he might not know that we used to be his friends. He won’t know that we won’t try to fry him. If we surround him, we might be able to knock him out and then tie him up. We have extra rope.”

“We’re not going to hurt him,” Cindy said.

“We might have to hurt him a little to help him,” Sally snapped at her. “This is an emergency. Stop behaving like a little princess. We have to harden our hearts.”

“If it was you I wouldn’t mind picking up a bat,” Cindy said.

“You would just end up clobbering yourself,” Sally said.

“All right, all right,” Adam said, wanting to stop them from arguing. “We’ll drop down to see how he is. If he attacks, we’ll try to knock him unconscious.”

“If we take him with us,” Bum said. “What are we going to do when he regains consciousness?”

“We’ll worry about that later,” Adam said.

“That’s what the scientists who built the first atomic bomb would say to each other when someone asked ‘What if we blow up the world?’ ” Sally muttered.