“I don’t have to make you any promises at all,” said Leaky. “You’re the messenger. I want my husband back, and I believe you that the man you’re going to bring me is my husband, or as close to him as I’m going to get, and that’s close enough for me. Or if it turns out not to be, then Loaf and I will work it out without some fuzz-faced boy getting between us. Am I clear? Your job is done. This time you succeeded. I want him back. Bring him to me.”

Umbo didn’t answer.

She glanced over and saw that he hadn’t gone. “What are you waiting for?”

“Do you think I’m here on my own?” asked Umbo. “I’m here following his instructions.”

“And now you’ll go back following mine,” said Leaky. “Is it me Loaf wants to come home to? Then he doesn’t dictate terms to me, and he knows it. Tell him to get his sponge-covered face back here so I can decide for myself whether to scream and run away or give him a big sloppy wet kiss on his spongy new mouth.”

“It’s not spongy anymore,” said Umbo. “It’s pretty much almost normal except not, in a creepy way.”

“You’re not helping now,” said Leaky. “I think I’ve done a very good job of shutting up and listening. Now it’s your turn to shut up and go bring me my husband.”

“I’ll tell him that’s what you said,” said Umbo. “I hope it’s good enough.”

“It will be,” said Leaky. “If I said anything different, he wouldn’t believe I meant it.”

Umbo smiled wanly. “You’re probably right. Only . . . I don’t think it’ll be good for you to see him with other people around.”

“Everybody’s out of the roadhouse, if that’s what you’re worried about. But why can’t you bring him back right here?”

“Because to do that I’d have to get him here in the future, and I’d have a hard time sneaking him in.”

“You snuck in?”

“I came in by water and where I am, it’s nighttime and you’re busy in the kitchen so you can’t hear me.”

“You got a soaking?”

“I’ve swum this river before,” said Umbo. “When I come back with Loaf, it’ll be by the road, and I’ll have his face hidden so he doesn’t shock the local people.”

“And when will this magical event happen?”

“I’m not totally precise. But later today, probably.”

“I’m supposed to keep the roadhouse closed up for hours, maybe?”

Umbo gulped. “I do it inside my head and I can’t tell time all that precisely so—”