Page 32 of Going Home in the Dark

“How about ‘The Sleeper.’”

“‘At midnight in the month of June.’”

“‘I stand beneath the mystic moon.’”

“‘An opiate vapor, dewy, dim.’”

“‘Exhales from out her golden rim.’”

“Youdoremember.”

“We all do.”

“So do you remember who we were following?”

“No, but I remember when.”

“When?”

“When we got to the cemetery and saw the white rabbit!”

“He was dressed all in black.”

“Yeah, but he was hurrying like the white rabbit.”

“‘I’m late, I’m late for a very important date.’”

“Hurrying through the dark graveyard.”

“It was Pastor Larry!”

“Yes, yes! Where had he come from?”

“Somewhere in the south, going north toward the church.”

“He unlocked the center door at the back and went inside.”

“He was in the basement like five minutes.”

“When he came out, we were hiding behind headstones.”

“Near enough to hear him muttering a prayer.”

“As I remember it, not a prayer.”

“I agree. Not a prayer.”

“He was muttering, ‘Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit.’”

“Hey, yeah. Why did I remember a prayer?”

“Maybe because he sounded very passionate.”

“Scared and beseeching.”

“Yeah. That’s a better word. ‘Beseeching.’”

“He ran off toward the rectory.”

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