A hand flew from empty space. An old woman's hand, sinking for the last time. It seized anything to save itself. The anything was Will. She pulled him under.
"Will!"
"Jim! Jim!"
And Jim held him and he held her and pulled her free of the silently rushing mirrors coming in coming in from the desolate seas.
They stepped into sunlight.
Miss Foley, one hand to her bruised cheek, bleated, muttered, then laughed quickly, then gasped, and wiped her eyes.
"Thank you, Will, Jim, oh thank you, I'd of drowned! I mean ... oh, Will you were right! My God, did you see her, she's lost, drowned in there, poor girl, oh the poor lost sweet ... save her, oh, we must save her!"
"Miss Foley, boy, you're hurting." Will firmly removed her fists from clenching the flesh of his arm. "There's no one in there."
"I saw her! Please! Look! Save her!"
Will jumped to the maze entrance and stopped. The ticket taker gave him an idle glance of contempt. Will backed away to Miss Foley.
"I swear, no one went in ahead or after you, ma'am. It's my fault, I joked about the water, you must've got mixed up, lost, and scared...."
But if she heard, she went on biting the back of her hand, her voice the voice of someone come out of the sea after no air, a long dread time deep, no hope of life and now set free.
"Gone? She's at the bottom! Poor girl. I knew her. 'I know you!' I said when I first saw her a minute ago. I waved, she waved. 'Hello!' I ran!--bang! I fell. She fell. A dozen, a thousand of her fell. 'Wait!' I said. Oh, she looked so fine, so lovely, so young. But it scared me. 'What're you doing here?' I said. 'Why,' I think she said, I'm real. You're not!' she laughed, way under water. She ran off in the maze. We must find her! before--"
Miss Foley, Will's arm around her, took a last trembling breath and grew strangely quiet.
Jim was staring deep into those cold mirrors, looking for sharks that could not be seen.
"Miss Foley," he said, "what did she look like?"
Miss Foley's voice was pale but calm.
"The fact is ... she looked like myself, many, many years ago.
"I'll go home now," she said.
"Miss Foley, we'll--"
"No. Stay. I'm just fine. Have fun, boys. Enjoy."
And she walked slowly away, alone, down the midway.
Somewhere a vast animal made water. Ammonia made the wind turn ancient as it passed.
"I'm leaving!" said Will.
"Will," said Jim. "We're staying until sundown, boy, dark sundown, and figure it all. You chicken?"
"No," murmured Will. "But ... anybody want to dive back in that maze?"
Jim gazed fiercely deep into the bottomless sea, where now only the pure light glanced back at itself, held up emptiness upon emptiness beyond emptiness before their eyes.
"Nobody." Jim let his heart beat twice. "... I guess."
Chapter 16
A BAD thing happened at sunset.