PUNISH THE SINNERS by John Saul

Author:John Saul [Saul, John]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Dell
Published: 1978-08-20T21:00:00+00:00

“They did something to you,” Margo kept insisting. “While you were in that trance, or whatever it was, they did something to you.”

Balsam shook his head in despair. “They couldn’t have,” he repeated yet again. “I would have remembered it. I wasn’t unconscious. I was in some kind of odd state, I know, but I was conscious of my surroundings.”

“But you thought you were gone only an hour or two, and it was seven hours. Seven hours, Peter! If you really remember everything that happened, how could you have lost five or six hours?”

“I don’t know,” Peter said helplessly. “I suppose something happens to your time sense when you go into a trance. But I know I wasn’t unconscious. I know it.”

As the dawn came, they gave it up. They were both too tired to retrace the same ground. Peter went to the window, and watched the sun rise slowly over Neilsville. The clouds had gone, but there was a heaviness in the air that said they would be back soon. Peter turned back to Margo.

“You’d better go,” he said. “It’s awfully late.”

She nodded dully. “I know.” Her voice was lifeless. She looked at his tired eyes and she wanted to put her arms around him, to feel his arms around her. “Oh, Peter,” she said, the words choking her a little. “What are we going to do?”

He tried to smile at her, but the attempt failed. “I don’t know,” he said. Then a touch of irony crept into his voice. “I don’t seem to know much of anything, do I?”

Now she did go to him and put her arms around him. “Yes, you do,” she said softly. “There’s an explanation for all this. And we’ll find it. Really we will.”

Peter wanted to believe her; he told himself that he did. But inside, he wasn’t sure. Inside, he was terribly frightened, and terribly alone.

He sent Margo on her way, then sat for an hour, trying to fight off the sleep he was suddenly afraid of. At seven o’clock he called the school and told them that he had become ill in the night, and would not be in today. Then he went to bed and spent the day sleeping—and dreaming. In the dreams, there were many explanations of the strange marks on his back. But when he woke up every now and then, none of them made sense. Or maybe they did.

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