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"He got quite a shock when my father told him about you," added Meggie. But Dustfinger must

be told what happens to him, she thought, he must. Then he'll understand why he really can't go

back. And all the same, she thought next, he'll still be homesick. Homesick forever.

"I must see him! Only once. Don't you understand?" Fenoglio looked pleadingly at Mo. "I could

just follow you, inconspicuously. How would he know who I am? I want to find out if he really

looks the way I imagined him, that's all."

However, Mo shook his head. "I think you'd better leave him alone."

"Nonsense. Surely I can see him whenever I like. After all, I invented him!"

"And you killed him off," Meggie pointed out.

"Well." Fenoglio raised his hands helplessly. "I wanted to make the story more exciting. Don't

you like exciting stories?"

"Only if they have happy endings."

"Happy endings!" Fenoglio snorted scornfully and then listened to what was going on upstairs.

Something or someone had landed heavily on the wooden floorboards. Loud howls followed the

thud. Fenoglio strode to the door. "Wait here! I'll be back in a minute!" he called, disappearing

into the corridor.

"Mo!" whispered Meggie. "You've got to tell Dustfinger! You've got to tell him he can't go back."

But Mo shook his head. "He won't want to listen, I promise you. I've tried more than a dozen

times. Perhaps it wouldn’t be a bad idea to bring him together with Fenoglio after all. He might

well be more likely to believe his creator than me." With a sigh, he brushed a few cake crumbs

off Fenoglio's kitchen table. "There was a picture in Inkheart," he murmured, raising the palm of

his hand over the tabletop as if to conjure up the picture itself. "It showed a group of women

standing under an arched gateway, in splendid clothes as if they were going to a party. One of

them had hair as fair as your mother's. You can't see the woman's face in the picture, she has her

back turned, but I always imagined it was her. Crazy, isn't it?"

Meggie placed her hand on his. "Mo, promise you won't go back to the village!" she said. "Please!

Promise me you won't try to get the book back."

The second hand on Fenoglio's kitchen clock was dividing time into painfully small segments. At

last Mo answered. "I promise," he said.

"Look at me and say it!"

He did. "I promise!" he repeated. "There's just one more thing I want to discuss with Fenoglio,

and then we'll go home and forget about the book. Happy now?"

Meggie nodded. Although she wondered what else there could be to discuss.

Fenoglio returned with a tearful Pippo on his back. The other two children followed their

grandfather, looking crestfallen. "Holes in the cake and now a dent in his forehead, too. I think I

ought to send all of you home!" Fenoglio told them crossly as he put Pippo down on a chair.

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Then he rummaged around in the big cupboard until he found a Band-Aid, which he stuck none

too gently on his grandson's cut forehead.

Mo pushed his chair back and stood up. "I've changed my mind," he said. "I'll take you to

Dustfinger after all."

Fenoglio turned to him in surprise.

"Perhapsyou can make it clear to him once and for all that he can't go back," Mo continued.

"Goodness knows what he might do next! I'm afraid it could be dangerous for him — and I do

have this idea, rather a weird idea, but I'd like to talk to you about it."

"Weirder than what I've heard already? I'd say that's hardly possible!" Fenoglio's grandchildren

had disappeared into the cupboard again. Giggling, they closed the doors. "Very well, I'll listen to

your idea," said Fenoglio. "But I want to see Dustfinger first!"

Mo looked at Meggie. It wasn't often that he broke a promise, and he clearly felt far from

comfortable about it. Meggie could understand that only too well. "He's waiting in the square,"

said Mo hesitantly. "But let me talk to him first."

"In the square here?" Fenoglio's eyes widened. "That's wonderful!" With one stride he was

standing in front of the little mirror hanging next to the kitchen door, running his fingers

through his black hair almost as if he were afraid Dustfinger might be disappointed by his

creator's appearance. "I'll pretend I don't see him until you call me," he said. "Yes, that's the

thing to do."

There was a clattering in the cupboard, and Pippo stumbled out in a jacket that came down to

his ankles and a hat so large that it had slipped right over his eyes.

"Of course!" Fenoglio took the hat off Pippo's head and put it on his own. "That's it! I'll take the

children with me. A grandfather with three grandchildren — nothing about that sight to make

anyone uneasy, is there?"

Mo just nodded and pushed Meggie out into the narrow hallway.

As they walked down the street leading back to the square and their car, Fenoglio followed a few

meters behind them, with his grandchildren running and jumping around him like three

puppies.

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Chapter 26 – Shivers Down The Spine and A Foreboding

And that's when she put her book down. And looked at me. And said it: "Life isn't fair, Bill.

We tell our children that it is, but it's a terrible thing to do. It's not only a lie, it's a cruel

lie. Life is not fair, and it never has been, and it's never going to be."

– William Goldman, The Princess Bride

Dustfinger sat on the chilly stone steps, waiting. He felt sick with fear; but he wasn't quite sure of

what. Perhaps the war memorial behind him reminded him too much of death. He had always

been afraid of death, which he imagined as cold, too, like a night without fire. Now, however, he

dreaded something else even more. Its name was sorrow, and it had been stalking him like a

second shadow ever since Silvertongue lured him into this world. Sorrow that made his limbs

heavy and turned the sky gray.

Beside him, the boy was running up and down the steps.

Up and down, tirelessly, with light feet and a cheerful face, as if Silvertongue had read him

straight into paradise. What could be making him so happy? Dustfinger looked around at the

narrow houses, pale yellow, pink, peach, the dark green shutters at the windows and the rust-

red tiles on the roofs, an oleander flowering in front of a wall as if its branches were on fire, cats

stalking past the warm walls. Farid stole up to one of them, stroked its gray fur, and put it on his

lap, although it dug its claws into his thighs.

"You know what people do to keep the numbers of cats down around here?" Dustfinger

stretched his legs and blinked up at the sun. "When winter comes they take their own cats

indoors for safety, then they put out dishes of poisoned food for the strays."

Farid still fondled the gray cat's pointed ears. But his face was rigid and grim, not a trace left of

the happiness that had just made it look so soft and open. Dustfinger glanced quickly aside. Why

had he said that? Had the happiness on the boy's face upset him so much?

Farid let the cat go and climbed the steps to the memorial.

He was still sitting there on the wall, legs drawn up, when the other two came back. Silvertongue

had no book with him, and he looked strained — his guilty conscience was clearly visible on his

face.

Why? What could have made Silvertongue look so guilty? Dustfinger glanced suspiciously

around without knowing quite what he was looking for. Silvertongue's face always showed his

feelings; he was an open book, which any stranger could read. His daughter was different. It

wasn't so easy to make out what was going on in her mind. But now, as she came toward him,

Dustfinger thought he saw something like concern in her eyes, perhaps even pity. . . . What had

that writer fellow said to make the girl look at him like that?

He got up and brushed the dust off his pants.

"No copies left, am I right?" he asked, when the two of them had reached him.

"You're right. They've all been stolen," replied Silver-tongue. "Years ago."

His daughter never took her eyes off Dustfinger.

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"Why are you staring at me like that, princess?" he snapped. "Do you know something I don't ?"

Bull's-eye. An accidental one, too. He hadn't wanted to score a bull's-eye at all, certainly not a

direct hit on an uncomfortable truth. The girl bit her lip, still looking at him with that same

mixture of pity and concern.

Dustfinger rubbed his hand over his face, feeling his scars on it like a picture postcard saying

"Greetings from Basta." He could never forget Capricorn's rabid dog for a single day even if he

wanted to. "To help you please the girls even better in the future!" Basta had hissed in his ear

before wiping the blood off his knife.

"Oh, curse it all!" Dustfinger kicked the nearest wall so hard that he felt the pain in his foot for

days to come. "You've told that writer about me!" he accused Mo. "And now even your daughter

knows more about me than I do! Very well, out with it! I want to know now, too. Tell me. You

always wanted to tell me, after all. Basta hangs me, is that it? Strings me up and tightens the

noose until I'm dead as a doornail, right? But why should that bother me? Basta's in this world

now, isn't he? The story's changed — it must have changed. Basta can't hurt me if you just send

me back there where I belong!"

Dustfinger took a step toward Silvertongue as if to grab him, shake him, take out on him all that

had been done to himself, but Meggie came between them. "Stop it! It's not Basta!" she cried,

pushing him away. "It's one of Capricorn's men, and he's waiting for you in the book. They want

to kill Gwin and you try to help him, so they kill you instead! Nothing about that has changed! It

will simply happen and there's nothing you can do about it. Do you understand? You must stay

here, you can't go back, ever!"

Dustfinger stared at the girl as if he could shut her up that way, but she held his gaze. She even

tried to take his hand.

"You should be glad to be here!" she faltered as he retreated from her. "You can escape from

them here. You can go away, far away, and ..." Her voice quivered. Perhaps she had seen the tears

in Dustfinger's eyes. Angrily, he wiped them away with his sleeve and looked around like an

animal in a trap, searching for some way out. But there was no way out. No going forward and,

even worse, no going back.

A trio of women standing at the bus stop glanced curiously in his direction. Dustfinger often

attracted such glances; anyone could see he didn't belong here. A stranger forever.

Three children and an old man were playing football with a tin can on the other side of the

square. Farid looked at them. The Arab boy had Dustfinger's backpack over his narrow

shoulders, and gray cat hairs clung to his pants. He was deep in thought, wriggling his bare toes

into the gaps between the paving stones. He was always taking off the sneakers Dustfinger had

bought him and going around barefoot, even on hot tarmac, with his shoes tied to the backpack

like loot he was taking home.

Silvertongue looked at the playing children, too. Had he given some sign to the old man with

them? The old fellow left the children and came over. Dustfinger took a step back. A shiver ran

down his spine.

"My grandchildren have been admiring the tame marten that boy has on a chain," said the old

man as he approached.

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Dustfinger took another step backward. Why was the dark-haired man looking at him like that?

In quite a different way than the women at the bus stop. "The children say the marten can do

tricks and the boy's a fire-eater. Perhaps we could come to the show and watch at close range?"

The cold shiver spread right through Dustfinger, although the sun was shining down on him. The

way the old man looked at him — as if he were a dog who had run away long ago and was now

back, tail between his legs, perhaps with lice in his coat, but definitely his, the old man's dog.

"Nonsense, we don't do tricks!" he managed to say. "There's nothing to see here!" He retreated

again, but the old man followed him — as if they were linked by an invisible thread.

"I'm sorry," said the old man, raising a hand as if to touch Dustfinger's scarred face.

Dustfinger's back came up against a parked car. Now the old man was standing right in front of

him, and still staring, staring —

"Go away!" Dustfinger pushed him roughly back. "Farid, bring me my things!" The boy hurried to

his side. Dustfinger snatched the backpack from his hand, picked up the marten, and stowed him

in the pack, taking no notice of the animal's sharp, snapping teeth. The old man stared at Gwin's

horns. Fingers flying, Dustfinger slung the pack over his shoulder and tried to push past him.