Twilight Eyes by Dean Koontz Page B

raising his voice above the calliope music.
    â€œTerrific.”
    We moved beside the ticket booth, out of the swarming marks.
    He was eating a chocolate doughnut. He licked his lips and said, “Rya doesn’t seem to’ve bitten off any of your ears or fingers.”
    â€œShe’s nice,” I said.
    He raised his eyebrows.
    â€œWell, she is,” I said defensively. “A little gruff, maybe, and certainly plainspoken. But underneath all that, there’s a decent lady, sensitive, worth knowing.”
    â€œOh, you’re right. Absolutely. I ain’t surprised by what you say—just that you saw through her hard-bitten act so quickly. Most people don’t take time to see the niceness in her, and some people never see.”
    My spirits rose further when I heard his confirmation of my vague psychic impressions. I wanted her to be nice. I wanted her to be a good person under the Ice Maiden act. I wanted her to be a person worth knowing. Hell, what it came down to—I just wanted her, and I didn’t want to be wanting someone who was genuinely a bitch.
    â€œCash Dooley found trailer accommodations for you,” Jelly said. “Better settle in while you’re on your break.”
    â€œI’ll do that,” I said.
    I was feeling great as I started to turn away from him, but then I saw something out of the corner of my eye that brought me crashing down. I swung back on him, praying that I had imagined what I thought I had seen, but it was not imagination; it was still there. Blood. There was blood all over Jelly Jordan’s face. Not real blood, you understand. He was finishing his chocolate doughnut, unhurt, feeling no pain. What I saw was a clairvoyant vision, an omen of violence to come. Not merely violence, either. Superimposed on Jelly’s living face was an image of his face in death, his eyes open and sightless, his chubby cheeks smeared with blood. He was not just swimming down the time-stream toward injury but . . . toward imminent death.
    He blinked at me. “What?”
    â€œUh . . .”
    The precognitive flash faded.
    â€œSomething wrong, Slim?”
    The vision was gone.
    There was no way I could tell him and make him believe. And even if I could make him believe, there was no way I could change the future.
    â€œSlim?”
    â€œNo,” I said. “Nothing wrong. I just...”
    â€œWell?”
    â€œWanted to thank you again.”
    â€œYou’re too damned grateful, boy. I can’t stand slobbering puppies.” He scowled. “Now get the hell out of my sight.”
    I hesitated. Then to cover my confusion and fear, I said, “Is that your Rya Raines imitation?”
    He blinked again and grinned at me. “Yeah. How was it?”
    â€œNot nearly mean enough.”
    I left him laughing, and as I moved away I tried to persuade myself that my premonitions did not always come to pass—(although they did)
    â€”and that, even if he was going to die, it wouldn’t be soon—(although I sensed it would be very soon, indeed)
    â€”and that even if it would be soon, there was surely something I could do to prevent it.
    Something.
    Surely something.

chapter seven
    NIGHT VISITOR
    The crowd began to thin out and the midway began to shut down at midnight, but I kept the high-striker open until twelve-thirty, snaring a last few half-dollars, because I wanted to report a HE-MAN (rather than a GOOD BOY) take for my first day on the job. By the time I closed the concession and headed for the meadow at the back of the county fairgrounds, where the carnies had established their mobile community, it was a few minutes after one o’clock.
    Behind me, the last lights on the midway winked off when I left, almost as if the whole show had been for my benefit alone.
    Ahead and below, in a large field ringed by woods, almost three hundred trailers were lined up in neat rows. Most were owned by the concessionaires and their