range, though. Something was happening to Jimmy, nibbling away
at the outer edges of the fear like a big, hungry river cat. Making the
fear seem less swollen and awful, shredding it away in little flakes.

There was a white core of anger in Jimmy which seemed suddenly to blaze
up.

He shut his eyes tight.

In his mind's gaze Jimmy saw himself holding the Harmon brothers up by
their long, mottled legs. The Harmon brothers were frogs. Not friendly,
good natured frogs like Uncle Al, but snake frogs. Cottonmouth frogs.

All flannel red were their mouths, and they had long evil fangs which
dripped poison in the sunlight. But Jimmy wasn't afraid of them no-ways.
Not any more. He had too firm a grip on their legs.

"Don't let anything happen to Uncle Al and Pigtail!" Jimmy whispered, as
though he were talking to himself. No--not exactly to himself. To
someone like himself, only larger. Very close to Jimmy, but larger, more
powerful.

"Catch them before they harm Uncle Al! Hurry! _Hurry!_"

There was a strange lifting sensation in Jimmy's chest now. As though he
could shake the river if he tried hard enough, tilt it, send it swirling
in great thunderous white surges clear down to Lake Pontchartrain.

* * * * *

But Jimmy didn't want to tilt the river. Not with Uncle Al on it and
Pigtail, and all those people in New Orleans who would disappear right
off the streets. They were frogs too, maybe, but good frogs. Not like
the Harmon brothers.

Jimmy had a funny picture of himself much younger than he was. Jimmy saw
himself as a great husky baby, standing in the middle of the river and
blowing on it with all his might. The waves rose and rose, and Jimmy's
cheeks swelled out and the river kept getting angrier.

No--he must fight that.

"Save Uncle Al!" he whispered fiercely. "Just save him--and Pigtail!"

It began to happen the instant Jimmy opened his eyes. Around the bend in
the sunlight came a great spinning disk, wrapped in a fiery glow.

Straight toward the Harmon shantyboat the disk swept, water spurting up
all about it, its bottom fifty feet wide. There was no collision. Only a
brightness for one awful instant where the shantyboat was twisting and
turning in the current, a brightness that outshone the rising sun.

Just like a camera flashbulb going off, but bigger, brighter. So big and
bright that Jimmy could see the faces of the Harmon brothers fifty times
as large as life, shriv