The Halloween Tree

"Oh, wait, please wait--" the voice began to fail. "I don't feel well. I can't run. Can't--can't--"

"Pipkin!" everyone shouted, waving from the edge of the cliff.

His figure was small, small, small. There were shadows mixed everywhere. Bats flew. Owls shrieked. Night ravens clustered like black leaves in trees.

The small boy, running with his lit pumpkin, fell.

"Oh," gasped Moundshroud.

The pumpkin light went out.

"Oh," gasped everyone.

"Light your pumpkin, Pip, light it!" shrieked Tom.

He thought he saw the small figure scrabbling in the dark grass below, trying to strike a light. But in that instant of darkness, the night swept in. A great wing folded over the abyss. Many owls hooted. Many mice scampered and slithered in the shadows. A million tiny murders happened somewhere.

"Light your pumpkin, Pip!"

"Help--" wailed his sad voice.

A thousand wings flew away. A great beast beat the air somewhere like a thumping drum.

The clouds, like gauzy scenes, were pulled away to set a clean sky. The moon was there, a great eye.

It looked down upon--

An empty path.

Pipkin nowhere to be seen.

Way off, toward the horizon, something dark frittered and danced and slithered away in the cold star air.

"Help--help--" wailed a fading voice.

Then it was gone.

"Oh," mourned Mr. Moundshroud. "This is bad. I fear Something has taken him away."

"Where, where?" gibbered the boys, cold.

"To the Undiscovered Country. The Place I wanted to show you. But now--"

"You don't mean that Thing in the ravine, It, or Him, or whatever, that Something, was--Death? Did he grab Pipkin and--run?!"

"Borrowed is more like it, perhaps to hold him for ransom," said Moundshroud.

"Can Death do that?"

"Sometimes, yes."

"Oh, gosh." Tom felt his eyes water. "Pip, tonight, running slow, so pale. Pip, you shouldn't've come out!" he shouted at the sky, but there was only wind there and white clouds floating like old spirit fluff, and a clear river of wind.

They stood, cold, shivering. They looked off to where the Dark Something had stolen their friend.

"So," said Moundshroud. "All the more reason for you to come along, lads. If we fly fast, maybe we can catch Pipkin. Grab his sweet Halloween corn-candy soul. Bring him back, pop him in bed, toast him warm, save his breath. What say, lads? Would you solve two-mysteries-in-one? Search and seek for lost Pipkin, and solve Halloween, all in one fell dark blow?"

They thought of All Hallows' Night and the billion ghosts awandering the lonely lanes in cold winds and strange smokes.