And he won’t now either, Alvin told himself. Just keep searching, so you can dig the real well. The false one didn’t drive that old deceiver off, but the real one’s bound to, and I won’t see him shimmering at the edges of my vision for three months after that.

  With that thought in mind, Alvin hunkered down and kept his mind on searching for a break in the hidden shelf of stone.

  How Alvin searched things out underground wasn’t like seeing. It was more like he had another hand that skittered through the soil and rock as fast as a waterdrop on a hot griddle. Even though he’d never met him a doodlebug, he figured doodling couldn’t be much different than how he done it, sending his bug scouting along under the earth, feeling things out all the way. And if he was doodlebugging, then he had to wonder if folks was right who allowed as how it was the doodlebug’s very soul that slithered under the ground, and there was tales about doodlebugs whose souls got lost and the doodler never said another word or moved a muscle till he finally died. But Alvin didn’t let such tales scare him off from doing what he ought to. If there was a need for stone, he’d find him the natural breaks to make it come away without hardly chipping at it. If there was need for water, he’d find him a way to dig on down to get it.

  Finally he found him a place where the shelf of stone was thin and crumbled. The ground was higher here, the water deeper down, but what counted was he could get to it with his spade.

  This new spot was halfway between the house and the smithy—which would be less convenient for Nat, but better for his wife Gertie, who had to use the same water. Alvin set to with a will, because it was getting on to dark, and he was determined to take no rest tonight until his work was done. Without even thinking about it he made up his mind to use his power like he used to back on his father’s land. He never struck stone with his spade; it was like the earth turned to flour and fair to jumped out of the hole instead of him having to heft it. If any grownup happened to see him right then they’d think they was likkered up or having a conniption fit, he dug so fast. But nobody was looking, except for Arthur Stuart. It was getting nightward, after all, and Al had no lantern, so nobody’d ever even notice he was there. He could use his knack tonight without fear of being found out.

  From the house came the sound of shouting, loud but not clear enough for Alvin to make out the words.

  “Mad,” said Arthur Stuart. He was looking straight at the house, as steady as a dog on a point.

  “Can you hear what they’re saying?” said Alvin. “Old Peg Guester always says you got ears like a dog, perk up at everything.”

  Arthur Stuart closed his eyes. “You got no right to starve that boy,” he said.

  Alvin like to laughed outright. Arthur was doing as perfect an imitation of Gertie Smith’s voice as he ever heard.

  “He’s too big to thrash and I got to learn him,” said Arthur Stuart.

  This time he sounded just like Alvin’s master. “I’ll be,” murmured Alvin.

  Little Arthur went right on. “Either Alvin eats this plate of supper Nat Smith or you’ll wear it on your head. I’d like to see you try it you old hag I’ll break your arms.”

  Alvin couldn’t help himself, he just laughed outright. “Consarn it if you ain’t a perfect mockingbird, Arthur Stuart.”

  The little boy looked up at Alvin and a grin stole across his face. Down from the house come the sound of breaking crockery. Arthur Stuart started to laugh and run around in circles. “Break a dish, break a dish, break a dish!” he cried.

  “If you don’t beat all,” said Alvin. “Now you tell me, Arthur, you didn’t really understand all them things you just said, did you? I mean, you were just repeating what you heard, ain’t that so?”

  “Break a dish on his head!” Arthur screamed with laughter and fell over backward in the grass. Alvin laughed right along, but he couldn’t take his eyes off the little boy. More to him than meets the eye, thought Alvin. Or else he’s plain crazy.

  From the other direction came another woman’s voice, a full-throated call that floated over the moist darkening air. “Krthur! Arthur Stuart!”

  Arthur sat right up. “Mama,” he said.

  “That’s right, that’s Old Peg Guester calling,” said Alvin.

  “Go to bed,” said Arthur.

  “Just be careful she don’t give you a bath first, boy, you’re a mite grimy.”

  Arthur got up and started trotting off across the meadow, up to the path that led from the springhouse to the roadhouse where he lived. Alvin watched him out of sight, the little boy flapping his arms as he ran, like as if he was flying. Some bird, probably an owl, flew right alongside the boy halfway across the meadow, skimming along the ground like as if to keep him company. Not till Arthur was out of sight behind the springhouse did Alvin turn back to his labor.

  In a few more minutes it was full dark, and the deep silence of night came quick after that. Even the dogs were quiet all through town. It’d be hours before the moon came up. Alvin worked on. He didn’t have to see; he could feel how the well was going, the earth under his feet. Nor was it the Red man’s seeing now, their gift for hearing the greenwood song. It was his own knack he was using, helping him feel his way deeper into the earth.

  He knew he’d strike rock twice as deep this time. But when the spade caught up on big chunks of rock, it wasn’t a smooth plate like it was at the spot Hank Dowser chose. The stones were crumbly and broke up, and with his knack Al hardly had to press his lever afore the stones flipped up easy as you please, and he tossed them out the well like clods.

  Once he dug through that layer, though, the ground got oozy underfoot. If he wasn’t who he was, he’d’ve had to set the work aside and get help to dredge it out in the morning. But for Alvin it was easy enough. He tightened up the earth around the walls of the hole, so water couldn’t seep in so fast. It wasn’t spadework now. Alvin used a dredge to scoop up the mucky soil, and he didn’t need no partner to hoist it out on a rope, either, he just heaved it up and his knack was such that each scoop of ooze clung together and landed neat as you please outside the well, just like he was flinging bunny rabbits out the hole.

  Alvin was master here, that was sure, working miracles in this hole in the ground. You tell me I can’t eat or drink till the well is dug, thinking you’ll have me begging for a cup of water and pleading for you to let me go to bed. Well, you won’t see such a thing. You’ll have your well, with walls so solid they’ll be drawing water here after your house and smithy have crumbled into dust.

  But even as he felt the sweet taste of victory, he saw that the Unmaker was closer than it had ever come in years. It flickered and danced, and not just at the edges of his vision anymore. He could see it right in front of him, even in the darkness, he could see it clearer than ever in daylight, cause now he couldn’t see nothing real to distract him.

  It was scary, all of a sudden, just like the nightmares of his childhood, and for a while Alvin stood in the hole, all froze with fear, as water oozed up from below, making the ground under him turn to slime. Thick slime a hundred feet deep, he was sinking down, and the walls of the well were getting soft, too, they’d cave in on him and bury him, he’d drownd trying to breathe muck into his lungs, he knew it, he could feel it cold and wet around his thighs, his crotch; he clenched his fists and felt mud ooze between his fingers, just like the nothingness in all his nightmares—

  And then he came to himself, got control. Sure, he was up to his waist in mud, and if he was any other boy in such a case he might have wiggled himself down deeper and smothered hisself, trying to struggle out. But this was Alvin, not some ordinary boy, and he was safe as long as he wasn’t booglied up by fear like a child caught in a bad dream. He just made the slime under his feet harden enough to hold his weight, then made the hard place float upward, lifting him out of the mud until he was standing on gravelly mud at the bottom of the well.

  Easy as breaking a rat’s neck. If that was all the Unmaker could think of doing, it might as well go on home. Alvin was a match for him, just like he was a match for Nat Smith and Hank Dowser both. He dug on, dredged up, hoisted, flung, then bent to dredge again.

  He was pretty near deep enough now, a good six feet lower than the stone shelf. Why, if he hadn’t firmed up the earthen sides of the well, it’d be full of water over his head already. Alvin took hold of the knotted rope he left dangling and walked up the wall, pulling himself hand over hand up the rope.

  The moon was rising now, but the hole was so deep it wouldn’t shine into the well until near moon-noon. Never mind. Into the pit Alvin dumped the barrowload of the stones he’d levered out only an hour before. Then he clambered down after it.

  He’d been working rock with his knack since he was little, and he was never more sure-handed with it than tonight. With his bare hands he shaped the stone like soft clay, making it into smooth square blocks that he placed all around the walls of the well from the bottom up, braced firm against each other so that the pushing of soil and water wouldn’t cave it in. Water would seep easily through the cracks between stones, but the soil wouldn’t, so the well would be clean almost from the start.

  There wasn’t enough stone from the well itself, of course; Alvin made three more trips to the stream to load the barrow with water-smoothed rocks. Even though he was using his knack to make the work easier, it was late at night and weariness was coming on him. But he refused to pay attention. Hadn’t he learned the Red man’s knack for running on long after weariness should have claimed him? A boy who followed Ta-Kumsaw, running without a rest from Detroit to Eight-Face Mound, such a boy had no need to give in to a single night of well-digging, and never mind his thirst or the pain in his back and thighs and shoulders, the ache of his elbows and his knees.

  At last, at last, it was done. The moon past zenith, his mouth tasting like a horsehair blanket, but it was done. He climbed on out of the hole, bracing himself against the stone walls he’d just finished building. As he climbed he let go of his hold on the earth around the well, unsealed it, and the water, now tame, began to trickle noisily into the deep stone basin he’d built to hold it.

  Still Alvin didn’t go inside the house, didn’t so much as walk to the stream and drink. His first taste of water would be from this well, just like Nat Smith had said. He’d stay here and wait until the well had reached its natural level, and then clear the water and draw up a bucket and carry it inside the house and drink a cup of it in front of his master. Afterward he’d take Nat Smith outside and show him the well Hank Dowser called for, the one Nat Smith had cuffed him for, and then point out the one where you could drop a bucket and it was splash, not clatter.

  He stood there at the lip of the well, imagining how Nat Smith would sputter, how he’d cuss. Then he sat down, just to ease his feet, picturing Hank Dowser’s face when he saw what Al had done. Then he lay right down to ease his aching back, and closed his eyes for just a minute, so he didn’t have to pay no heed to the fluttering shadows of unmaking that kept pestering him out the corners of his eyes.

  Alvin woke up hours later, the moon low in the west, the first scant light appearing in the east. He hadn’t meant to sleep. But he was tired, after all, and his work was done, so of course he couldn’t close his eyes and hope to stay awake. There was still time to take a bucketful of water and carry it inside.

  Were his eyes open even now? The sky he could see, light grey to the left, light grey to the right. But where were the trees? Shouldn’t they have been moving gently in the morning breeze, just at the fringes of his vision? For that matter, there was no breeze; and beyond the sight of his eyes and touch of his skin, there were other things he could not feel. The green music of the living forest. It was gone; no murmur of life from the sleeping insects in the grass, no rhythm of the heartbeats of the dawn-browsing deer. No birds roosting in the trees, waiting for the sun’s heat to bring out the insects.

  Dead. Unmade. The forest was gone.

  Alvin opened his eyes.

  Hadn’t they already been open?

  Alvin opened his eyes again, and still he couldn’t see; without closing them, he opened them still again, and each time the sky seemed darker. No, not darker, simply farther away, rushing up and away from him, like as if he was falling into a pit so deep that the sky itself got lost.

  Alvin cried out in fear, and opened his already-opened eyes, and saw:

  The quivering air of the Unmaker, pressing down on him, poking itself into his nostrils, between his fingers, into his ears.

  He couldn’t feel it, no sir, except that he knew what wasn’t there now; the outermost layers of his skin, wherever the Unmaker touched, his own body was breaking apart, the tiniest bits of him dying, drying, flaking away.

  “No!” he shouted. The shout didn’t make a sound. Instead, the Unmaker whipped inside his mouth, down into his lungs, and he couldn’t close his teeth hard enough, his lips tight enough to keep that slimy uncreator from slithering on inside him, eating him away from the inside out.

  He tried to heal himself the way he done with his leg that time the millstone broke it clean in half. But it was like the old story Taleswapper told him. He couldn’t build things up half so fast as the Unmaker could tear them down. For every place he healed, there was a thousand places wrecked and lost. He was a-going to die, he was half-gone already, and it wouldn’t be just death, just losing his flesh and living on in the spirit, the Unmaker meant to eat him body and spirit both alike, his mind and his flesh together.

  A splash. He heard a splashing sound. It was the most welcome thing he ever heard in his life, to hear a sound at all. It meant that there was something beyond the Unmaker that surrounded and filled him.

  Alvin heard the sound echo and ring inside his own memory, and with that to cling to, with that touch of the real world there to hang on to, Alvin opened his eyes.

  This time for real, he knew, cause he saw the sky again with its proper fringe of trees. And there was Gertie Smith, Nat’s missus, standing over him with a bucket in her hands.

  “I reckon this is the first water from this well,” she said.

  Alvin opened his mouth, and felt cool moist air come inside. “Reckon so,” he whispered.

  “I never would’ve thought you could dig it all out and line it proper with stones, all in one night,” she said. “That mixup boy, Arthur Stuart, he come to the kitchen where I was making breakfast biscuits, and he told me your well was done. I had to come and see.”

  “He gets up powerful early,” said Alvin.

  “And you stay up powerful late,” said Gertie. “If I was a man your size I’d give my husband a proper licking, Al, prentice or no.”

  “I just did what he asked.”

  “I’m certain you did, just like I’m certain he wanted you to excavate that there circle of stone off by the smithy, am I right?” She cackled with delight. “That’ll show the old coot. Sets such a store by that dowser, but his own prentice has a better dowsing knack than that old fraud—”

  For the first time Alvin realized that the hole he dug in anger was like a signboard telling folks he had more than a hoof-knack in him. “Please, ma’am,” he said.

  “Please what?”

  “My knack ain’t dowsing, ma’am, and if you start saying so, I’ll never get no peace.”

  She eyed him cool and steady. “If you ain’t got the dowser’s knack, boy, tell me how come there’s clear water in this well you dug.”

  Alvin calculated his lie. “The dowser’s stick dipped here, too, I saw it, and so when the first well struck stone, I tried here.”

  Gertie had a suspicious nature. “Do you reckon you’d say the same if Jesus was standing here judging your eternal soul depending on the truth of what you say?”

  “Ma’am, I reckon if Jesus was here, I’d be asking forgiveness for my sins, and I wouldn’t care two hoots about any old well.”

  She laughed again, cuffed him lightly on the shoulder. “I like your dowsing story. You just happened to be watching old Hank Dowser. Oh, that’s a good one. I’ll tell that tale to everybody, see if I don’t.”

  “Thank you, ma’am.”

  “Here. Drink. You deserve first swallow from the first bucket of clear water from this well.”

  Alvin knew that the custom was for the owner to get first drinks. But she was offering, and he was so dry he couldn’t have spit two bits’ worth even if you paid him five bucks an ounce. So he set the bucket to his lips and drank, letting it splash out onto his shirt.

  “I’d wager you’re hungry, too,” she said.

  “More tired than hungry, I think,” said Alvin.

  “Then come inside to sleep.”

  He knew he should, but he could see the Unmaker not far off, and he was afeared to sleep again, that was the truth. “Thank you kindly, Ma’am, but anyhow, I’d like to be off by myself a few minutes.”

  “Suit yourself,” she said, and went on inside.

  The morning breeze chilled him as it dried off the water he spilled on his shirt. Was his ravishment by the Unmaker only a dream? He didn’t think so. He was awake right enough, and it was real, and if Gertie Smith hadn’t come along and dunked that bucket in the well, he would’ve been unmade. The Unmaker wasn’t hiding out no more. He wasn’t sneaking in backways nor roundabout. No matter where he looked, there it was, shimmering in the greyish morning light.

  For some reason the Unmaker picked this morning for a face-to-face. Only Alvin didn’t know how he was supposed to fight. If digging a well and building it up so fine wasn’t making enough to drive off his enemy, he didn’t know what else to do. The Unmaker wasn’t like the men he wrestled with in town. The Unmaker had nothing he could take ahold of.

  One thing was sure. Alvin’d never have a night of sleep again if he didn’t take this Unmaker down somehow and wrestle him into the dirt.

  I’m supposed to be your master, Alvin said to the Unmaker. So tell me, Unmaker, how do I undo you, when all you are is Undoing? Who’s going to teach me how to win this battle, when you can sneak up on me in my sleep, and I don’t have the faintest idea how to get to you?