"Are you all right?" Keir said.

"I'm fine," Chuck said, giggling, and seeing his laughter turn into bubbles and exclamation points.

"Did you get the number of the grocery truck that hit me?"

"Pumpkelos," Bergold said. "They're our largest citrus fruit. You can get a gallon of juice out of just one."

"That's my problem," Chuck said solemnly, lying on the floor. "You know that megadoses of vitamin C can be bad for you!" He started laughing at his own witticism. The others shook their heads.

"You were knocked silly," Keir said. He looked relieved. Factory workers in white clustered around, grabbing the fruit and carrying them away. "Come on now, get up."

Chuck picked himself up. His legs felt unsteady. He looked down at them, and they wobbled visibly as though made of rubber. He wiggled his knees so his legs bowed out widely from side to side.

"How marvelous," Bergold said, scribbling away in his little book with an oversized pencil.

"You've acquired Animated Features. That's a rare dream."

"Bless my soul," Hiramus said, wiggling his own legs. "I can't get over the rubberiness of you."

"Try it!" Chuck said, encouragingly. "Think two-dimensionally!"

Hiramus concentrated, his long face contorted with the effort. "I can't seem to do it. Perhaps my self-image is too rigid."

"That's too bad," Chuck said, with sympathy, as he tottered up and down the room. "You ought to loosen up! It's fun!" The sensation of having bones made of elastic was a lot like being drunk, without the headache. In fact, nothing hurt. Just walking seemed to tickle his muscles from the inside. It made him want to do more. He grabbed one of the pumpkelos from a surprised factory worker and heaved it into the air. "Okay, missile! Come and get me!"

The huge fruit flew up in the air. At the top of its arc, it turned into a red-tipped rocket, complete with the word acme printed on the side. Its tail-burner ignited, and it accelerated downward. Grinning, Chuck threw his arms out, tossed his head back, and waited.

"No!" yelled Persemid.

The rocket knocked Chuck to the ground and exploded in a cloud of black smoke. When it cleared, Chuck was coated with soot. He got to his feet, shook himself like a puppy, and the covering dissipated in the air.

Persemid looked at him in astonishment. "You're insane!" she exclaimed. "You could have been killed!"

"Oh, c'mon," Chuck said. He didn't believe it. He felt immortal. "You try it!" He pointed his hands at the ceiling like a stage magician. "I'll make a giant boulder, and we can all get flattened."

"Oh, no," Pipistrella said, in alarm. "I wouldn't want to do anything that ugly. It's . . . it's below where my spirit wants to reach."

"Well, then, try something that your spirit would like," Chuck said, encouragingly. He reached out to her. She recoiled, but not before he touched the tip of her finger. She was so lovely. He had thought so since he had first seen her, but he didn't understand her. She seemed so confident in this peculiar reality, as if she was from some kind of higher plane, just loosely held in her physical body. She would make a beautiful cartoon.

Accordingly, when his influence struck her, it was not with the gross blocks of color that Chuck wore. She became a different kind of drawing, an old-master rendering of a nymph in simple, perfect lines, black on white. Birds and butterflies, drawn with lifelike accuracy, flitted around her head. A pillar appeared at her shoulder, and flowering vines snaked down it, still only in black and white, yet looking more real than anything else in the room."Oh! That's so sweet of you!" she said, admiring her lines with shining eyes.

Chuck blushed, his cheeks glowing with red light. "You're welcome," he said, the words in timid little letters above his head.

"How did you do that?" Persemid demanded, her hair scattered every which way like a cartoon witch. "I've only been trying to bend the way you did, and in one second flat you've turned the place into an animation studio full of junk!"

Keir immediately turned into a wolf-more like the big, bad sort from an early animated feature than a real lupine-and trotted over to lean its side against Persemid's leg. They communed, but she wasn't appeased.

"Why shouldn't I be able to do anything he can? This is his first time here! Patience . . ." Her face changed, as if she was accepting a scolding. "Oh, all right. I'm sorry." She looked accusingly at Chuck. "He says it's inhibition."

Chuck tried to feel guilty for her sake, but he didn't. He hadn't made this happen. He was just experiencing it. He spun in a circle.

So this was what it felt like to be really free. Flat thinking meant he could wrap himself around any idea, anything at all. He knew he had been afraid of what Dreamlanders went through every day, not knowing what shape they'd be at any time. He had no idea as to the sense of liberation that came with it. Chuck started to see the good side of being able to alter himself. This was a facet of transformation that he had never even dreamed of. It was so deep and yet so simple that he forgot to laugh.

With Persemid still glaring at him, Chuck bent to retrieve his suitcases. They had been smashed flat, too. He slung them on his back, not bothering to reinflate them, seeing another advantage in two-- dimensional thinking. Maybe when he got knocked flat it closed up the hole in himself. He'd have to check when he was alone.

A cartoonlike steam whistle opened its mouth and emitted a throaty honk. All around them, the white-coated workers dropped whatever they were doing and started to stream toward the factory door.

"Closing time," said Keir.

"Saved by the whistle," Hiramus said. Without moving from where they stood, they found themselves standing in the street overlooking the river. The factory had automatically put them out.

The orange sun hovering just above the western horizon drew a mirror image of itself in the rippling water. Warm yellow light came from the square windows in the tiny houses on the opposite bank, and smoke curled up from the tiny chimneys. It was all so picturesque Chuck expected to see credits crawl up the sky. He could make it happen. White lettering would show up the best. He raised a hand.

Before he could write a single word, Keir came over and knocked his arm down. The words directed by appeared on the sidewalk at his feet. Keir twitched a finger in his face. Naughty, naughty, Chuck thought, and subsided.

Chapter 21.

"Now that you're all so nicely loosened up," Keir said, clapping his hands together as he turned to the others, "I think we ought to have a night out. Yore is a wonderful place for tourists. There's plenty to do in the evenings. Since we're only here for one night, we should take advantage of it."

"I think that sounds like a wonderful idea. I would very much like to see nights in the days of Yore," Chuck said solemnly, then broke up.

"You're still giddy," Persemid said, looking peeved that he'd thought of the pun first. "Sounds good to me!"

"Wonderful," Keir said, clapping his hands together. "Are you ready to paint the town red?"

"Yes, indeed," Hiramus said. His Western rig unbuttoned into a sports coat and casual-dress trousers. His hand hovered over his string necktie, as though he couldn't make up his mind, then dismissed the silk strip with a flick of his fingers. The dress shirt became a button-neck henley.

"Oh, well, if we're dressing up . . ." Persemid said. She swept her hands down her sides, and her gingham dress darkened into a black lace frock with a scoop neck and handkerchief hem, and a beaded black shawl. Pipistrella didn't change, but she always looked dressed up. Chuck gave it his best shot, gladly parting with coveralls in favor of khaki trousers and a handsome suede shirt.

"Ready," he said.

"Good!" Keir said. He went from one to the other, handing them each a bucket and a wide paintbrush. Surprised, Chuck nearly dropped the heavy pail, which sloshed, sending up a wave of red.

"What's this?" Chuck asked, gesturing with his brush.

"What did you think you were going to use?" Keir asked. "We're painting the town red tonight!"

"This is really stupid," Chuck said. The heads of everyone passing by swiveled on their necks as they walked away, openly staring. Some of them were laughing. Chuck felt his cheeks burning and had to pat them to put out the fire. He threw an angry gesture at the bucket of paint. "I thought we were going to a party or bar. I can't enjoy myself carrying this around!"

"You don't know until you try," Keir told him sternly. "Come with me."

They stopped in front of a building covered with gray clapboard. Loud music came from its interior, but Chuck couldn't see any doors. Keir started applying red paint to the wall. "Come on, I said! Try it!"

Reluctantly, Chuck dunked his brush and started painting. The irregular boards were dry, soaking up the first layer like sand drinking water. He had to give it another coat. The brush glided down, neatly depositing the second layer of gleaming red. It looked very pretty. The color ought to have looked gory, but instead it imparted liveliness, playfulness, even mischief. He actually started to enjoy himself. After all, painting the town red literally was no more foolish than some of the things people really did when they went out to "paint the town red." He grinned at Keir.

"I could do this all night-" he started to say, when, abruptly, the wall opened up, catapulting him into the middle of a crowd of people dancing to a swing beat. A woman in a circle skirt took him by the hands, and before Chuck knew it, he was dancing, too. Keir swirled by, holding the hand of a pretty, ponytailed woman.

"Do you see?" he called. "You just have to let yourself get into it!"

Chuck followed Keir's lead. When the action in the first dance hall started to slow down and people began to disappear, Chuck grabbed up his brush and pail, and ran to the next place that sounded promising. Yore's main street was lined with shabby buildings pulsing with music, all waiting for patrons to start painting so they could come in and enjoy themselves. Sometimes they had only to touch brush to wall before they were swept into the interior where they might find a loud party dancing under a spinning mirror ball, a hellfire club full of men in wasp-waist tailcoats and women in leather Merry Widows, a children's birthday party, or a New Year's Eve gala with champagne-quaffing celebrants waiting for the ball to drop from a tower. They got their fill of bursting fireworks, rivers of drink and mountains of food. Chuck's first glass of wine burned his throat on the way down. He didn't feel any of the drinks that followed as he joined in the gaiety.

Chuck had always thought he was a man for night life, but he had a thing or two to learn from Sean Draper. Usually so withdrawn, the Irishman seemed to have been given new life as much by Pipistrella's kind interest as Keir's quiet talks. He had a knack for knowing where to find the liveliest dancing or the best food or drink. Chuck learned quickly to follow Sean.

Almost everywhere he went, Chuck spotted Hiramus sitting quietly in booths against the wall or at the bar, watching him. Chuck found the scrutiny more than a little creepy. Couldn't the guy go and enjoy himself somewhere, and leave him alone? Someone stuck a glass in his hand, and Chuck decided to forget about him. The night was still young, and there was fun to be had. He couldn't waste time worrying about one crotchety old man.

Sean left what seemed like a promising party, and began daubing the sides of a little place that looked like an old, one-room schoolhouse. Within a few strokes they were in the middle of a mahogany-paneled bar with brass rails and a full dinner buffet to one side. Dancers hopped and stepped on a square of floor, but most of the room was given over to drinking and cheerful conversation. Sean made a straight path toward the bar, where a stout, rosy-complected man was holding out a pint glass to him. He had one for Chuck, and everyone who followed in his wake.

"You've got a gift there," Chuck told him, lifting his glass to Sean as they found a section of wall to lean against in the crowded room.

"Oh, I can teach you all how to do it," Sean said easily, hoisting a foaming glass of beer. "You just go with the feeling. Go where it's welcoming you."

Chuck shook his head, now muzzy from smoke and the excellent lager he'd been consuming in the last three establishments. "Sounds too instinctive to me."

"Ah, well, it's easy," Sean said, taking a long draught. "Ah! It's moments like this that I have to remember the good things I should be going back to."

Chuck was puzzled. "Why shouldn't you be going back to them?" he asked. Sean opened his mouth to answer, but was interrupted by the arrival of smiling waitresses who deposited platters of savory canapes and sandwiches on the sideboard near them. Chuck smelled corned beef, and seized the nearest sandwich. "Mmm!"

"I want to thank you, friend," Sean said, finishing his beer and signalling with a slightly unsteady hand for another one.

"For what?" Chuck asked, looking up from his sandwich.

"For treating me like one of your own. I'm not, you know. You've all been very kind. I can't say how much I've appreciated it."

"I'm sorry. I don't know what you mean," Chuck said.

"Oh," Sean said, embarrassed, peering into his glass. "Never you mind, then."

"Come dance with me!" Persemid cried, coming up to pull Sean away. Chuck grinned as the two of them bounded away across the floor. For someone with such short legs, Persemid could cut a very fine rug. Sean was only just keeping up with her. She threw a wink at Chuck. Her red hair glistened, throwing copper sparks off into the air whenever she tossed her head. Chuck grinned. All she had to do was loosen up a little, and let herself have fun. Sean, too, was more at home here than in the places they'd been together so far.

Left alone with his thoughts, Chuck was puzzled by what Sean had just said to him. He wondered if he had missed something. Perhaps his obtuseness was the result of having been colorized that afternoon, but after another half glass of beer, he realized that Sean simply had not explained what he was talking about. Chuck felt sorry for the man. He was so inhibited. Something in his previous experience kept him from reaching out and trying new things without feeling guilty or being scared. It was possible to have life worse than Chuck had it. Inadvertently, his hand started to creep toward the hollow place in his heart.

"So you're a Visitor, huh?" A heavy hand clamped down on Chuck's arm and spun him around. He found himself face to face with a very large, unshaven man with reddened eyes. "You from out there somewhere? You one of the Belly-Button Gang?"

Chuck wasn't about to let anyone twang his navel cord again, so he didn't pull up his shirt. Instead, he smiled.

"That's right. My four friends and I are here to learn, er, about the Dreamland."

"Uh-huh," said the man, weaving unsteadily on his feet. "I hear that in the Waking World, you people only have one face."

"All day long," Chuck said. "It's not at all like this one."

"One face? Every day? All day?"

"That's right. It's normal for us."

"Well," said the man pushing close to him and breathing alcohol in his face, "that would make you freaks." Chuck backed away from him and found his way blocked. He turned around to see an equally large man leaning over him.

"Now, just a moment," Chuck said. "We can't help that. I've been changing while I've been here."

He smiled uneasily as more big men clustered around. "You folks sure are lucky."

"You patronizing us?" the first man asked, poking Chuck in the middle with a knuckle. "You people think you're better than us?"

"No!" Chuck said. "I didn't know you existed at all! I mean, I never realized people in dreams thought."

"Yeah, right! You think you can walk in here," the knuckle punctuated every syllable, "and lord it over us because you think you're more real than we are?" Chuck looked over the man's shoulders, hoping for a quick retreat. Instead, more angry faces crowded in on him. They got closer and closer, pressing Chuck between them until he felt his body squeezed out like toothpaste.

"Guys, I have the greatest respect for you," Chuck wheezed, his voice reedy and thin, shrinking away from the man's raised fist. The first man, looming over him, started laughing.

"You're pathetic, do you know that? Sad, miserable, one-faced, phony bum . . ."

Chuck cringed at every word of abuse, feeling smaller and smaller as the insults mounted up. The men seemed to grow bigger and more threatening. No, they weren't-he was shrinking! Every time they laughed at him, he lost height, dropping below chest level, then belt level. The taunting voice followed him, loud as an air-raid siren, ". . . your superior attitude makes us sick, you know that?"

Chuck shrank until he was no higher than the men's shoes.

Their abuse had made it possible for him to escape. At that size, he could run between their feet. He saw a gap appear as his tormentors milled around, looking to see where he had gone. Chuck saw his opening, and started running. At only six inches in height, he was vulnerable. The gigantic boots and shoes started stomping and trampling. Chuck dodged just in time to keep from being squashed by a cowboy boot, and found himself running a gantlet of threshing soles.

"Get him!" the voice roared.Like a matinee hero pursued by an avalanche, Chuck made for the door. Suddenly, he felt himself lifted up by the scruff of his neck. This was it then, he thought, curling up and throwing his arms over his head. He was going to die now.

Instead of being crushed, he was set down heavily on a flat surface.

"Your turn!" a little girl cried. Chuck opened his eyes, only to have a brief view of a little girl in a pink paper crown before his vision was cut off by the introduction of a blindfold. He had been dropped into the middle of a children's birthday party. "Go on! See if you can pin the tail on the donkey!"

"All right," Chuck said. A ribbon with a tack stuck in one end was placed in his hand, and he was spun in a circle. Accompanied by helpful shouts from the other kiddies at the party, he staggered forward, hands out, feeling for the target. Suddenly, a sharp pain jabbed him in the side.

"Ow!" He swept off the blindfold to see dozens of partygoers, homing in on him with more pins.

Theirs looked longer and sharper than rapiers. Their eyes glittered as they raised their hands to strike.

Chuck shrank back. A hand reached in, grabbed him by the arm, and yanked him out of the circle.

"There you are," said Hiramus peevishly. "Keir wants us all to go back to the train. It's almost dawn."

"What?" Chuck said. He looked back at the party. The children had gathered around a little boy wearing the blindfold, and were shrieking with laughter as he lurched around with his arms held out before him. They all looked so innocent. Could those little ones really have been trying to kill him? "I think you just saved me from being skewered."

"Think nothing of it," Hiramus said. "We should go."

"Where's Keir?" Chuck asked.

The corners of Hiramus's mustache turned upward in a wry smile. "Seeking Miss Pip, I believe."

Chuck turned wearily toward the door. "At least I don't have to wait up for her."