Us and Uncle Fraud by Lois Lowry

and ran, leaving Marcus there. It seemed as if I had been running through this rain all day. This time, as I ran splashing and sobbing through the cemetery, my feet were bare; somehow my boots and shoes had been wrested from my feet by the river. And my slicker was in shreds, the hat gone. I pushed my wet hair out of my eyes, wincing when I touched my face. I pulled my hand away; it was covered with blood.
    I tried, as I ran, to remember which way to turn as I left the cemetery gate: Which way would be closest to a house where I could use the telephone and call for help?
    But close to the cemetery entrance, I saw a man kneeling on one of the small rises that was still free of the flood. I didn't care who he was, or that he seemed to be praying for a lost relative or friend. He was a man—an adult—and I was a child with one brother still in a battered heap by the devastated wall and the other lost in that ghastly, grabbing water. I ran, gasping, up the small hill to beg him to help me.
    He stood and backed off when he saw me. "Go away!" he said harshly.
    I realized how frightening I must seem, covered with mud and bleeding from the gash in my forehead, appearing out of nowhere in that godforsaken place inundated now with turbulent water and broken tombstones. But I recognized the man. It was Kenny Stratton's father.
    "It's me, Mr. Stratton," I cried, desperate. "It's Louise Cunningham—I'm Kenny's friend. Help me! My brother got sucked into the river!"
    He stared at me with panic in his eyes. "Where?" he asked.
    "Down there!" I pointed. "He's caught on a tree, and it headed down that way, toward the bridge!"
    "I'll call the police," he said. "Come with me!"
    He dropped a small object he was holding, and turned and ran toward the cemetery gate. Without thinking, I picked up the small, mud-coated thing and thrust it into the pocket of my slicker. His legs were much longer than mine; I followed him at a
distance, then saw him bang on the door of a house and go inside.
    Panting, I reached the house and climbed the front steps just as he came back out. "The police already know," he said. "Someone spotted him from the bridge when he got caught on one of the supports. They're trying to get him out now."
    People came from inside the house and clustered around me. Someone wiped at my bloody face with a towel, but I pushed her away.
    "I have my car right here," Mr. Stratton told me. "I'll take you down to the bridge where he is."
    "Is Tom dead?" I asked.
    No one answered for a moment. "They don't know," Mr. Stratton said, finally, and put his arm around me.
    "You go on," I said. "I have to go back. My other brother's still down there."
    "Another brother?" asked the woman who had been trying to wipe my face. "Is he all right?"
    "He's puking," I said flatly, "and I want to take him home."
    They let me go. I looked back, as I reentered the cemetery, and saw that they had all gone with Mr. Stratton to the old car that was parked in the rain-filled street.
    This time I half-walked, half-ran, into the cemetery, following the same flooded path through the same eerie, desolate landscape. When I was partway to the river, I saw Marcus in his bright yellow slicker, or what remained of it, coming slowly
toward me. He was limping. Like me, he was barefoot and bleeding and coated with mud; like me, he was crying.
    "Tom's caught in the bridge supports and they're trying to get him out," I said when I reached him.
    Marcus didn't answer. He stared at me with stunned eyes. His nose was bleeding, and the blood turned pink as it was diluted on his face by rain and tears. The pale pink drops fell from his chin.
    "Come on, Marcus. We have to go home and tell Mother."
    He still said nothing. He stared at me and wept silently. I was frightened by his silence; I wished he would scream or hit me. Instead, he simply stood there, dazed.
    Finally he looked down at his own hand, clenched to a fist around a piece of bent and twisted metal. He raised his