Free The Nightmare Factory by Thomas Ligotti Page B

cheered, or at least one did. Just as I was ready to begin reading, however, the lights went out, which was rather unexpected. And for the first time I noticed that facing each other on opposite sides of the room were two rows of jack-o’-lanterns shining bright orange and yellow in the darkness. They all had identical faces—triangular eyes and noses, wailing O ’s for mouths—and could have been mirror reflections of themselves. (As a child, I was convinced that pumpkins naturally grew this way, complete with facial features and phosphorescent insides.) Furthermore, they seemed to be suspended in space, darkness concealing their means of support. Since that darkness also prevented my seeing the faces of the children, these jack-o’-lanterns became my audience.
    But as I read, the real audience asserted itself with giggles, whispers, and some rather ingenious noises made with the folding wooden chairs they were sitting in. At one point, toward the end of the reading, there came a low moan from somewhere in the back, and it sounded as if someone had fallen out of his seat. “It’s all right,” I heard an adult voice call out. The door at the back opened, allowing a moment of brightness to break the spooky spell, and some shadows exited. When the lights came on at the end of the story, one of the seats toward the back was missing its occupant.
    “Okay, kids,” said the big witch after some minor applause for Preston, “everyone move their chairs back to the walls and make room for the games and stuff.”
    The games and stuff had the room in a low-grade uproar. Masked and costumed children ruled the night, indulging their appetite for movement, sweet things to eat and drink, and noise. I stood at the periphery of the commotion and chatted with Mr. Grosz.
    “What exactly was the disturbance all about?” I asked him.
    He took a sip from a plastic cup of cider and smacked his lips offensively. “Oh, nothing, really. You see that child there with the black-cat outfit? She seemed to have fainted. Not entirely, of course. Once we got her outside, she was all right. She was wearing her kitty mask all through your reading, and I think the poor thing hyperventilated or something like that. Complained that she saw something horrible in her mask and was very frightened for a while. At any rate, you can see she’s fine now, and she’s even wearing her mask again. Amazing how children can put things right out of their minds and recover so quickly.”
    I agreed that it was amazing, and then asked precisely what it was the child thought she saw in her mask. I couldn’t help being reminded of another cat earlier in the day who also saw something that gave her a fright.
    “She couldn’t really explain it,” replied Mr. Grosz. “You know how it is with children. Yes, I daresay you do know how it is with them, considering you’ve spent your life exploring the subject.”
    I took credit for knowing how it is with children, knowing instead that Mr. Grosz was really talking about someone else, about her . Not to overdo this quaint notion of a split between my professional and my private personas, but at the time I was already quite self-conscious about the matter. While I was reading the Preston book to the kids, I had suffered the uncanny experience of having almost no recognition of my own words. Of course, this is rather a cliché with writers, and it has happened to me many times throughout my long career. But never so completely. They were the words of a mind (I stop just short of writing soul ) entirely alien to me. This much I would like to note in passing, never to be mentioned again.
    “I do hope,” I said to Mr. Grosz, “that it wasn’t the story that scared the child. I have enough angry parents on my hands as it is.”
    “Oh, I’m sure it wasn’t. Not that it wasn’t a good scary children’s story. I didn’t mean to imply that, of course. But you know, it’s that time of year. Imaginary things are supposed