Free New Title 1 by F. Paul Wilson Page A

his tail to wrap around that stuffed rabbit and squeeze it? Almost like a boa constrictor."
    "A good fake, but still a fake." Had to be.
    One aspect of the show that reinforced his sense of fakery was that there was nothing the least bit sad or pathetic about these "freaks." No matter how bizarre their bodies, they seemed proud of their deformities—almost belligerently so. As if the people strolling the midway were the freaks.
    Jack and Gia caught up to Vicky where she’d stopped before a midget standing on a miniature throne. He had a tiny handlebar mustache and slicked-down black hair parted in the middle. A gold-lettered sign hung above him: Little Sir Echo .
    "Hi!" Vicky said.
    "Hi, yourself," the little man replied in a note-perfect imitation of Vicky’s voice.
    "Hey, Mom!" Vicky cried. "He sounds just like me!"
    "Hey, Mom!" Little Sir Echo said. "Come on over and listen to this guy!"
    Jack noticed a tension in Gia’s smile and thought he knew why. The mimicked voice was too much like Vicky’s—pitch and timbre, all perfect down to the subtlest nuance. If Jack had been facing away, he wouldn’t have had the slightest doubt that Vicky had spoken.
    Amazing, but creepy too.
    "You’re very good," Gia said.
    "I’m not very good," he replied in a perfect imitation of Gia’s voice. "I’m the best. And your voice is as beautiful as you are."
    Gia flushed. "Why, thank you."
    The midget turned to Jack, still speaking in Gia’s voice: "And you, sir—Mr. Strong Silent Type. Care to say anything?"
    "Yoo doorty rat!" Jack said in his best imitation of a bad comic imitating James Cagney. "Yoo killed my brutha!"
    Gia burst out laughing. "God, Jack, that’s awful!"
    "A W. C. Fields fan!" the little man cried with a mischievous wink. "I have an old recording of one of his stage acts! Want to hear?"
    Without waiting for a reply, Sir Echo began to mimic the record, and a chill ran through Jack as he realized that the little man was faithfully reproducing not only the voice, but the pops and cracks of the scratched vinyl as well.
    "Marvelous, my good man!" Jack said in a W.C. Fields imitation as bad as his Cagney. "But now we must take or leave. We’re off to Philadelphia, you know."
    "You should stick to your own voice," Gia said as Jack guided her away from the booth.
    Jack didn’t tell her that something in a pre-rational corner of his brain had been afraid to let the midget hear his natural voice. Probably the same something that made jungle tribal folk shun a camera for fear it would steal their souls.
    "Look!" Vicky said, pointing to the far end of the midway. "Cotton candy! Can I have some?"
    "Sure," Gia said. "You go ahead and pick the color and we’ll be right there."
    Jack smiled as he watched her go. Always good to give Vicky a head start if a decisions such as shape and color were involved. She agonized over those sorts of minutiae.
    As they passed a booth with a green-skinned fellow billed as "The Man from Mars," Gia took Jack’s hand.
    "Vicky seems to be having a great time." She leaned against him. "And to tell the truth, I’m kind of enjoying this myself."
    Jack was about to reply when a child’s scream pierced them, froze them.
    Jack looked at Gia and saw the panic in her eyes. It came again, unquestionably Vicky's voice, high-pitched, quavering with terror.
    Jack was already moving toward the sound, traveling as fast as the crowd would permit, bumping and pushing those he couldn't slide past. But where was she? She'd been moving ahead of them down the midway only a moment ago. How far could she have gone in less than a minute?
    Then he spotted her skinny eight-year-old form darting toward him, her face a strained mask of white, her blue eyes wide with fear. When she saw him she burst into tears and held out her arms as she stumbled toward him. Her voice was a shriek.
    "Jack! Jack! It's back! It's gonna get me again!"
    She leaped and he caught her, holding her tight as she quaked with fear.
    "What is it,