It Is Said (Mathias Bootmaker and the Keepers of the Sandbox) Read Free

there, standing over him. He slowly sat up and found himself surrounded by children.
    Alexander, Daniel and Alice pushed their way through the pack and looked down at the Man in Black.  
    “Say it!” Daniel ordered.
    The Man in Black sneered at all of them until he noticed Daniel was still holding his seltzer bottle, and it wasn’t empty.  
    “Uncle,” was the last thing the Man in Black would say to them.
    The children started cheering. Their screams of happiness and shouts of victory filled the saloon. They had defeated their bully and better days were ahead.  
    The Man in Black watched all of this with a stunned disbelief. In one moment, the Man in Black thought of revenge. In the next moment those thoughts faded as all of the children, one by one, began to vanish until the Man in Black was all alone.
    Lightning struck close by and lit the windows with bright white light. The deafening roar of thunder followed, shaking the saloon through to its rafters. Taking its cue, the playerless piano began a twisted little tune. The final note hung in the air as the piano disappeared.
    The old clock on the wall began to chime. It was high noon once more.
    With each strike a little of his world was taken from him.   Bong . Gone were the tables. Bong . Gone were the bar and its beautiful mirror. Bong . Gone were the balcony and its once carpeted stairs. So it went until there was nothing left but the old clock on the wall, and on the very last bong it vanished as well.
    The Man in Black stood himself up and for the third time, surveyed the room. There was nothing left except for a sound. A creaking. A groaning. A shrill, metal pulling on metal sound. But there was nothing in the room. He looked up. He dove towards the saloon doors just as the wrought iron chandelier hit the floor with a crash. The dust barely had time to settle before the chandelier, like everything else, was gone.  
    Horrified, the Man in Black thrust himself with so much force through the saloon doors that he flew past his horse and landed in the middle of Main Street. He lay there in the mud and watched as the Abandon All Hope Saloon, the entire building, disappeared, leaving a giant gaping hole deep in the heart of Fears Corner.  
    A bolt of lightning, a crash of thunder, and the rain just stopped. A cold stillness, a blast of wind, and the hail began to fall.   The ice balls, each a different size, from tiny to huge, pelted everything else left in town. They coldly tore through wood and window. The never ever used jail was obliterated when a giant hailstone dropped square on it.  
    The Man in Black turned away from the blast of destruction. He tucked himself into a tight little ball right there in the middle of town and waited for the giant hail to fall on him. Then just like the rain, the hailstorm stopped. He dared not move.  
    With his arms around his head, the Man in Black couldn’t hear a thing. But with his body so close to the ground, he could feel a low rumble. He opened his eyes and there it was, two or three miles away, the biggest twister he had ever seen. It was coming fast, and the wind that roared up was proof of it.  
    His horse, once a fearless demon, was terrified and in a panic. He chomped at his bit and pulled at the reins that were still tied to the hitching post. He was tugging hard enough to almost pull the posts themselves right up and out of the ground.  
    The Man in Black could see his only means of escape about to escape on its own. Against the brutal force of the wind, he dragged himself up and began to fight his way to the horse. The tornado was bearing down on the town and the wind was getting vindictive. In its relentlessness it picked up the Man in Black and threw him towards his own horse.  
    He landed with a glancing blow under the hitching post. He reached up and grabbed the reins. Pulling them down, he used the slack to untie the horse. Free, the horse whinnied and reared up, pulling the Man in Black up into the