Eddie wondered how he could have first missed the sound, so firmly had it now become established. Where could it be coming from? It was, he guessed, about an hour till dawn, and no tractors or other farm machinery should be running. And it wasn't a radio.
A plane?
Leaning from the window he glanced upwards, then gasped in astonishment. Goose pimples of excitement tingled his skin, for there in the sky, above the oak tree on the ridge hung a pattern of sharp white lights. They were little lights, as if someone had strung together a fanciful arrangement of Christmas tree bulbs, then sent them dangling aloft beneath a kite.
Rags' mutterings became deep and angry. Finally he gave vent to a short sharp bark.
Instantly Eddie quieted the dog. Lights or not, his mother had made it plenty clear about Rags' being in the house.
Crouching on the floor, both arms about Rags, Eddie whispered words of reassurance while he stared up at the strange sparklings. The oak tree—the one with his tree house—was a scant quarter mile from where he knelt, and he wondered if its being so high on the ridge had caused it to draw some sort of lightning to itself. He'd read of that happening ... chain lightning. Or was it called Fox Fire? Eddie couldn't remember. Anyway, it looked something like that, he imagined.
But no lightning, he remembered, made a noise like a machine. Unconsciously, he'd hooked sight and sound together.
Frowning, Eddie let go of the dog. If the lights had been over the barn or garage, he'd have gone to tell his father. Or over the garden, his mother. But the tree house didn't concern them. It was his, and even if it hadn't been an hour before dawn he wouldn't have told his parents. He had things in there he shouldn't have, and it wouldn't do for either mother or father to go snooping around, even if they couldn't find his secret ladder and climb it.
He returned to the window.
Something thrashed in the highest branches of the oak. Rags began his whining again.