The window across the street was dark for a second. Then the light came.
It came slowly, and it came steady. It was not the jittery flicker of somebody fumbling with a phone. It was the clean deliberate rhythm of somebody who had done this every school morning since April and knew exactly how long a dash was. Denny watched it with the card in his hand, his finger on the column.
Dot dot dash dot. He found it. F.
Dot. E.
Then a pause, longer than between letters — and then a rapid stutter of dots, eight of them, quick.
"That's a mistake," Ruthie said. "Eight dots means mistake. She's starting over."
Denny felt something tighten behind his breastbone and did not look at the girl. If you were lying, he thought, you would not have told me about eight dots. If you were lying, F-E would have gone right on to L-D-M-A-N, and you would have stood there nodding, because who'd know, and I'd have had a reason to walk across that street with my hand on my gun.
The light began again.
Dash dot. N.
Dash dash dash. O.
A pause. A word.