shall lie across the Pattern of the Age, and the Dark One shall once more layhis hand upon the world of man. Women shall weep and men quail as the nations ofthe earth are rent like rotting cloth. Neither shall anything stand nor abide...Yet one shall be born to face the Shadow, born once more as he was born beforeand shall be born again, time without end. The Dragon shall be Reborn, and thereshall be wailing and gnashing of teeth at his rebirth. In sackcloth and ashesshall he clothe the people, and he shall break the world again by his ing,tearing apart all ties that bind. Like the unfettered dawn shall he blind us,and burn us, yet shall the Dragon Reborn confront the Shadow at the Last Bat　

　1　 With a gentle sigh the service tube dropped a message capsule into the receiving cup. The attention bell chimed once and was silent. Jason dinAlt stared at the harmless capsule as though it were a ticking bomb.　 Something was going wrong. He felt a hard knot of tension form inside of him. This was no routine service memo or hotel munication, but a sealed personal message. Yet he knew no one on this planet, having arrived by spacer less than eight hours earlier. Since even his name was new-dating back to the last time he had changed ships- there could be no personal messages. Yet here one was.　 Stripping the seal with his thumbnail, he took the top off. The recorder in the pencil-sized c　

　THE SWEETHEART OF A KING.　　The scene was not exactly new to me. Moved by the spirit of adventure, or by an access of ennui which overtakes me at times, I had several times visited the gaudy establishment of Mercer, on the fashionable side of Fifth Avenue in the Fifties. In either case I had found disappointment; where the stake is a matter of indifference there can be no excitement; and besides, I had been always in luck.　But on this occasion I had a real purpose before me, though not an important one, and I surrendered my hat and coat to the servant at the door with a feeling of satisfaction.　At the entrance to the main room I met Bob Garforth, leaving.　There was a scowl on his face and h　

　　　　I was following Derry Welfram at a prudent fifty paces when he stumbled, fell face down on the wet tarmac and lay still. I stopped, watching, as nearer hands stretched to help him up, and saw the doubt, the apprehension, the shock flower in the opening mouths of the faces around him. The word that formed in consequence in my own brain was violent, of four letters and unexpressed.　　Derry Welfram lay face down, unmoving, while the fourteen runners for the three-thirty race at York stalked closely past him, the damp jockeys looking down and back with muted curiosity, minds on the business ahead, bodies shivering in the cold near-drizzle of early October. The man was drunk. One could read t　

　　　　SUDDENLY THE child began to scream, piercing shrieks of terror that died down to shaking sobs, clutching at his mother so that his tiny ringers pinched her skin agonisingly through her flimsy summer dress.　　　　Veronica Jones grimaced in the deep green gloom of the reptile house, had to check herself from giving her five-year-old son one of her habitual cuffs across his head. She held him to her, closed her eyes momentarily, a human ostrich trying to hide her embarrassment from the ghostly white faces that turned in her direction. Trust the little sod to start playing up. You squandered a sizeable chunk of the weekly family allowance to give him a treat and this was how he repaid you. Out　

　　John Dean. Henry Kissinger. Adolph Hitler. Caryl Chessman. Jeb Magruder. Napoleon. Talleyrand. Disraeli. Robert Zimmerman, also known as Bob Dylan. Locke. Charlton Heston. Errol Flynn. The Ayatollah Khomeini. Gandhi. Charles Olson. Charles Colson. A Victorian Gentleman. Dr. X.　　Most people also believe that God has written a Book, or Books, telling what He did and why-at least to a degree-He did those things, and since most of these people also believe that humans were made in the image of God, then He also may be regarded as a person. . . or, mare properly, as a Person.　　Here are some people who have not written books, telling what they did. . . and what they saw:　　The man who buried Hit　

　　　　　　HE SEEMED INCAPABLE of creating such chaos, but much of what he saw below could be blamed on him. And that was fine. He was ninety-one, paralyzed, strapped in a wheelchair and hooked to oxygen. His second stroke seven years ago had almost finished him off, but Abraham Rosenberg was still alive and even with tubes in his nose his legal stick was bigger than the other eight. He was the only legend remaining on the Court, and the fact that he was still breathing irritated most of the mob below.　　　　He sat in a small wheelchair in an office on the main floor of the Supreme Court Building. His feet touched the edge of the window, and he strained forward as the noise increased. He hated cops　

　Winters on Ballybran were generally mild, so the fury of the first spring storms as they howled across the land was ever unexpected. This first one of the new season swept ferociously across the Milekey Ranges, bearing before its westward course the fleeing sleds of crystal singers like so much jetsam. Those laggard singers who had tarried too long at their claims were barely able to hold their bucking sleds on course as they bolted for the safety of the Heptite Guild plex.　Inside the gigantic Hangar, its baffles raised against the mach winds, ordered confusion reigned. Crystal singers lurched from their sleds, half deafened by windscream, exhausted by their turbulent flights. The Hangar c　

　FOR NATALIE　　ACKNOWLEDGMENTS　　Special thanks to Natalie Freer-the most genuine and giving person I know. To Stephen Reilly, my brother and my good friend and my loyal supporter, even from thousands of miles away. To Mum for her ments on the text and to Dad for his woeful title suggestions and to both of them for their love and support. And, last, thanks to everyone at Pan and Thomas Dunne Books (in particular, my editors, Cate Paterson, Pete Wolverton, and Madonna Duffy, first, for "discovering" me and, second, for enduring all of my crazy ideas). To all of you, never underestimate the power of your encouragement.　　SOUTHEASTERN ANTARCTICA　　THE ANTARCTIC ICE SHELF...　

　　　In what felt to him like the first cold morning of the world, he groped for fire.　　　It was a high place where he searched, a lifeless, wind-scoured place, a rough, forbidding shelf of black and splintered rock. Snow, driven by squalls of frigid air, streamed across the black rock in white powder, making shifting veils of white over layers of gray ancient ice that was almost as hard as the rock itself. Dawn was in the sky, but still hundreds of kilometers away, as distant as the tiny sawteeth of the horizon to the northwest. The snowfields and icefields along that far edge of the world were beginning to glow with a reflected pink.　　　Ignoring cold and wind, and mumbling to himself, the sea　

　　JOB INTERVIEW　　　　Jack Torrance thought: Officious little prick.　　Ullman stood five-five, and when he moved, it was with the prissy speed that seems to be the exclusive domain of all small plump men. The part in his hair was exact, and his dark suit was sober but forting. I am a man you can bring your problems to, that suit said to the paying customer. To the hired help it spoke more curtly: This had better be good, you. There was a red carnation in the lapel, perhaps so that no one on the street would mistake Stuart Ullman for the local undertaker.　　As he listened to Ullman speak, Jack admitted to himself that he probably could not have liked any man on that side of the desk-under the cir　

　　　　This story takes place in an America whose history is often similar to, but often quite different from our own. You should not assume that the portrayal in this book of a person who shares a name with a figure from American history is an accurate portrayal of that historical figure. In particular, you should be aware that William Henry Harrison, famed in our own history for having the briefest presidency and for his unforgettable election slogan "Tippecanoe and Tyler too," was a somewhat nicer person than his counterpart in this book.　　My thanks to Carol Breakstone for American Indian lore; to Beth Meacham for Octagon Mound and Flint Ridge; to Wayne Williams for heroic patience; and to