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“It is written that the truth will set you free. This must be why you have found us tonight. There can be no other explanation. And if, as you say, there are things about the Headstones that exceed your understanding, too, then perhaps there is a larger truth at work than any of us knows—or can ever know. But tell us the truth you came to tell, whoever you really are, wherever you really come from. It must be important. After all that has happened tonight, that much is clear.”

Lloyd looked McGitney in the eye, then scanned the faces around the room. Then he held up the box the professor had given him, in what seemed another life.

“The markings on this box, which you can all see are exactly like the markings on the strips of wood you carry, were not made thousands or even a hundred years ago. They were made in recent times by twin brothers. Wild, sad creatures. Freaks of nature, you would call them. From Indiana.”

A great choral sigh was released around the storehouse.

“The twins were deformed and disabled. A man who ran a medicine show had found them and taken them in, intending to exhibit them for profit, although I think he had too much heart to exploit them. Maybe because of their monstrous appearance they seemed to have grown up in their own world, never a part of the life that we know—though alert enough and smart in their own way. At least they were not imbeciles. But they could not speak English. Instead, they spoke a language all their own, which was every bit as odd to hear as these markings are to look at. The pitchman thought their speech was just animal chatter, but I know that it had a pattern and a depth—and a variety at least as great as English, perhaps much greater. I was given this box with their written language carved into it, because I hoped to study it and understand its meaning. I first believed it was something they invented, although both the writing and their speech had a—I’m not sure of the right word—an authority that some made-up code is not likely to have. But if they were specimens or representatives of some bigger group or a people whose language this is, I don’t know where to look for them.”

Lloyd paused, and McGitney tugged at his beard.

“You’re saying these writings are the creation of idiots from Indiana, and only a few years old?”

“I did not say they were idiots,” Lloyd answered. “It appears they were from Indiana, but there is no actual proof of that.”

“But why do the characters and symbols spring to life? Why do they glow?”

“That I do not know—yet,” Lloyd responded. “I agree with you that it’s wondrous strange, but you have assumed that the illumination is somehow inherent in the symbols—that they have a life of their own. Maybe the cause lies rather in how the symbols have been made. I have seen luminous fungi in caves. There are water creatures with strange properties, and any number of minerals with unusual characteristics. I cannot account for the capacity just now, but I propose to you that the mystery of the gleaming could be reconciled and the secret of the symbols still remain unsolved.”

“But your contention is that the sacred markings are not old and do not tell of the grand historic legacy that we, the Quists, have come to know and worship through the Book of Buford?”

“The sheets of bark are old,” Lloyd replied. “Clearly. The markings on them may or may not be. But I saw the wild twins making such symbols and figures with my own eyes not long ago. They would use any surface that was made available to them, and a range of implements from charcoal stick and quill to awl or sharpened bone. You will note that all the illuminated examples we have here are carved, which allows for the indentations to have been treated with some unknown material or by some undetermined process after creation. Sadly, we lack any examples of their writing system produced by pen or chalk on paper or parchment. It would be very interesting to see if such specimens would also demonstrate the same luminosity now. If they did, that would suggest