I said, “They didn’t have any drums.”

She looked at me oddly.

“Drums,” I insisted. “They were beating drums, it was driving me crazy. Then the drums stopped and I got out of there and I didn’t see any drums. Just these things.” I held up the bone. “What happened to the drums”

“They used the bones.”

“How”

“They beat on the ground with them,” she said. “Evan, we have to get out of here.”

I knelt down, pounded the bone on the ground. I could have made as much noise pounding a pillow with a sponge. “There must have been more to it than that,” I said.

“There were a great many of them, Evan.”

“I noticed.”

“And they pounded with great fervor.”

I pounded with great fervor myself. I began to see how it could have sounded like drumming, especially when it was all going on over my head.

Plum was busy apologizing. “I was sorry to run off without warning, Evan. But when I saw them coming I was frightened.” I couldn’t exactly blame her. “I wanted only to get away without attracting their attention. Others who have spied on their midnight rituals have been killed. I was afraid.”

“Who were they, anyway”

“The Nishanti.”

“Oh.”

“They are outlawed, Evan. They have always been outlawed, but with the new government the penalties are most severe. And yet the Nishanti flourish. There are more of them than ever before.”

“What do they do Besides pound bones on the ground”

“They raise the Devil.”

“I’ll say they do,” I said. “They raise the devil, all right. But what’s the point of it all”

“No, no, Evan. That is what they do.” She gestured. “Raise the Devil. It is their belief that they can come to the cemetery at midnight after a burial, and that they can chant