Fog usually creeps in on little cat feet, but not on Nantucket. On island, it creeps in as relentlessly as a sabre-toothed tiger stalking a wounded Woolly Mammoth.

Freakboy balanced along the deck railing as if he were Philippe Petit on a tightrope over Niagara. Johnny Dark took the steps two at a time and reached the front door as Freakboy executed a nimble dismount to land, noiseless as a Ninja, at his side.

"You're going to talk to Doc?" asked the Freak.

"You got it," answered Johnny.

The crew sat playing poker at the kitchen table; Doc wasn't there. Freakboy vanished up the stairs to check on Lily. Johnny called out as he searched through the ground floor, but there was no sign of Doc.

Freakboy slid sideways down the bannister. "She's gone," he said. Johnny swore and peered out the window, but fog shrouded the house. He could see nothing. "The barn," he muttered, as Freakboy followed him out the door.

*********

Bill Roman paced the floor in a motel room five minutes from the closed Hyannis airport. Nothing was flying in or out, not tonight. He cursed the fog and stood sipping his Glenfiddich as he eyed the suitcases on the bed. He unlocked one and lifted the lid. Piles of green stared back at him.

********

Johnny slowly made his way across the property. His steps were halting, his arms outstretched like a zombie, feeling his way through the fog. He could hear music from the barn -- Verdi's "Il Trovatore." He knew he'd find Doc -- if he could find the damn barn.

Something charged out of the fog, hit Johnny hard from the side and he went down, slamming his head against a lobster pot as he fell. "Freaker?" he gasped. A cold hand touched his face. He froze. The icy fingers crawled over his ear, found his earring and stopped. He moved as if in a daze to cover the hand with his own.

"Help me. Please, help me." whispered Lily.

What is Days to Cover?

1) The number of days the media covers a declining stock

2) Number of days a company is engaged in a hostile takeover bid

3) A calculation related to short interest

4) The number of days a stock's daily dollar volume declines

The correct answer is 3) A calculation related to short interest.

Days to cover is a function of how many shares of a particular company have been sold short. It is calculated by dividing the number of shares sold short by the average daily trading volume.

Look at Nantucket's Pea Soup [Nasdaq: FOG]. One million shares of it have been sold short (we can find this number, called the short interest, in such publications as Barrons and the Investors Business Daily). It has an average trading volume of 25,000. The days to cover is 1,000,000/25,000, or 40 days.

When you short a stock, you want the days to cover to be low, say around 7 days or less. This will make the shares less subject to a short squeeze, the nightmare of shorters, as we've seen, in which someone starts buying up the shares and driving up the share price. This induces shorters to buy back their shares, which also drives up the price! A short days to cover means the short interest can be eliminated quickly, preventing a short squeeze from working very well.

Also, a lengthy days to cover means that many people have already sold short the stock, making a further decline less likely.

Doc threw open the barn door and glared at Freakboy. "If you're here, Johnny can't be far away," he growled.

"Wrong," smiled Freakboy. "They're gone. Johnny and the girl are gone."

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