‘Well, yes,’ I said, and I felt that sickness and faintness again, and again I pushed it away. Suddenly I wasn’t going to be stopped any more. ‘Let’s go get it.’ I lay down.
He let me watch the ceiling and listen to silence for a while, and then he said, ‘You’re in the library. You’ve just met Miss Kew. She’s talking to you; you’re telling her about the children.’
I lay very still. Nothing happened. Yes, it did; I got tense inside all over, from the bones out, more and more. When it got as bad as it could, still nothing happened.
I heard him get up and cross the room to the desk. He fumbled there for a while; things clicked and hummed. Suddenly I heard my own voice:
‘ Well, there ’ s Janie, she ’ s eleven like me. And Bonnie and Beanie are eight, they ’ re twins, and Baby. Baby is three. ’
And the sound of my own scream—
And nothingness.
Sputtering out of the darkness, I came up flailing with my fists. Strong hands caught my wrists. They didn’t check my arms; they just grabbed and rode. I opened my eyes. I was soaking wet. The thermos lay on its side on the rug. Stern was crouched beside me, holding my wrists. I quit struggling.
‘What happened?’
He let me go and stood back watchfully. ‘Lord,’ he said, ‘what a charge!’