know. That darkest splinter of his mind did not want her to succeed;
her success would be its death, and to save itself, it would destroy her
if it got the chance.
If she and Jim were to have a life together, or any life at all, their
future lay in the past, and the past lay in New Svenborg.
She swung the wheel hard right, began to turn around to head out of the
driveway to the county road-then stopped. She looked at the windmill
again.
Jim had to be part of his own cure. She could not track down the truth
and make him believe it. He had to see it himself.
She loved him.
She was afraid of him.
She couldn’t do anything about the love; that was just part of her now,
like blood or bone or sinew. But almost any fear could be overcome by
confronting the cause of it.
Wondering at her own courage, she drove back along the graveled path to
the foot of the windmill. She pumped three long blasts from the horn,
then three more, waited,a few seconds and hit it again, again.
Jim appeared in the doorway. He came out into the gray morning light,
squinting at her.
Holly opened her door and stepped out of the car. “You awake?”
“Do I look like I’m sleepwalking?” he asked as he approached her.
“What’s going on?”
“I want to be damn sure you’re awake, fully awake.”
He stopped a few feet away. “Why don’t we open the hood, I’ll put my
head under it, then you can let out maybe a two-minute blast, just to be
sure. Holly, what’s going on?”
“We have to talk. Get in.”
Frowning, he went around to the passenger’s side and got into the Ford
with her.
When he settled into the passenger’s seat, he said, “This isn’t going to
be pleasant, is it?”
“No. Not especially.”
In front of them, the sails of the windmill stuttered. They began to
turn slowly, with much clattering and creaking, shedding chunks and
splinters of rotten vanes.
“Stop it,” she said to Jim, afraid that the turning sails were only a
prelude to a manifestation of The Enemy. “I know you don’t want to hear
what I have to say, but don’t try to distract me, don’t try to stop me.”
He did not respond. He stared with fascination at the mill, as if he
had not heard her.
The speed of the sails increased.
“Jim, damn it!”
At last he looked at her, genuinely baffled by the anger underlying her
fear. “What?”
Around, around, around-around-around, aroundaroundaround. It turned
like a haunted Ferris wheel in a carnival of the damned.
“Shit!” she said, her fear accelerating with the pace of the windmill
sails.
She put the car in reverse, looked over her shoulder, and backed at high
speed around the pond.
“Where are we going?” he asked.
“Not far.”
Since the windmill lay at the center of Jim’s delusion, Holly thought it
was a good idea to put it out of sight while they talked.
She swung the car around, drove to the end of the driveway, and parked
facing out toward the county road.
She cranked down her window, and he followed suit.
Switching off the engine, she turned more directly toward him. In spite
of everything she now knew-or suspected-about him, she wanted to touch
his face, smooth his hair, hold him. He elicited a mothering urge from
her of which she hadn’t even known she’d been capable-just as he
engendered in her an erotic response and passion that were beyond
anything she had experienced before.
Yeah, she thought, and evidently he engenders in you a suicidal
tendency. Jesus, Thorne, the guy as much as said he’ll kill you!
But he also had said he loved her.
Why wasn’t anything easy?
She said, “Before I get into it. . . I want you to understand that I
love you, Jim.” It was the dumbest line in the world. It sounded so
insincere.
Words were inadequate to describe the real thing, partly because the
feeling ran deeper than she had ever imagined it would, and partly
because it was not a single emotion but was mixed up with other things