“Stop,” he said, but she only chattered on.
He took hold of her with both hands and shouted for her to shut up, shaking her as he did so. Above them, the boughs creaked; a litter of twigs fell down on him.
“Wake up, damn you,” he told her. “Carys! This is Marty; me, Marty! Wake up, for Christ’s sake.”
He felt something in his hair, and glanced up to see a woman spitting a pearl-thread of saliva down upon him. It spattered on his face, ice-cold. Panic mounting, he started to yell at Carys to make her stop, and when that failed he slapped her hard across the face. For an instant the flow of conjuring was interrupted. The tree and its inhabitants complained with growls. He slapped her again, harder. The fever behind her lids had begun to abate, he saw. He called to her again, and shook her. Her mouth lolled open; the tics and terrible intentionality left her face. The tree trembled.
“Please . . .” he begged her, “wake up.”
The black leaves shrank upon themselves; the fevered limbs lost their ambition.
She opened her eyes.
Murmuring its chagrin, the rot rotted and went away into nothingness.
The mark of his hand was still ripening on her cheek, but she was apparently unaware of his blows. Her voice was blurred by sleep as she said:
“What’s wrong?”
He held her tight, not having any answer he felt brave enough to voice. He only said:
“You were dreaming.”
She looked at him, puzzled. “I don’t remember,”, she said; and then, becoming aware of his trembling hands: “What’s happened?”
“A nightmare,” he said.
“Why am I out of bed?”
“I was trying to wake you.”
She stared at him. “I don’t want to be woken,” she said. “I’m tired enough as it is.” She disengaged herself. “I want to go back to bed.”
He let her return to the crumpled sheets and lie down. She was asleep again before he had crossed to her. He did not join her, but sat up until dawn, watching her sleep, and trying to keep the memories at bay.
“I’m going back to the hotel,” he told her in the middle of the next day; this very day. He’d hoped she might have some explanation for the events of the previous night-frail hope!-that she might tell him it was some stray illusion that she had managed at last to spit out. But she had no such reassurances to offer. When he asked her if she remembered anything of the preceding night she replied that she dreamed nothing these nights, and was glad of it. Nothing. He repeated the word like a death sentence, thinking of the empty room in Caliban Street; of how nothing was the essence of his fear.
Seeing his distress, she reached across to him and touched his face.-His skin was hot. It was raining outside, but the room was clammy.
“The European’s dead,” she told him.
“I have to see for myself.”
“There’s no need, babe.”
“If he’s dead and gone, why do you talk in your sleep?”
“Do I?”
“Talk; and make illusions.”
“Maybe I’m writing a book,” she said. The attempt at levity was stillborn. “We’ve got plenty of problems without going back there.”
That was true; there was much to decide. How to tell this story, for one; and how to be believed for another. How to give themselves into the hands of the law and not be accused of murders known and unknown. There was a fortune waiting for Carys somewhere; she was her father’s sole beneficiary. That too was a reality that had to be faced.
“Mamoulian’s dead,” she told him. “Can’t we forget about him for a while? When they find the bodies we’ll tell the whole story. But not yet. I want to rest for a few days.”
“You made something appear last night. Here, in this room. I saw it.”
“Why are you so certain it’s me?” she retorted. “Why should I be the one who’s still obsessed? Are you sure it isn’t you who’s keeping this alive?”
“Me?”
“Not able to let it go.”
“Nothing would make me happier!”