The whispery, vibrative voice on the telephone said, “Protect her, Oracle.”
“What do you want from me?”
“Protect her.”
“Why are you doing this?”
“Protect her.”
“Protect who?” she demanded.
“Willa. Protect Willa.”
She was still frightened and confused, but she was beginning to be angry, too. “I don’t know anyone named Willa, dammit! Who is this?”
“Leonard.”
“No! Do you think I’m a doddering, senile old fool? Leonard’s dead. Eighteen years! You’re not Leonard. What kind of game are you playing?”
She wanted to hang up on him, and she knew that was the best thing to do with a crank like this, but she couldn’t make herself put down the receiver. He sounded so much like Leonard that she was mesmerized by his voice.
He spoke again, much softer than before, but she could still hear him. “Protect Willa.”
“I tell you, I don’t know her. And if you keep calling me with this nonsense, I’m going to tell the police that some sick practical joker is—”
“Carol… Carol,” the man said, his voice fading syllable by syllable. “Willa… but you call her… Carol.”
“What the hell is going on here?”
“Beware…the…cat.”
“What?”
The voice was so distant now that she had to strain to hear it. “The… cat…”
“Aristophanes? What about him? Have you done something to him? Have you poisoned him? Is that what’s been wrong with him lately”
No response.
“Are you there”
Nothing.
“What about the cat?” she demanded.
No answer.
She listened to the pure, pure silence, and she began to tremble so violently that she had trouble holding the phone. “Who are you? Why do you want to torment me like this? Why do you want to hurt Aristophanes?”
Far, far away, the achingly familiar voice of her long-dead husband uttered a few final, barely audible words. “Wish… I was there… for the… apple dumplings.”
* * *
They had forgotten to buy pajamas for Jane. She went to bed in knee socks, panties, and one of Carol’s T-shirts, which was a bit large for her.
“What happens tomorrow?” she asked when she was tucked in, her head raised on a plump pillow.
Carol sat on the edge of the bed. “I thought we might start a program of treatment designed to pry open your memory.”
“What kind of treatment?”
“Do you know what hypnotic regression therapy is?”
Jane was suddenly frightened. Several times since the accident, she had made a conscious, concerted effort to remember who she was, but on each occasion, as she felt herself coming close to a disturbing revelation, she had become dizzy, disoriented, and panicky. When she pressed her mind back, back, back toward the truth, a psychological defense mechanism cut off her curiosity as abruptly as a strangler’s garrote might have cut off her air supply. And every time, on the edge of unconsciousness, she saw a strange, silvery object swinging back and forth through blackness, an utterly indecipherable yet blood-chilling vision. She sensed there was something hideous in her past, something so terrible that she would be better off not remembering. She had just about made up her mind not to seek what had been lost, to accept her new life as a nameless orphan, even though it might be filled with hardships. But through hypnotic regression therapy, she could be forced to confront the specter in her past, whether she wanted to or not. That prospect filled her with dread.
“Are you all right?” Carol asked.
The girl blinked, licked her lips. “Yeah. I was just thinking about what you said. Hypnotic regression. Does that mean you’re going to put me in a trance and make me remember everything?”
“Well, it isn’t that easy, honey. There’s no guarantee it’ll work. I’ll hypnotize you and ask you to think back to the accident on Thursday morning; then I’ll nudge you further and further into the past. If you’re a good subject, you might remember who you are and where you come from. Hypnotic regression is a tool that comes in handy sometimes when I’m trying to get a patient to relive a deeply hidden, severely regressed trauma. I’ve never used the technique on an amnesia victim, but I know it’s applicable to a case like yours. Of course, it only works about half the time. And when it does work, it takes more than one or two sessions. It can be a tedious, frustrating process. We’re not going to get much of anywhere tomorrow, and in fact your parents will probably show up before I’ve been able to help you remember. But we might as well make a start. That is, if it’s all right with you.”