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‘Ivy, it’s Daddy,’ Bill pleaded, stretching out his arms to embrace her as she passed him, her eyes blazing lights projecting out of a feverish face, as she drew away from him and fled to a far corner of the room.

‘Call Dr Kaplan, Janice,’ he whispered huskily.

‘Wait!’

The voice was Elliot Hoover’s, speaking from the doorway directly behind them. Janice turned and saw him looking intently at Ivy, rushing about the room at a quickened pace, totally driven by the acute urgency of her nightmare. Hoover’s eyes were fixed on the tormented child, critically observing every movement and gesture she made, listening to the rasping, thoroughly exhausted voice repeating, ‘Mommydaddymommy-daddyhothothotmornmy daddy mommy daddy …’

Janice felt Bill’s hand stiffen in hers as he, too, turned and planted a stern, warning look on the interloper.

But Hoover ignored them both, his eyes and mind wholly devoted to their daughter, trying to define the meaning of the terrible hallucination in which she was caught. And then a look of inexpressible sadness swept across his face; his eyes grew large and haunted as he uttered, ‘My God,’ in a barely audible breath.

He quickly stepped past them into the room and worked his way closer to Ivy, who was reeling about dizzily, near the window, her hands seeking the glass, reaching for it, gropingly, each time pulling back in pain and fear, as if it were molten lava.

‘Audrey!’ The word burst out of Hoover like a shot: sharp, clipped, imperative, holding promise, offering hope. ‘Audrey Rose! It’s Daddy.’ And he took another step towards the agonized child fretting at the window, waving her thin arms at the glass despairingly, pleading with the demons without in the high-pitched, sorrowing voice of a child half her age, ‘Mommydaddy-mommydaddyhothothothotmommydaddymommydaddy …’

‘Audrey Rose! I’m here, Audrey! Here!’

Janice’s knuckles turned white in Bill’s hand as she watched Hoover take another step towards Ivy, who gave no indication that she heard him or was aware of his presence.

‘Over here, Audrey! It’s Daddy! I’ve come!’

Bill’s hand sought release from Janice’s grip, and she knew he was about to move, about to seize Hoover and throw him out of the room. She saw the murderous intent in Bill’s eyes and flashed him a look entreating patience.

‘Audrey! This way, darling! Audrey Rose! It’s Daddy!’

Suddenly, Ivy swung about from the window and turned her flushed, fear-ravaged face to Hoover, gazing up at him like a suppliant asking for mercy, the beseeching babble of words shifting to ‘Daddydaddydaddydaddydaddydaddydaddydaddy…’

‘Yes, Audrey! It’s Daddy! It’s Daddy! This way, darling!’ he desperately urged in a breathless voice. ‘This way, Audrey Rose! This Way! Come!’ And taking a step backwards, he extended his hands to the startled child, offering direction, inviting trust. ‘This way, darling! This way!’

Slowly, the anguish and panic seemed to drain from their daughter’s face; the rapid, feverish intensity of the words seemed to relax, to space out and become more defined, ‘Daddy, daddy, daddy, daddy …’

‘Yes, darling, this way,’ Hoover coaxed, bending down and extending his two arms fully to her. ‘Come, Audrey, come!’

‘Daddy … daddy?’ Her eyes remained fastened on a point just beyond the image of Hoover, squinting hard to penetrate the opaque veil of the all-engulfing nightmare.

‘This way, Audrey Rose! COME!’ His voice rose to a command. ‘COME, AUDREY!’

A prickle of fear coursed up Janice’s spine as she saw the face of her own child begin to soften with recognition, begin to lose the ravaged and brutalized look of terror. Teardrops hanging on her eyelids - the great blue eyes which now shone so large and brilliant out of her white and worn face - she slowly extended her hands to Hoover, in a tentative, testing manner. ‘Daddy?’

‘Yes, Audrey Rose! It’s Daddy!’ Hoover encouraged, in a subdued voice charged with emotion. ‘Come, darling…’

‘Daddy?’ And with a smile that seemed to answer him, she scampered forward into his arms, clutching him in a deep embrace. And thus they remained, clinging to each other, like a pair of lovers finally meeting after a long and wearying journey.

Bill stood like a man in a trance, his shadow thrown vague and large upon the two of them by the hall light behind him. His face was pale; his eyes were wet and glistening; his mouth quivered with parted lips. His whole being seemed absorbed in the anxiety and tenderness at his feet.

‘What the hell do you think you’re doing?’ he sputtered hoarsely, in a voice Janice hardly recognized. He stood, waiting for an answer, the lines in his face continuing to move, to speak, though his voice had stopped.

Elliot Hoover rose slowly, lifting Ivy up with him in his arms. When he turned to Bill and Janice, they saw that she was asleep, breathing normally, her lovely face now calm and composed in restful slumber. The man who had released her from her bondage took a step closer to Bill and gently conveyed the precious burden into its rightful arms.

‘It was the accident,’ Hoover said starkly. ‘There was a fire … the windows were closed … she couldn’t get them open, and there was no way of getting her out of the car … I was told that it lasted for some minutes …’

A strange stillness seemed to close all around them. The very air seemed hushed and solemnized.

A cough behind Janice made her aware that Carole had been witness to the entire drama. She had forgotten about Carole, had forgotten about Russ, still upstairs in their bedroom.

‘I’ll be leaving now,’ Hoover said, a look of profound concern in his eyes. ‘There’s a great deal I must think about. You were both very kind to see me. Good night.’

With a token smile, he excused his way past them and left the room. Janice could hear his footsteps fade away through the lower regions of the apartment and finally disappear. Bill heard nothing. His entire attention was caught up in the subdued and peaceful cadence of Ivy’s even breathing, as she slept, satisfied and calm, in his arms.

Russ was still in their bedroom, breaking down the sound equipment and packing it, when Bill carried Ivy past their door to her room.

‘Everything okay?’ Russ asked Janice, who had paused at the open door.

‘I think Carole needs you,’ she said wanly.

‘Oh, yeah? What’s up?’

‘There was some trouble with Ivy— She’ll tell you.’

Russ nodded and picked up his recorder. ‘I’ll go right down.’

At the door he turned to Janice with a parting shot. ‘By the way’ - he grinned, placing the reel of tape down on the bureau -‘this guy’s bananas!’

*

‘I’m sorry, Janice, I just don’t buy it.’

‘Okay.’

‘I mean it, I don’t buy it’

‘Okay.’ Her voice was soft, bereft of passion, past caring any longer what he bought or didn’t buy.

The darkness of the room seemed darker than Janice ever remembered it. Each lay awake, their bodies separated, hands disconnected, dwelling on their own private islands of despair.

‘Suggestive hypnosis? Isn’t that what Dr Vassar called it?’

‘I don’t remember,’ she said.

‘Well, that’s what it was. It worked for her, it’s worked for him. Suggestive hypnosis.’

‘You mean he’s a psychiatrist?’

‘Or a hypnotist.’

Janice suddenly felt sorry for Bill. He had been through a bitter, emasculating experience and was desperately trying to regain some semblance of mastery over the situation.

‘You don’t believe it’s possible?’ he asked.

That he’s a hypnotist? No.’

‘All right, then, what do you believe?’

He was forcing her to think.

‘All right,’ she said quietly. ‘I do not think he’s a hypnotist. I do not think he’s a nut. I do not believe in reincarnation. I believe that Elliot Hoover is a dedicated, persuasive man with a single purpose in his life. For some reason, he wants our child. With all his sweet, poetic, religious talk, he’s got a fire burning inside him that won’t let him quit till he gets what he wants.’ She heard her voice quiver and felt tears sting at her eyes. ‘So you’d better stop him … before he destroys us all…’

Janice turned her head into the pillow and let it all come out. Bill was there at once, holding her, caressing her body, kissing the tears from her face.

‘It’s a hell of a thing, isn’t it?’ he whispered huskily. ‘But don’t worry, he’s not about to get what he wants … I promise you that!’

His hand moved to her breast, kneading its soft and pliant goodness, finger tracing the corona of her nipple, feeling the gravel begin to ripple and rise along with his own passion. Her sobs were stifled by the depth of his lingering kisses. They made love. Afterwards they both slept.

Janice awoke abruptly at three ten, having heard a sound from Ivy’s room. But when she looked in, Ivy was sleeping peacefully in the arms of her stuffed panda. Janice felt her head. It was hot. If the pattern of seven years ago persisted, her fever would grow by morning.

She tiptoed from the room and returned to bed. Neither she nor Bill slept the rest of the night.

Even after a long shower and a lingering shave, Bill looked haggard and spent, and he spoke in a voice that was gritty with weariness. He told Janice about the trip to Hawaii as he stood in the kitchen doorway sipping coffee.

‘Goody for you,’ Janice replied. The flippancy of her remark failed to camouflage fear and accusation.

‘I’m planning to take you and Ivy with me.’

‘Really? How will we manage that, rent a hospital plane?’

‘She’s not that sick, Janice.’

‘She will be. Give her time.’

‘Maybe Dr Kaplan can give her something.’

‘For God’s sake, Bill,’ Janice said, with a sort of wild fatigue, ‘you know what course these things take! By afternoon she’ll be burning with fever … and there’s not a damn thing Kaplan will be able to do about it beyond aspirin and bed rest.’

Bill drew a deep breath and said, ‘Well, we’ll see,’ then told her about Jack Belaver’s heart attack, why he couldn’t turn down the assignment, and how it would be pure hell going without them But Janice scarcely heard him through the noise of the water tap whipping up a froth of suds on the breakfast dishes, forcing him to raise his voice in competition.

‘I don’t know why you’re acting like this—’

Janice turned off the water and looked at him with quiet intentness. ‘You really don’t?’

His answer was to stride purposefully away from her into the living-room and pick up the telephone. She heard him dial a number, then say in a voice loud enough for her to hear, ‘Extension 7281.’ A pause. ‘Don Goetz, please, this is Mr Templeton.’ Another pause. ‘Hi, guy. Listen, Don, I pulled something in my back and gotta go to the bone man. Cover for me today, will you? … Yeah? What else is cooking? … Well, you can handle that … Get hold of Charlie Wing if you get into trouble … And, oh, Don, tell that girl of mine to get me three good seats on tomorrow’s flight to Hawaii … Yes, three. Janice and Ivy are going with me … And Don, tell her to make it the last flight of the day that gets there before midnight.’ A chuckle. ‘Pel said Thursday, and Thursday, it’ll be…’

Bill didn’t return to the kitchen. Janice heard him go upstairs, where he spent several minutes before presenting himself at the kitchen door, dressed for the street and carrying Russ’ tape recorder.

‘You really believe she’ll be well enough to travel?’ Janice said with gloomy scepticism.

‘I’m not ready to predict anything, Janice. If she’s okay, your tickets are there; if not, I’ll cancel them.’ His voice shifted to a more lethal register. ‘One thing I will predict, though, it’s the end of the line for Air Hoover - we won’t be bothered by him again.’ He held up the tape recorder for emphasis. ‘If you need me, I’ll be with Harold Yates.’

He left without kissing her.

Janice puttered in the kitchen another ten minutes, then fixed Ivy a large glass of orange juice and carried it upstairs.

Ivy was sitting up in bed, alert and active, cutting figures out of an old Vogue with Janice’s sewing scissors. Except for a slight headache, she was gay, buoyant, talkative, and, as in the past, seemed to have no memory whatever of her nightmare.

‘I’m making a family,’ she said with a lovely smile as Janice reached out and felt her head. It seemed a bit cooler. Perhaps Bill was right after all. Perhaps they would be able to make the trip.

Thoughts of the warm, clear, multicoloured waters, the soft rain showers with their incredible rainbows, the balmy, sensuous nights beneath an impossibly yellow moon gradually quieted Janice’s restless spirit.

Ivy had to tell her, ‘The doorbell’s ringing.’

Janice descended the steps with a facing heart. The mail had been delivered earlier. No one came to the front door without first being announced - unless it was Carole.

‘Who is it?’ Janice asked through the bolted door.

‘It’s Dominick, Miz Templeton,’ came the muffled reply. ‘I got a delivery.’

It was a potted plant, a hothouse chrysanthemum with two large white blooms. The pot, a Mexican ceramic, was encircled by a red ribbon with a small envelope bearing the florist’s name attached to it. Janice thanked Dominick and brought the plant into the kitchen. She paused a moment, gazing grimly at the gift, before opening the envelope and extracting the card.

Tiny, precise handwriting covered both sides of the stiff cardboard, forcing Janice to seek a patch of sunlight in order to read it. The message was in quotes, and said:

Take the flowers. The blossom perishes as completely as if it had never existed; but the roots and bulb hold in subjective embrace the most minute details of that flower. When the cycle, the basic law, is fulfilled, the subjective entity thrills, expands, clothes itself again with the specimens of cells and reproduces the plant in all its former perfection and beauty. Thus do flowers reincarnate and express the same elemental soul of the plant. How much more reasonable is it that the intense individualization in man should also be conserved by subjective periods in his life history?

And below it was the credit line: ‘Esoteric Astrology, by Alan Leo.’

A shudder of superstition and fear went through Janice as she tore the card into small pieces and threw them into the trash can. Next, with a set face and trembling hand, she picked up the plant and all its green tissue and, holding it away from her body as if it were something loathsome, carried it out to the service hall incinerator and dropped it down the chute. It was the only thing to do, she thought, sensing a sudden power and mastery over her destiny, a perfectly normal, healthy reaction to a foe’s sneak attack.