"You may tell me. What Procedures do you use?"
The girl's perplexity at the new word looked real.
"I don't know anything about that, mum. I don't do much. Just spells.
Like now my boy friend's gone in the army, I do things to keep him from
getting shot or hurt, and I've spelled him so that he'll keep away from
other women. Honest, I don't do much, mum. And it don't always work.
And lots of things I can't get that way." Her words had begun to run
away with her.
"Very well. Where did you learn to do this?"
"Some I learned from ma when I was a kid. And some from Mrs.
Neidel--she gets spells against bullets from her grandmother who had a
family in some European war before the last one. But most women won't
tell you anything. And some spells I kind of figure out myself, and try
different ways until they work. You won't tell on me, mum?"
"No. Look at me now. What has happened to me?"
"Honest, mum, I don't know. Please, mum, don't make me say it." The
girl's terror and reluctance were so obviously genuine that Norman felt
a surge of anger at Tansy. Then he remembered that the thing beyond the
door was incapable of either cruelty or kindness.
"I want you to tell me."
"I don't know how to say it, mum. But you're ... you're _dead_."
Suddenly she threw herself at Tansy's feet. "Oh, please, please don't
take mine! Please!"
"I would not take your soul. You would get much the best of that
bargain. You may go away now."
"Oh, thank you, thank you." She hastily gathered up the scattered
clothes. "I'll have them all ready for you at nine o'clock. Really I
will." And she hurried out.
* * * * *
Only when he moved, did Norman realize that his muscles were stiff and
aching from those few taut minutes of peering. The robed and toweled
figure was sitting in exactly the same position as when he had last
seen it, hands loosely folded, eyes still directed toward where the
girl had been standing.
"If you knew all this," he asked simply, "why were you willing to stop
last week when I asked you?"
"There are two sides to every woman." It might have been a mummy
dispensing elder wisdom. "One is rational, like a man. The other
knows. Men are artificially isolated creatures, like islands in a sea
of magic, protected by their rationality and by the devices of their
women. Their isolation gives them greater forcefulness in thought
and action, but the women know. Women might be able to rule the world
openly, but they do not want the work or the responsibility. And men
might learn to excel them in the Art. Even now there may be male
sorcerers, but very few.
"Last week I suspected much that I did not tell you. But the rational
side is strong in me, and I wanted to be close to you in all ways. Like
many women, I had not been awakened. I was not certain. And when I
destroyed my charms and guards, I became temporarily blind to sorcery.
Like a person used to large doses of a drug, I was uninfluenced by
small doses. Rationality was dominant. I enjoyed a few days of false
security. Then rationality itself proved to me that you were the victim
of sorcery. And during my journey here I learned much, partly from
re-examination of my own memories, partly from what He Who Walks Behind
let slip." She paused and added, with the blank innocent cunning of a
child, "Shall we go back to Hempnell now?"
The phone rang. It was the night clerk, almost incoherent with some
sort of agitation, babbling threateningly about police and eviction. To
pacify him, Norman had to promise to come down at once.
The old man was waiting at the foot of the stairs.
"Look here, mister," he began, shaking a finger, "I want to know what's
going on. Just now my Sissy came down from your room white as a sheet.
She wouldn't tell me anything, but she was trembling like all get-out.
Sissy's my granddaughter. I got her this job, and I'm responsible for
her."
He seemed genuinely concerned.
"I know what hotels are. I've worked in 'em all my life. And I know
the kind of people that come to them--sometimes men and women working
together--and I know the kind of things they try to do to young girls.
"Now I'm not saying anything against you, mister. But it was mighty
queer the way your wife came here. I thought when she asked me to call
Sissy that she was sick or something. But if she's sick, why haven't
you called a doctor? And what are you doing still up at almost four?
Mrs. Thompson in the next room called to say there was talking in your
room--not loud, but it scared her. I got a right to know what's going
on."
Norman put on his best classroom manner and blandly dissected the
old man's apprehensions until they began to look very unsubstantial.
Dignity told. With a last show of grumbling, the old man let himself
be convinced. As Norman started upstairs, he was shuffling back to the
switchboard.
* * * * *
On the second flight, Norman heard a phone ringing. As he was walking
down the hall, it stopped.
He opened the door. Tansy was standing by the bed, speaking into the
phone. Its dull blackness, curving from mouth to ear emphasized the
pallor of lips and cheek and the whiteness of the toweling.
"This is Tansy Saylor," she was saying tonelessly. "I want my soul."
A pause. "Can't you hear me, Evelyn? This is Tansy Saylor. I want my
soul."
He had completely forgotten the call he had put in. It had been done in
a moment of crazy anger. He hadn't even any clear idea of what he had
been going to say.
He stepped forward. A low wailing sound was coming from the phone.
Tansy was talking against it.
"This is Tansy Saylor. I want my soul."
He was almost there. The wailing sound had swiftly risen to a squeal,
but mixed with it was an intermittent windy whirring.
He reached out to take the phone. But at that instant the phone twisted
like a stumpy black worm, whipped tight to the skin, and dug into chin
and neck just below the ear, like a double-ended black paw. The squeal
became a muffled sucking.
If you tore that away, you would tear the face with it. He knew. He
dropped to his knees and ripped the cord from the wall. Violet sparks
spat from the torn wire. The loose end writhed like a wounded snake,
whipped around his forearm, tightened spasmodically, then relaxed.
He stood up. The phone had fallen to the floor. There was nothing out
of the ordinary about it now.
Tansy was still standing in the same place. Not an atom of fear showed
in her expression. With the unconcernedness of a machine, she had
lifted a hand and was slowly massaging cheek and neck. From the corner
of the squeezed lips a few drops of blood were trickling.
The rack, he was thinking, would be too good for that woman. Or the
scourge, or the wheel. So foully to attack a mere empty creature was
an ultimate, unspeakable viciousness, like crushing a kitten under your
heel. Perhaps the Boot, or the Funnel--
Swiftly the phantasmagoria of the Inquisition faded from his mind, as
his first surge of anger spent itself and settled down to a steady hate.
"What did she say to you?" he asked evenly.
"She kept saying, 'Who is this? Who is this?' That was all. Then she
stopped and the noise began."
"How did she sound?"
"She sounded very frightened."
"Good!" He smacked his fist against his palm. "Magic works," he said
grimly. "We'll make it work better. She'll be more frightened after we
begin."
"Perhaps you have already begun."
He did not understand at the time the significance of that toneless
reply.