Now he felt for the plight of this other man who feared entry into a woman, and that it was not a laughing matter. Then he went on to consider why, in the case of the clitoris, its position in the cup of his hand had brought both wonder and responsibility for its well-being. He was glad that the frog had remained moist and oiled, for that was a good sign. Yet he felt guilty that the sexual parts should have been chosen by his subconscious mind to be severed from their fellows, but there was relief in the fact (after all those repeated dreams in which the penis had come away in his hand) that now in some sort of sympathy the clitoris had followed his sad appendage into the unknown to keep it company.

He was happy about this, even though he knew that the companionship was emanating from his mind only, and not from Catherine’s. And even though no dream was occupied by the two free-floating loins at the same time (although that too might come in time, he thought) he was glad of the dream, for its sense of fellowship and exotica. Intoxicated, he remembered fondly eyeing the frog as it sat crouched in his hand, moist, ready to spring.

He knew it – the sexual parts were trying to break through the prejudice of the mind.

But in the world of the real and normal the place beside him in the bed was empty. He struggled up from sleep still carrying the clitoris in his hand, like a diver striking to the surface of the sea with a pearl.

He looked around bewildered. The ward was filled with the smell of may-blossom. The stench of lust. What was happening? Then the dream returned to him from another dream. He’d been dreaming about her again. And he felt a deep nostalgia for Catherine, for that sick feeling of wondering: Would Catherine be there, would she turn up, would she be beside him? It was a mystery. He felt there was some awful truth about himself he had to tell before she would return to him, but what it was he could not say.

For hours Jack walked the corridor, perplexed and delighted by the scandalous dream. The other patients, knowing the by-laws of another’s obsession, kept out of his way. He relived the dream to find its meaning.

All he could think was that a false author dwelt within him. In his dreams the true author existed, unhampered by reality. He re-entered his office and immediately thought of Catherine learning to play the trumpet.