“ ‘Let me know if you have trouble with that,’ he said. ‘The Talamasca can help.’

“We didn’t join tables for dinner. I felt it was best. I wanted Nash and Aunt Queen to continue to get to know Tommy, and Tommy was doing splendidly well. He wasn’t shy or overexcited, and just as I had surmised when I met him, he was extremely bright. Literature and history were his loves, thank God. Math he couldn’t understand very well but he inched along. He’d benefited tremendously from his Catholic education so far, and Nash and Aunt Queen were both finding him fascinating, which was what I had hoped.

“After we had all had our ‘egregious’ desserts, I took Tommy over to be presented to the Mayfairs and to Stirling, and he comported himself with manners in keeping with the occasion, and then it was agreed my beloved family members would return to the hotel and I would go up with Mona to her room.

“I threw my arm around Goblin and I said in his ear, ‘Go back to the family. Stay close to them. And come to me if Petronia comes.’

“He was surprised. But at once he nodded and disappeared.

“Mona’s room was a luxury suite just like the one which I had occupied, with a parlor adjacent to it and a big double hospital bed. Mona had covered the bed with white eyelet baby quilts, as she had described to me. Only now she gathered up all the wilted lilies and daisies, and, choosing great handfuls of fresh ones from the baskets all around the room, she covered the bed afresh.

“Then she hopped up on the bed and leaned back on a huge nest of pillows, smiling playfully at me. And we both went into gales of laughter.

“Dr. Winn Mayfair stood by solemnly watching all these proceedings, and then he said in his soft respecting voice, a voice that always commanded respect in return:

“ ‘Very well now, Ophelia, are you ready for me to insert the line?’

“ ‘Go ahead, Doctor,’ she answered. ‘And be sure to understand, you can close that door afterwards. Quinn knows the line is the only thing that can be inserted, right, Quinn?’

“I think I blushed. ‘Yes, Doctor,’ I said.

“ ‘Do you fully understand the risk, Quinn?’ asked Dr. Winn.

“ ‘I do, sir,’ I replied.

“It was hard for me to look at the needle in the back of her hand, at the redness of her skin and the tape that overlay it, but I felt I had to, I had to experience it with her as best I could, and my eyes moved up the transparent tubing to the plastic sack of clear liquid which hung from its metallic hook at the top. At some uncertain juncture a tiny computer generated numbers and beeps. A larger machine sat near, ready for some more complex connection, but fortunately none seemed to be needed just now.