The careful reader will remember that when I last left off the story of my final confrontation with Mary Sabon and her necklace of flesh—which, if you will remember, consisted, before the metaphor came to life and lurched forward, of two dozen of those social climbers who had become convinced she was the best historian since my brother—I was walking down the marble stairs in their direction.

I descended to the foot of the stairs. The marble shone like glass; my face and those of the others reflected back at me. The assembled guests slowly fell apart into their separate bead selves. Blank-eyed beads wink-winking at me as they formed a corridor to Sabon. Smelling of too little or too much perfume. Shedding light by embracing shadows. A series of stick-figures in a comedy play.

“What can she be typing so furiously?”

“How long’s she been in there?”

“At least five days. I bring her food and drink. I take it out again. She’s enough paper in there to last another week.”

“Do they mind?”

“What? They? Haven’t seen them here for weeks. They’ll not be around again.”

Mary Sabon. We are approaching Sabon now. Or I am, now that I’ve made it down the marble staircase. I suppose I must conjure her into existence before I can banish her … Red hair. Massive long locks of red hair, forest-thick and as uncivilized. Emerald eyes—or, perhaps, paste pretending to be jewel. A figure that. A voice which. A smile of.

I’m afraid I cannot do her the justice Duncan did in his journal entries, so I will stand aside to let him speak, even if he does stutter, enraptured by a school-girl-smell, white-socks fantasy with as much reality to it as a paper chandelier.

Mary Sabon. Sabon, Mary. Sabon. Mary. Mary. Mary Sabon. Sabon. Sabon. Sabon. The name burns like a flame in my head like her hair burns like her name burns like a flame in my head. She burns in my head. She burns in my head. I am delirious with her. I am sick with her. Blessed infection. I think of nothing but her. Walking home today, I could sense that the trees lining the boulevard contained her. I see her features when I stare down at the pavement upon which I tread. She is half-formed in the air. The faint smell of Stockton pine needles and incense. As of her. As of an echo of her. Her form a flame in the world that burns through everything, and there is nothing in the world but her—the world revealed as paper that burns away at the first hint of her. Above and below, a flame in my head. I cannot get her out. I am not sure I want to get her out. Rather banish myself from myself than to banish her from me.

“Does she tip well?”