She said, “I am here—I’ve been here—I mean, it was difficult to sleep. I wandered out for a walk.”

“Huddlestone and I were talking. Elijah Huddlestone. Perhaps you heard us.”

“Voices,” she said. “I heard—voices.”

The man was looming closer and taller, all the gigantic night-prowlers of eternity muddled into his lone shape. He said, sharply, “You came—”

“I came because … Mr. Bale, I must go. I must—”

“I’ve thought we would meet out here,” he said. “But not like this. I didn’t think it would be this way.” His touch branded her body; her skin was cold, clammy as the film of ghost-flowers.

He said, “Wet.” His fingers slid away. In the circle of a new match-light he lifted her limp arm. “Blood. You are cut by those briars. I must fix it for you.”

“At home—I’ll wash it there. It isn’t serious. Mr. Bale, I ask—” She heard her words go fluttering off like wet moths, clogged with chilly darkness.

“Come over into the kitchen; I’ll dress it. I am quite a surgeon.”

“That woman.” Irene felt her mouth making the words. Now I’m saying that woman, the old lady who works for you, your housekeeper.

“She went to Mummasburg after dinner, with her nephew, for a few days.” His hand was between her arm and her side. She looked up at him. Grim shape, dark shape—

No. No, Mr. Bale. I’ll worry. I came out to—walk. The—the Fannings. They do not know I’m gone. There’ll be a storm … she was walking, the two of them walking in stony blackness. It was no longer possible for her to know whether she shaped the words and pushed them from her lips, or whether her brain merely staggered silently beneath their weight and her lips were set and unyielding … Forever, vines. Wistaria sent her out there, the cat creature, the tropical passion, and the other vine caught and held her.

Bale’s arm slid tightly around her legs, outside the long cape, his other arm grew around her shoulders, he lifted her over the fence. “Mr. Bale,” and this time she heard her voice, grave and distinct, “I would rather not. I feel that it would—”

Then he brought her into the kitchen. There was the soapy smell of old wood, washed to its core, smooth as powder. A kerosene lamp burned with steady wick near the northwest window, and a big brown insect was trying to get inside and roast himself. He plunged at the pane with ticking resignation.

Irene leaned close against the rosy cloth of the long table. Curdling streamers of blood ran slowly down her wrist, drying and thickening as they oozed.