After those few seconds of freezing fear, he was bored silly. Two of the gray-haired women employed the Ouija board, which told them they were never too old for love. After that, there was a round of dream interpretation, though Manfred figured cynically that most of the dreams had been constructed well after the sleep session. If there was anyone approaching Fiji’s talent there that night, Manfred could not detect it. Since he always watched the money flow, he’d noticed right away that Fiji kept a pretty blue bowl on the counter, and he also noticed all the women dropped twenty dollars in it discreetly before they paraded out the door, chattering excitedly about astral projections and ley lines.

Fiji stood on her porch smiling after them, pleased with the evening and with herself, as far as Manfred could tell.

“Was that a typical class?” Manfred asked, making sure his tone was polite and respectful.

Possibly he hadn’t succeeded, because Fiji looked a bit taken aback.

“I would say so,” she said. “You got a true reading, didn’t you?”

“I had a vision,” he said, reluctantly. “At least, I guess it was a vision.”

“Tell me about it, if it wasn’t too personal.”

“It wasn’t personal at all. It was a message for someone else.” He described the brief scene. When Fiji heard about Aubrey’s corpse talking, she shuddered.

“Do you think I should tell him?” Manfred asked.

“Of course,” Fiji said immediately. But she looked anything but happy. “If you have a true vision, you should tell the person involved. He’ll be glad to hear that . . . if he believes you.”

“People mostly believe what they want to,” Manfred observed. “My whole business is based on that principle. How do you square this class with that piece of truth?”

Fiji’s round face was sad, and Manfred felt at once as though he’d kicked a puppy. After a moment, she returned to the easy chair she’d occupied during the “class.” She crossed her legs, and her boot-clad foot swung back and forth. “It’s like teaching ballet,” she said. “Or piano.” She looked very serious.

Manfred laughed. “You mean, ninety-nine percent of the students have no aptitude at all, but you keep doing it for the one student who has talent?”

“Exactly,” she said. She thought that over and nodded some more. “Plus, it gives them something to do, something to think about besides the here and now. That’s not a bad thing, either.”

“You sound like they were all fuzzy kittens,” Manfred said. “Don’t you ever worry about them doing harm with what you’re teaching them?”

“Meditation? Planchette work? Dream interpretation?”

“Witchcraft? Spells? Blood magic?”

“I don’t teach them that,” Fiji said indignantly.

“But it’s the next step. They’ll look at your books, ask you questions about your own spells, your own beliefs, and next thing you know . . .”