Rachaela looked at him and their eyes met. Dust still lay upon the vivid brightness of Eric's black eyes. No change. No older and no younger.

"I'm afraid of you, still," Rachaela said.

"Yes. That will go."

"Will it?"

"Time," he said.

"Oh, time. It doesn't heal. It spoils. Can it do anything good?"

"There's no choice," he said, "but to continue, and see."

"Adamus found another option. He hanged himself."

"But you," he said, "have not."

Out in the garden, Rachaela guided the two cats. They investigated every bush and stem, and Jacob arrogantly sprayed, marking a territory he did not realize was soon to be altered. Apparently the new flat had access to a garden below. She was planning for the cats as for herself. What they would eat and the freedoms they would need. This was helpful. She was not quite alone, for now she did not want to be. She partly feared it.

Among the windy, bare and acorn-colored oaks, she met Miranda walking with Tray.

Miranda was the young woman in her filmy dress, and Tray an elderly lady dressed in black. They moved hand in hand, so that Miranda could support Tray. In Tray's other arm was held close a brand-new bright golden lion, a wonderful velvet beast, with mane and tufted tail, and sherry eyes that sparkled. An old woman with a toy lion.

"There is Rachaela," said Miranda.

Tray smiled at Rachaela. She was innocent.

She had gone quite insane, so much must be obvious, but, like Ruth, she was not to be handed over to any authority, not even to her own mother, to whom the body of the fat brown dead man had been returned, smoothly by night.

"Tray has a new name we're trying," said Miranda. "Tell Rachaela."

"Terentia," said Tray. She smiled again and seemed pleased. She raised the lion and kissed it like biting a golden fruit.

"It's an old Roman name," said Miranda. "Ah, look." And she bent down to stroke Juliet. Still linked by hand, Tray or Terentia too, bent down. She tucked the lion under her chin and stroked Jacob who hurried up to be included.

The wind blew savagely against the garden, and the trees creaked like the masts of a ship.

Time… The world, a ship upon the seas of centuries, passed on.

Althene did not come to say good-bye again. Rachaela had anyway locked her door. She sat between the cats and the sunset began, cold red under a dome of alcoholic violet.

The helicopter dropped from the sky.

Out of the opened window of her unlit room, Rachaela saw the camp of bikers raise their heads to see. Two of the men got up, shouting and excited. Lou was there, in creased black rubber, and Camillo, just visible, the white dreadlocks, not turning to look.