It had been window dressing, the pony rented for George, I was sure. We were supposed to think they were a typically happy farm family. But how did Mrs. Reddy know we were coming the day we arrived from the East? The real estate agent in Ashland could have phoned her, but that wouldn’t have given her much time to arrange for the pony. I should have asked the boy what time of the day the pony had been delivered.

Still, no phone call might have been necessary. If she could make me think I was Margaret Dorn, she could easily have telepathic powers as well. And, on the plus side, if Mrs. Reddy was responsible, then I wasn’t crazy after all.

It seemed all the more urgent now that I find the remains of Margaret Dorn and the General. Whether or not Mrs. Reddy could use them in some supernatural way, if she believed she could use them, then they had better be destroyed before something worse happened to Duff or me.

By the time I reached home, however, I was in a state of terror and incapable of searching for anything. I ran from the car without even closing the door, went into the house and up the stairs, refusing to answer any of Jack’s questions, and locked myself in my room.

I heard him hobbling up the stairs around noon. He knocked on my door and then went back downstairs again. After a while I opened the door and found a cup of tea and a cheese sandwich on a tray. I made a deliberate effort to eat the sandwich and drink the tea, using my right hand, but it was impossible. My left hand kept grabbing the cup and the sandwich and I was powerless to stop it. After a while I quit fighting it.

I went to the mirror occasionally to see who I was, but I remained Maggie Caine, at least in appearance, for the rest of the day. (I brushed my hair several times, using my left hand, and remembered that I had been doing it that way for several days.) When they returned from school Duff and Franny came to my door, but I ignored all their rappings and pleadings.

That night I became Margaret Dorn again in body. I didn’t have to look in the mirror to know it. My face became longer, my cheekbones more pronounced, my breasts swelled, and my fingers became thinner and more tapered. And the General came to me again.

In the morning I was awakened by Jack hammering on my door. He was yelling, “Get up, Maggie! You have a visitor!”

I found my watch on the dresser. It was nine-­thirty. I calculated that I had slept fourteen hours or more. I hadn’t done that in years—not since college, and then only after a couple of all-­night pre-­exam sessions.