Oxford Town.

That produced a faint chord of recognition far back in Eddie’s mind. She said the words in a kind of rhythm that he for some reason associated with Henry . . . Henry and wet diapers. Why? What? Didn’t matter now.

“You’re trying to tell me you think this is all some sort of dream you’re having while you’re unconscious?”

“Or in a coma,” she said. “And you needn’t look at me as though you thought it was preposterous, because it isn’t. Look here.”

She parted her hair carefully on the left, and Eddie could see she wore it to one side not just because she liked the style. The old wound beneath the fall of her hair was scarred and ugly, not brown but a grayish-white.

“I guess you’ve had a lot of hard luck in your time,” he said.

She shrugged impatiently. “A lot of hard luck and a lot of soft living,” she said. “Maybe it all balances out. I only showed you because I was in a coma for three weeks when I was five. I dreamed a lot then. I can’t remember what the dreams were, but I remember my mamma said they knew I wasn’t going to die just as long as I kept talking and it seemed like I kept talking all the time, although she said they couldn’t make out one word in a dozen. I do remember that the dreams were very vivid.”

She paused, looking around.

“As vivid as this place seems to be. And you, Eddie.”

When she said his name his arms prickled. Oh, he had it, all right. Had it bad.

“And him.” She shivered. “He seems the most vivid of all.”

“We ought to. I mean, we are real, no matter what you think.”

She gave him a kind smile. It was utterly without belief.

“How did that happen?” he asked. “That thing on your head?”

“It doesn’t matter. I’m just making the point that what has happened once might very well happen again.”

“No, but I’m curious.”

“I was struck by a brick. It was our first trip north. We came to the town of Elizabeth, New Jersey. We came in the Jim Crow car.”

“What’s that?”

She looked at him unbelievingly, almost scornfully. “Where have you been living, Eddie? In a bombshelter?”

“I’m from a different time,” he said. “Could I ask how old you are, Odetta?”

“Old enough to vote and not old enough for Social Security.”

“Well, I guess that puts me in my place.”

“But gently, I hope,” she said, and smiled that radiant smile which made his arms prickle.

“I’m twenty-three,” he said, “but I was born in 1964—the year you were living in when Roland took you.”

“That’s rubbish.”

“No. I was living in 1987 when he took me.”

“Well,” she said after a moment. “That certainly adds a great deal to your argument for this as reality, Eddie.”

“The Jim Crow car . . . was it where the black people had to stay?”