He went to the daybed, a place where he had Slept many times, and lay down. He closed his eyes. At first there was bone-tired relief. Again he did not Sleep. Instead, bright geometrical shapes began to appear before his eyes. These resolved into burning images of Miriam’s face, of Miriam standing over him during the agonizing time of his transformation.

His eyes opened almost of their own accord. Other faces had been about to replace Miriam’s.

The sound of a raging crowd evaporated into the soft morning air. Where, after all, do the dead go? Nowhere, as Miriam said—or is there a world beyond life, a world of retribution?

“You can’t blame me,” he growled.

He was surprised to hear a voice answer.“I’m not! You can’t help it if they forgot!” Alice.

John turned his head. She stood frowning, her violin case in her hand. She was here for her music lesson. Her odor, rich beyond description, poured into the room. “Good morning,” John said as he clambered to a sitting position on the side of the daybed.

“I do music with the Blaylocks at ten. But they’re gone.”

She did not recognize him.

“Yes, yes—they had some kind of a bank meeting. They told me—told me to tell you.”

“You must be the Vienna Philharmonic musician. My dad told me about you.”

He got to his feet, went to her, bowed. He dared not touch her, dared not even brush his hand against her. The hunger had become an inferno the instant he had caught scent of her. He had never experienced so much concentrated need, had never wanted anything so badly.

“Are you a regular with the Vienna Philharmonic?”

“Yes.” His hands shook, he clutched them together to keep from grabbing her.

“What’s your instrument?”

Careful here. He couldn’t say cello because she might ask him to play. It was completely beyond his capacity in this condition. “I play—french horn.” There, that was good.

“Heck, I was hoping you were strings.” She looked at him with her soft, intense eyes. “Strings are a lot of fun. They’re hard, though. Do you have your horn?”

“No—no, I prefer it does not travel. The tone, you know.”

She glanced away. “Are you all right?” she asked in a small voice.

“Of course,” he said. But he did not feel all right, he felt like splitting her in two.

“You look so old.” Her voice was low and hesitant. The knuckles of the hand gripping the violin case were white.

John tried to lick his lips, realized that they were stretched dry. The faces of other children swam into his memory. Miriam had insisted he take them when he was a beginner because they were easier. In those days homeless, unknown children were commonplace.