It dawned on David Caul that they were all talking about what was going to be happening at that trial on Monday. It was his impression that here was a meeting of the minds about the scenario of that trial. Gary and Judy agreed that the victims’ names be deleted from the record. What remained was to determine what would happen to Billy if Judge Flowers found him not guilty by reason of insanity.

Gary rose and said, “We have Dr. Caul here from Athens. He has had experience in treating patients with multiple personalities at the Athens Mental Health Center, a state facility, and he was highly recommended by both Dr. Ralph Allison in California and Dr. Cornelia Wilbur in Kentucky, who themselves are recognized experts in this area of psychiatry.”

Caul found all eyes suddenly focused on him. Judge Flowers asked, “Dr. Caul, would you accept him for treatment?” Something suddenly triggered his alarm instinct. He decided that all these people were passing along a hot potato and he had better clarify his position.

“Yes, I’ll take him,” Caul said. “But if he comes to Athens, I want to be able to treat him in the same manner that I’ve treated other multiples, in an open—and the most therapeutic—setting we have.” He looked around at the others who were watching him, then back at Flowers and Metcalf, and said emphatically, “And if I can’t do, that, don’t send him.”

When he looked around, he saw all heads nodding.

As he drove back to Athens, Dr. Caul mulled over what he had seen and heard at the meeting, and it occurred to him that almost everyone there, even the prosecutor Yavitch, accepted the fact that Milligan was a multiple personality. He knew that if it went at the trial as it seemed to be going at that meeting, Milligan was about to become the first multiple personality charged with major crimes ever to be declared not guilty by reason of insanity. He realized the meeting he had just attended foreshadowed the making of legal and psychiatric history on Monday in that courtroom.

(2)

When Billy Milligan awoke on December 4, the morning they were to take him from the Columbus Ohio Psychiatric Hospital back to the Franklin County Courthouse, and looked into the mirror, he was startled to see that his mustache was gone. But he didn't remember shaving it and he wondered who had done it. The mustache had been shaved off between the first and second rapes, and he had grown it back. Now he had lost time again. He had the same odd sensation he had known in those last days at Harding and in the Franklin County Jail— that somehow Ragen and Arthur had stood apart, and they couldn’t or wouldn’t fuse until they were sure he wouldn’t be sent to prison. Well, he was partially fused, enough to stand trial.

He would continue to answer to the name Billy, though he knew he was neither the core Billy nor a completely fused Billy. He was somewhere in between. He wondered, as they walked to the police van, what it would feel like if he was ever completely fused.