I
could make her hold hot dishes without a whimper while serving us at
dinner, and make her wait while I talked to Harold. I've looked at her
hands afterward--"

Similarly he lived through the stories of Clara and Milly, Mary and
Ermengarde. He could not shut his own mind from hers, nor could he
close the slit, though it was within his power to widen it. Like some
foul medusa, or some pulpy carnivorous plant, her soul infolded and
clung to his, until it seemed almost that his was the prisoner. Not
symbiosis, but parasitism. "And there was Trudie. Trudie worshiped me. She was a big girl, slow
and a little stupid. She had come from a farm. She used to spend hours
on my clothes. I encouraged her in various ways, until everything about
me became sacred to Trudie. She lived for my little signs of favor. In
the end she would do anything for me, which was very amusing, because
she was very easily embarrassed and never lost her painfully acute
sense of shame--"

But now he was at the door of his house, and the unclean trickle of
thoughts ceased, and the slit narrowed to the tiniest watchful crack. He shepherded Mrs. Gunnison to the door of Tansy's dressing room. He
pointed at the form huddled on the blanket he had thrown across the
floor. It lay as he had left it, eyes closed, jaw lolling, breathing
heavily. "Take away what you have conjured into it," he commanded. There was a pause. A black spider crawled off Tansy's skirt and
scuttled across the blanket. Even as there came the thought, "That is
it," he lunged out and cracked it under his heel as it escaped onto the
flooring. He was aware of a half-cloaked comment, "Its soul sought the
nearest body. Now faithful King will go on no more errands for me. I
will have to find another dog." "Return what you have taken," he commanded. This time there was a longer pause. The slit closed entirely. The bound figure stirred, as if seeking to roll over. The lips moved. The slack jaw tightened. Conscious only of the black weight against his
mind, and of a sensory awareness so acute that he believed he could
hear the very beating of the heart in Tansy's body, he stooped and cut
the lashings, removed the carefully arranged paddings from wrists and
ankles. The head rolled restlessly from side to side. The lips seemed to be
saying, "Norman ... Norman--" The eyelids fluttered and he felt a
shiver go over the body. And then, in one sudden glorious flood, like
some flower blooming miraculously in an instant, expression surged
into the face, the limp hands caught at his shoulders, and from the
wide-open eyes a lucid, sane, fearless human soul peered up at his. Not for one instant after that wonderful relief could his mind hold the
repellent darkness pressing against it. And the swift lifting of that
darkness was a relief almost equal to the first. With one venomous, beaten glance, Mrs. Gunnison turned away. He could
hear her footsteps trail off, the front door open and shut. Then his
arms were around Tansy and his lips were against hers. XVI. Urgently she pushed him away from her eager lips. "We daren't be happy, Norm," she said. "We daren't be happy for one
single moment." A disturbed and apprehensive look clouded the longing in her eyes, as
if she had become conscious of a great wall shutting out the sunlight. When she answered his unspoken question, it was almost in a whisper, as
if even to mention the name might be dangerous. "Mrs. Carr--"

Her hands tightened on his arms, conveying to him in a physical way the
immediacy of their danger. "Norman, I'm frightened. I'm terribly frightened. For both of us. My
soul has learned so much. Things are different from what I thought. And
they're much worse." He took hold of her shoulders, straightened her up. "You're safe," he
told her, and there was a scowling strength in his face and his voice. "I've gotten you back, and I'm going to hold you. I've powers you don't
know about yet. They can never touch you again." "Oh, Norman," she began, dropping her eyes, conflicting emotions
evident in her expression, "I know how brave and clever you've been. Only I know the risks you've run, the sacrifices you've made for
me--wrenching your whole life away from rationality in the bare space
of a week, enduring of your own free will the beastliness of that
woman's naked thoughts which I was able to endure only because I was
forced to. And you have beaten Evelyn Sawtelle and Mrs. Gunnison fairly
and at their own game. But Mrs. Carr--" Her hands transmitted her
trembling to him. "Oh, Norman, she only _let_ you beat them. She
wanted to give them a fright, and she preferred to let you do it for
her. That's always her way. But now she'll take a hand herself." "I think you're exaggerating," he said slowly. "What you've gone
through was enough to finish you a dozen times. But ... we'll talk
about it. First I'll get a drink." And yet, he began to think, Tansy is not the sort to exaggerate. The
fact that she's gone through so much and come out so magnificently,
is itself a proof that she would not give way to unnecessary fears. He would have to watch himself. His physical weakness, coupled with
repugnance for what he had done, was liable to bias his judgment and
make him believe anything that promised peace and rest. He rubbed his
eyes and blinked them, shaking his head. Relief was making him relax
too much. He downed a stiff drink, and poured himself another. Better
go easy with that, though. Up to a point it would help, but then it
would be worse than nothing at all. Mrs. Carr, eh? He hadn't paid much attention to her. He'd even wondered
if she were concerned at all. Still, that might only mean exceptional
cunning. And yet she seemed such a silly old goat. But that might be
pretense. Tansy had been in a position to learn a lot. *       *       *       *       *

When he got back to the bedroom, Tansy had changed from her torn and
creased dress into one of white wool, which he had always liked very
much, but which she had not worn for some time. He remembered she had
told him that it had shrunk and become too small for her. But now he
sensed intuitively that, in the joy of her return, she took a naïve
pride in her youthful body and wanted to show it to best advantage. "It's like coming into a new house," she told him, with a quick little
smile that momentarily cut across her apprehensive look. "Or rather
like coming home after you've been away for a long time. You're very
happy, but everything is a little strange. It takes you a while to get
used to it." Now that she mentioned it, he realized that there was a kind of
uncertainty about her movements, gestures, and expressions, like a
person convalescent after a long sickness and just now able to get up
and about. She had combed out her hair so that it fell to her shoulders, and
she was still in her bare feet, giving her a diminutive and girlish
appearance that he found very attractive.