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"Quite wise of you," I said, and patted her shoulder as I
passed. I was growing as fond of Edna as I was of her son, and that
was saying a good deal. "I'll go on back there with them and see
what they're doing. I have some questions for both of them anyway.
Oh, and Edna?"

"Yes, Fremont?"

"Did anything come up while I was gone that needs my attention
before five o'clock?" I estimated it was probably about
four-thirty, and even as I did so, the chiming clock in the hall
landing gave the one chime with which it marks the half hour. I had
become quite good at telling time without a watch.

"No, not a thing. You folks need more work, and that's a fact.
My Aloysius, he's out doing something of his own for no pay, he
says. Course, it's not as if he's likely to starve without-what's
that you call them, cases-but still when he was in the PD they
always did have something to do."

"I know, believe me." I also took that mild criticism like a
blow to the heart. I cared far too much whether the J&K Agency
succeeded or not, and so-probably unwisely-instead of just putting
what Edna had said away in some mental filing cabinet, I explained:
"Michael Kossoff, the other partner, is away at the moment. I don't
believe you've ever met him?"

Edna folded her arms and rocked back and forth a little in her
chair. "Can't say as I have, no. But Aloysius has told me about him
plenty of times. Admires him. Wants to be like him, to e-moo-late
him. Hah!"

"He could do worse," I said rather grimly . . . because I knew
all too well that, with his particular temperament, Wish Stephenson
could also do better. Wish is basically a sunny person while
Michael has moods, and a black streak a mile wide.

I got lost in amorphous thoughts of my complex life-and-work
partner for a moment, but soon recalled myself. "At any rate, one
of Michael's contributions to the business, aside from bankrolling
it single-handedly and volunteering his time as consultant, is that
he goes out and recruits business through his personal contacts.
When he returns from his current trip, I'm sure he'll bring some
new work with him."

I wasn't sure of any such thing but felt a need to appease Edna.
To prepare the way for her to like Michael, since I didn't want to
lose her.

"Oh, and Edna-" I began but then I stopped myself. I had been
about to tell her of my plan to use my current case to get us some
newspaper publicity, but I thought better of it. I wasn't ready yet
to have anyone else know that but me. So I changed in midstream,
rapidly, and went on: "Please feel free to lock up the front door
and go home a bit early. I'll look after Mr. Rule and Mrs. McFadden
now. We'll be fine."

Edna Stephenson cocked her head to one side and regarded me
skeptically, those round brown eyes of hers full of questions. But
then to my relief her expression cleared, she smiled and regained
her more habitual bounciness. Edna could bounce while remaining
attached to the seat of a chair better than any human being I had
ever known.

"That'd be nize," she said, "on account of I could stop in me
favorite market on the way home, get there a bit early, before the
crowd, maybe they'll have some fine lamb chops. Aloysius does love
a good lamb chop, and so do I, but you haveta get there early."

"By all means," I agreed. It did sound good; my own stomach
rumbled at the thought of lamb chops, and I realized that I hadn't
given thought to my own dinner at all. More evidence of missing
Michael, and how quickly all the patterns of one's life can become
entwined with another's.

Well, never mind. What was waiting in my kitchen had nothing to
do with lamb chops. I said a final good night to Edna and went on
back.

Halfway through the conference room I heard them, a low
murmuring exchange of voices, male and female, so soothing it was
like the ebb and flow of a quiet sea. The peacefulness, the quiet
tone, caused me to slow my steps, to listen all the harder, and to
proceed with care.

Whatever Edna Stephenson may have feared, it was not what I
found in my kitchen. I found a man and a woman so remarkably in
accord with one another that they seemed almost to be functioning
as two halves of one person.

Neither was aware of me. They were off in a land of their own,
whose boundaries, I imagined, might be fragile. So I hung back just
beyond the door. From there, I could see both Frances and Patrick
in profile; without turning their heads, they could not see me.

Patrick Rule seemed to be burning with quiet intensity-I could
almost feel it myself, as if it were through riding on his energy
that Frances was able to do whatever it was she was doing. Though
he stared raptly at her face, her eyes were closed, and her face
was . . . incandescent.

He murmured, but by listening intently now I could just make out
the words: "Tell me, describe for me, dear Frances, the place where
you are now."

Long exhalation of breath, like an endless sigh, then Frances
said, "I am walking down a street, it's very flat. The street is
broad, and there are trees on both sides, huge old trees-are they
oaks?-whatever they are, their branches meet overhead and turn this
street into a kind of leafy tunnel."

Another long sigh.

"Continue, my dear," said Patrick, positively yearning toward
her. "And tell me, if you can, why you are on this street, and if
you know it, the name of the city you are in."

A single faint frown line appeared between Frances's brows.
"There is someone here who needs . . . diagnosis. A woman who is
ill, in one of these houses."

"Tell me about the houses."

"They're old. They have long porches, all the way across the
front." A silence ensued, as if Frances were walking past one house
and then another. "Some of them have columns . . . others are not
quite so grand . . . but they all have the porches."

"A warm climate then. Southern perhaps?" Patrick suggested.

Frances, off in her own dream now, or whatever peculiar state
she was in, ignored this comment to continue her perusal of the
landscape: "All the houses have these fences made of wrought iron,
very nicely done, with spikes on top. This is . . . this is . . .
New Orleans." The line between her brows passed away.

I folded my arms and leaned against the wall. They had been at
this for at least an hour and a half, maybe longer, because I had
no way of knowing exactly when they'd arrived. I supposed Patrick
Rule was only continuing to do what he'd said he would do-
determining the nature and extent of Frances's psychic ability-so
how could I complain? Yet how walking around the streets of New
Orleans in one's mind, especially considering that it seemed to
take a considerable expenditure of energy on both their parts to
get and keep her there, could be of any help to anyone was beyond
me.

Benefit of the doubt, I told myself, benefit of the doubt.

Frances had now found the house wherein the person needed her to
diagnose something. As far as I knew, Frances had never diagnosed
anything more than an overcooked egg in her entire life. So I
nearly fell through the carpet when she exhaled another of her long
sighs and then said:

"The patient is here, a woman named . . . Jean."

I leaned away from the wall and looked again through the door.
Frances had spread wide the fingers of both hands and was holding
them palms down about six inches above the surface of the table.
Patrick had pulled back to give her room. With her eyes still
closed, Frances moved her hands back and forth in small circular
motions made with agonizing slowness.

She said, "Jean has a tumor in her abdominal cavity." More slow
motion of hands and fingers. "It is located in the lower right
quadrant. The appendix is absent in this person." Small frown. She
turned her head just slightly, as if she were listening to
something or someone she could hear a little better that way. "The
appendix was removed when Jean was sixteen years old. She is thirty
now. If this tumor is not surgically removed, Jean will die because
it will grow so large as to obstruct bowel function. In itself, the
tumor is not life-threatening, in other words it is not cancerous.
But due to its size the tumor must be removed because it is
functionally dangerous. That is the end of the information
available for Jean,"

"Good!" Patrick declared, in much more his normal tone of voice.
"Remarkably good, Frances. You've done extraordinarily well."

Frances opened her eyes and smiled at him, but she did not
really return to anything like normal consciousness. She was
herself, and not herself. It was exceedingly strange, and now I
knew why Edna had been so upset.

Patrick turned his head and saw me. Rather than be startled, or
resent the interruption, he seemed genuinely pleased. "Fremont, do
come in. Sit down with us at the table and let me tell you all that
Frances and I have done this afternoon, building on some work we
began a couple of days ago. Frances, say hello to Fremont."

I joined them at the table, on the side opposite the door; and
as I sat down I remembered another round table where Frances and
Patrick and I had all sat; at the head of that table, although
properly speaking a round table cannot have a head, had sat a
medium now dead: Abigail Locke. And Abigail's faithful servant
Patrick had found himself a new . . . what?

"Hello, Fremont," Frances said. She smiled, but the smile was
vacant, without warmth. Yet she seemed so serene, so peaceful. Her
eyes did not connect with mine, though she turned them on me for a
moment. They did connect with Patrick Rule; as soon as her roving
eye had found him again, her face lit up (again) like a Christmas
tree.

I looked a question at Patrick, not knowing how to ask it in
Frances's presence.

He understood the question I hadn't asked, and he answered: "We
have discovered that Frances McFadden is a natural somnambulist. I
have become her mesmerist. We work together; this type of work
requires the combined energies of both. This afternoon we have done
some remarkable things together."

I'm sure, I thought. But I asked, "Such as . . . ?"

"Traveling clairvoyance-in this case, the diagnosis of illness
and prescribing of treatment by seeing at a distance. Also simple
clairvoyance, and some telepathy. The telepathy works extremely
well, extremely; I can't thank you enough, Fremont Jones, for
bringing Frances McFadden into my life."

"Yes, thank you, Fremont," Frances said, with that eerie,
disconnected smile.

"We're going to work together, it's perfect," Patrick declared
enthusiastically.

"I beg your pardon?" I said. "I don't think Jeremy McFadden is
very likely to allow that. He wouldn't have two weeks ago, I can
say that for certain."

"Oh, I'm not worried about that," Patrick said dismissively.
"With a talent as big as hers, the spirits themselves will find a
way. Doors will open, you'll see."

"No doubt," I said dryly. I expected him to say next something
about money being required to open doors. He did not disappoint me.
He said:

"Of course, there will be expenses in getting her set up.
Therefore I'll be dispensing with your detective services, Fremont
Jones. Effective immediately."

I was stunned. This could not be happening. My first big case,
for which I had done so much extra work, and which could get
J&K the publicity we so much needed . . .
No!

I did the only thing I could think of to do. It was a drastic
remedy, but I was desperate. I focused on Frances, until she turned
and focused equally on me. Then I said, "Frances, what does Emperor
Norton think about all this? About your becoming a
somnambulist?"

There came Frances's little frown again, and this time it
deepened. Patrick Rule looked at me with wide eyes, his whole face
having, it seemed, turned into a question mark. Frances's eyes
began to clear, and she looked at me as if she recognized me, as if
she were herself again. She blinked a couple of times, sat up a
little straighter, and said in her usual tone of voice: "Emperor
Norton? I forgot all about him! Imagine that."

YOU HAVE to let her go," I said quietly, so that only Patrick
Rule could hear. My right hand on his shoulder restrained him from
following Frances. I could feel the tension in his body, longing to
follow as surely as a dog must follow its master. I was wondering
which one of these two people held the other in thrall.

Frances ran lightly down J&K's front steps to Divisadero
Street, and when she had reached the bottom she turned and waved.
"Patrick," she said, "you know how to get in touch with me. I just
need time to contact the Emperor, that's all. My first loyalty must
be to him, surely you can understand that? Why, without his
help

I could not have come this far. I wouldn't have known where to
begin."

"And he did give her a task to do," I murmured, again to Patrick
alone.