“Don’t be fatalistic, love. If there’s a problem, there’s an answer—and there’s plenty of time. All the time in the world…”

“Did you bring me a newspaper?”

“Yes. This will keep you caught up. There’s been a quick war in Africa, and a new presidential candidate has come onto the scene.”

“Please love me.”

“I do.”

“No, I know that. Make love to me.”

They smiled at her fear of certain words, and then he undressed and made love to her.

Then, after, there came a moment of truth, and he said, “Laura, I have to tell you the way it is. We’re nowhere yet, but I have the best neurological minds in the world working on your problem. There’s been one other case like yours since I locked you away—that is, since you came to stay here—and he’s dead already. But they have learned something from him and they will continue to learn. I’ve brought you a new medicine.”

“Will we spend Christmas together?” she asked. “If you wish.”

“So be it.”

And so it was.

He came to her at Christmastime, and together they decorated the tree and opened presents.

“Hell of a Christmas with no snow,” she said.

“Such language—and from a lady!”

But he brought her snow and a Yule log and his love.

“I’m awful,” she said. “I can’t stand myself sometimes. You’re doing everything you can and nothing happens, so I harass you. I’m sorry.”

She was five feet seven inches in height and had black hair. Black? So black as to be almost blue, and her lips were a pink and very special pair of cold shell-coral things. Her eyes were a kind of dusk where there are no clouds and the day sets off the blue with its going. Her hands shook whenever she gestured, which was seldom.

“Laura,” he told her, “even as we sit here, they work. The answer, the cure, will come to pass—in time.”

“I know.”

“You wonder, though, whether it will be time enough. It will. You’re virtually standing still while everything outside races by. Don’t worry. Rest easy. I’ll bring you back.”