Marne waited patiently for her husband to go on. After a good minute, though, she wasn't sure he was going to. Creagon's eyes had that faraway look, as if he had left Marne in mind if not in body.

"You'd probably never believe that my sister was once as different from what she is now as night is from day, would you?" Creagon asked finally, his voice seeming to come from far, far away.

"How different?" Marne asked during another long pause that seemed to give indication that there was going to be no further interruptions from her husband.

"Oh… just different," Creagon said, noncommittally, seemingly coming back from wherever it had been that had momentarily claimed him.

But, Marne wasn't willing to leave it at that.

"You'd rather not talk about it, right?" Marne asked, figuring that was the best way to get things out if Creagon had any inclination whatsoever to carry the conversation further.

"Yea, maybe I'd better not talk about it," Creagon replied, a little sadly.

And Marne wasn't going to press the point further. She had learned long ago that you didn't get anything out of a man-especially out of Creagon-by prying it out. When Creagon was ready to let it come, it would flow out easily enough.

"I guess it's a bit painful, because I've always kind of blamed myself for what happened to my sister. Oh, not what happened," Creagon added quickly to correct a possibly misplaced emphasis, "but for what happened afterwards."

Marne waited. She hadn't really made heads or tails out of any of this yet; and, for one of the few times, she didn't really have any inkling.

There was another lengthy pause.

"When you and John were kids, did you ever… like… well… fool around with each other?"

Marne remembered that it had only been but a few minutes earlier that she had been remembering her rather inept attempt to seduce John.

"Funny you should mention that," Marne said with an accompanying laugh, "because, while at the window awhile ago, I was thinking of the time I tried to save John from a fate I thought was worse than death. My plan, of course, was to get him into bed with me."