To the nurse’s irritation, she insisted on waiting.

It was ten A.M. when Doctor Shaw stepped off the elevator, looking gloomy and determined. He barked at the supervising floor nurse, who objected to Adrienne following him through the heavy doors that gave entry to Ward A. Nearby, a bank of television monitors flickered with the images of a dozen, small, white rooms, each of which held a single person, none of whom were moving much.

“You know the regulations, Doctor—”

“You’re right,” Shaw told the nurse. “I do. And if we weren’t in a hurry, I’d transfer the patient to another room—but we don’t have time for that.”

We don’t? Adrienne thought.

“Well, if you’re going to violate protocol,” the nurse began, “I should think—”

“Why don’t you just make a report?” Shaw asked, striding away. “I’ll be releasing him in short order, anyway.”

“Releasing him? Mr. McBride isn’t in any condition—”

But Shaw wasn’t listening. He was walking so fast that Adrienne had to move at double-time, just to keep up with him.

All the rooms on the ward had large windows facing out on the corridor. The windows were made of the kind of glass that was embedded with a kind of chicken wire.

Shaw opened one of the doors, and stepped inside.

The room contained a built-in console with drawers against one wall and a bed against the other. A television was mounted on the wall facing the bed, and there was a video camera affixed to the ceiling. A small toilet in the corner. And that was that.

McBride lay in the bed, his head propped up on a pair of pillows, staring at a soap opera. He hadn’t moved when they entered the room, and now she saw that he couldn’t: his wrists were belted to the bed.

Adrienne was shocked. “Take those off!” she demanded, moving quickly to McBride’s side.

“Soon enough,” Shaw promised, gently lifting her hand from one of the restraints. Stepping closer, he laid a hand on McBride’s shoulder. “Lewis,” he said, “I want you to pay close attention to what I’m about to say.”

No reaction.

“It’s important,” the psychiatrist insisted, “and I’m worried that we don’t have a lot of time.”

Nothing from McBride—who looked as if he’d aged ten years since Adrienne had seen him, years in which he’d undergone some terrible ordeal. His face was drawn and his cheeks were covered with stubble. Hollow eyes that averted her own.

Frustrated, Adrienne reached up and snapped off the TV.

McBride turned his head toward her. “Thanks,” he said. “I hate that fucking show.”

Adrienne giggled, delighted to get a reaction—any reaction—from him. “Listen to me, Lewis,” Shaw demanded.

The patient shook his head, closed his eyes. “Let me alone, Doc.” His voice had all the resonance of a stone.

“I’m going to release you,” the psychiatrist announced.

It took a moment for the words to penetrate the insulation in which McBride had wrapped his understanding. Then his eyes blinked open, and he turned to Shaw with a sidelong glance.

“But you have to pay attention,” Shaw told him.

He was.

The psychiatrist cleared his throat.

“You didn’t do it!” Adrienne blurted. “You didn’t kill anybody.”

“Let me handle this,” Shaw insisted.

Adrienne put a hand on McBride’s cheek and, turning his head to her, looked him in the eyes. “No—I checked the papers. And it’s all a lie. There was nothing! No murder, no police—”

McBride shook his head. “I know what happened, kiddo. I know what I did.”

“But you’re wrong. You weren’t even married. There wasn’t any baby!” She paused. Should she tell him he was supposed to be dead? “It’s like Nikki,” she said. “They’ve given you one of these memories—”

“Who has?”

His question took her aback.

“Who has?” he repeated.

She didn’t know what to say. Looked to Shaw for help. Got none. Shrugged. “I don’t know,” she admitted. “Someone.”

McBride looked away. “I can feel it,” he told them. “I can feel the bat in my hands…”

“Lew,” Shaw began—

McBride turned back to Adrienne. “So, what you’re saying is: I’m just a screen for someone else’s projector.”

Adrienne weighed the metaphor. Shrugged. “Right,” she said.

McBride swung his eyes toward the psychiatrist. “Okay, let’s say you’re right. Then: what’s the point? Why would anyone want to make me think I killed my wife and child?” When Shaw frowned, McBride turned angrily to Adrienne. “What’s the point?” he repeated.

The question hung in the air, floating through the weird silence of that empty and sterile room. It was a good question, a tough question and, for a moment, Adrienne despaired of an answer. Then it came to her, and it was so simple. She cleared her throat. “So you’d kill yourself,” she said. “Like Nikki.”

Once the restraints had been removed, and McBride had seen the clipping from the Examiner, Shaw told him that “I want to put you in a trance.”

“No, thanks, Doc. Been there—done that. If you don’t mind…”

“There’s no way that I’m going to release you,” Shaw said, “until I’m certain you’re free of posthypnotic suggestions—whatever the source.”

McBride chewed on that, a defiant look in his eye.

“Let me be honest with you,” Shaw continued. “After what you’ve been through, it’s going to take a long time for you to get well. Under any other circumstances, I’d recommend counseling and therapy—and lots of it. He paused, and heaved a sigh. “But we don’t have that luxury. As Adrienne can tell you, I’ve been contacted by a government agency. They say they have ‘equities’ in the matter. That may be so. I don’t know. But what I do know is that they don’t have your best interests at heart. In fact, I got the distinct impression that they don’t care about you, at all.”

McBride thought about it. Finally, he asked, “And you think I’ve been given posthypnotic suggestions—”

“Absolutely! That’s why I was having such a helluva time getting through to you. Anytime you came close to your past—your real past—this brutal figment, this syndrome—would begin to surface. And when it did, you’d sense it and, psychologically, you’d start to panic. Fight or flight. It’s brilliant. They created a false memory so toxic that it gave you a built-in aversion to your real self.”

Even with the restraints removed, McBride remained where he was, in a sink of depression. “Maybe you’re right,” he said in a skeptical voice. “Then again, isn’t it more likely that I just got away with it?”

“No,” Adrienne exclaimed, her voice trembling with anger. “It isn’t more likely! You know somebody fucked with your head. Wake up! You didn’t kill Eddie, you didn’t blow up the house, you didn’t trash my apartment—”

“Who’s Eddie? “ Shaw asked, his voice thick with alarm.

Adrienne ignored him. “And you aren’t the one who’s trying to kill me.”

“Oh, Jesus—” Shaw muttered.

“So placing your bets on the ‘more likely’ explanation is kind of stupid, isn’t it?” she asked. Then she wrapped her arms around her body, turned away, and walked toward the opposite side of the room.

“Who’s Eddie?” Shaw asked.

“You don’t want to know,” Adrienne told him, her back to the psychiatrist. Suddenly, a thought occurred to her. “Wait a second,” she said, turning toward him. “I thought hypnosis was benign. And it was impossible to make hypnotized people do something that would cause harm. I heard you couldn’t make a person hurt anyone—let alone kill himself.”

“That’s a myth,” Shaw said, dismissing the idea. “PR from the hypnotism industry.” He gestured toward McBride. “Lewis can tell you all about it. He’s in the field.”

“What do you mean, it’s a myth?” Adrienne asked.

Shaw glanced at his watch, then ran his hand through his hair. “It’s all a question of context,” he explained.

“What context?” Adrienne asked.