example—reveal themselves to me by a quality in the odor of the victim’s skin. Warned, I abstain. When I do fall ill, as occasionally happens, I withdraw to some place where I can heal undisturbed. A doctor’s attentions would be more dangerous to me than any disease.”
Eyes on the path below, he continued calmly, “You can see by looking at me that there are no obvious clues to my unique nature. But believe me, an examination of any depth by even a half-sleeping medical practitioner would reveal some alarming deviations from the norm. I take pains to stay healthy, and I seem to be gifted with an exceptionally hardy constitution.”
Fantasies of being unique and physically superior; take him to the other pole. “I’d like you to try something now. Will you put yourself into the mind of a man you contact in the Ramble and describe your encounter with him from his point of view?”
He turned toward her and for some moments regarded her without expression. Then he resumed his surveillance of the path. “I will not. Though I do have enough empathy with my quarry to enable me to hunt efficiently, I must draw the line at erasing the necessary distance that keeps prey and predator distinct.
“And now I think our ways part for today.” He stood up, descended the hillside, and walked beneath some low-canopied trees, his tall back stooped, toward the Seventy-Second Street entrance of the park.
Floria arose more slowly, aware suddenly of her shallow breathing and the sweat on her face. Back to reality or what remained of it. She looked at her watch. She was late for her next client.
Floria couldn’t sleep that night. Barefoot in her bathrobe she paced the living room by lamplight. They had sat together on that hill as isolated as in her office—more so, because there was no Hilda and no phone. He was, she knew, very strong, and he had sat close enough to her to reach out for that paralyzing touch to the neck—
Just suppose for a minute that Weyland had been brazenly telling the truth all along, counting on her to treat it as a delusion because on the face of it the truth was inconceivable.
Jesus, she thought, if I’m thinking that way about him, this therapy is more out of control than I thought. What kind of therapist becomes an accomplice to the client’s fantasy? A crazy therapist, that’s what kind.
Frustrated and confused by the turmoil in her mind, she wandered into the workroom. By morning the floor was covered with sheets of newsprint, each broadly marked by her felt-tipped pen. Floria sat in the midst of them, gritty-eyed and hungry.
She often approached problems this way, harking back to art training: turn off the thinking, put hand to paper and see what the deeper, less verbally sophisticated parts of the mind have to offer. Now that her dreams had deserted her, this was her only access to those levels. The newsprint sheets were covered with rough representations of Weyland’s face and form. Across several of them were scrawled words: “Dear Doug, your vampire is fine, it’s your ex-therapist who’s off the rails. Warning: therapy can be dangerous to your health. Especially if you are the therapist. Beautiful vampire, awaken to me. Am I really ready to take on a legendary monster? Give up—refer this one out. Do your job—work is a good doctor.”
That last one sounded pretty good, except that doing her job was precisely what she was feeling so shaky about these days.
Here was another message: “How come this attraction to someone so scary?” Oh ho, she thought, is that a real feeling or an aimless reaction out of the body’s early-morning hormone peak? You don’t want to confuse honest libido with mere biological clockwork.
Deborah called. Babies cried in the background over the Scotch Symphony. Nick, Deb’s husband, was a musicologist with fervent opinions on music and nothing else.
“We’ll be in town a little later in the summer,” Deborah said, “just for a few days at the end of July. Nicky has this seminar-convention thing. Of course, it won’t be easy with the babies … I wondered if you might sort of coordinate your vacation so you could spend a little time with them?”
Baby-sit, that meant. Damn. Cute as they were and all that, damn! Floria gritted her teeth. Visits from Deb were difficult. Floria had been so proud of her bright, hard-driving daughter, and then suddenly Deborah had dropped her studies and rushed to