The Key to Midnight

future you will slip into a deep trance upon hearing me speak just two words: "dancing butterflies." '
        'Dancing butterflies,' Joanna repeated, at his request.
        The psychiatrist brought her slowly back from the past to the present, used the remote control to tilt her chair into the full upright position, and then woke her.
        Outside, when Alex and Joanna left Inamura's building, the day had grown colder. The huffing wind seemed like a living presence, pulling and shoving with malicious intent.
        As they walked toward Joanna's Lexus, a large black-and-yellow cat scurried along the gutter. It jumped the curb to the sidewalk, directly into their path, glanced warily at them, and then dashed down a set of shadow-filled basement steps. Alex was glad for the touch of yellow in its coat.
        'Dancing butterflies,' Joanna said.
        'You find that curious?'
        'I find it very Japanese. Dancing butterflies. Such a lovely, delicate image to be associated with a grim business like this.'
        The afternoon was giving way to evening. The low clouds were as dark as slate, and the sky looked too hard to be the home of any but malevolent gods.

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    36
        
        Twenty-four hours later. Saturday afternoon.
        The myna climbed the curved walls of its cage, and from time to time its talons plucked a reverberant note from the brass, which to Alex sounded like a piano wire snapping under too much tension.
        'Dancing butterflies,' said Omi Inamura.
        Joanna's eyes fluttered and closed. Her breathing changed. She went limp in the big reclining chair.
        With great skill, the psychiatrist took her back through the years until she was once again deep in the past, in the room that stank of antiseptics and disinfectants.
        'There is a window in that room, isn't there, Joanna?' Inamura asked.
        'Yes. One.'
        'Is the blind open?'
        'Yes.'
        The doctor hesitated, then asked. 'What do you see beyond that window?'
        'Tension, apprehension, and dissension have begun.'
        Inamura opened a copy of the Japanese edition of The Demolished Man, one page of which he had marked with a blue silk ribbon. Joanna had recited the last line of the jingle that was an integral part of Bester's story. Inamura read aloud the next to last line, hoping that it would prove to be the answering sentence - if there was such a thing. ' "Tenser, said the Tensor." '
        Although the doctor had not asked a question, Joanna responded. 'Tension, apprehension, and dissension have begun.'
        ' "Tenser, said the Tensor." '
        Joanna did not respond this time.
        Inamura leaned forward in his armchair. 'You are in the room that smells of alcohol… ammonia. You're strapped to the bed.'
        'Yes.'
        'There is a window. An open window. What do you see beyond the window, Joanna?'
        'The roof of a house,' she said without hesitation. 'It's a mansard roof. Black slate. No windows in it. I can see two brick chimneys.'
        'By God, it worked!' Alex said.
        'I got the Bester novel last evening,' Inamura said, 'and read it in a single sitting. It's engrossing science fiction. Do you remember what happens to the killer at the end of the novel?'
        'He's caught by the telepathic police,' Alex said.
        'Yes. Caught in spite of all his cleverness. And after they apprehend him, rather than imprison or execute him, they "demolish" the man. They tear down his psyche, wipe out his memory. They remove every twist and quirk that made it possible for him to commit murder. Then they reconstruct him as a model citizen. They make an entirely new person out of him.'
        'So in some ways it's similar to Joanna's experience. Except that she's an innocent victim.'
        'Some things that were science fiction thirty years ago are fact today. For better or worse.'
        'I've never doubted that modern brainwashing techniques could produce a total identity change,' Alex said. 'I just want to know why the hell it was done to Joanna.'
        'Perhaps we'll find the answer today,' the psychiatrist said. He faced his patient again. 'What else do you see beyond the window, Joanna?'
        'Just the sky.'
        'Do you know what city you're in?'
        'No.'
        'What country?'
        'No.'
        'Let's talk about the people who visit you in that room. Are there many of them?'
        'A