The Mask

excess baggage. I’ll go wherever you take me, whenever you take me.”
    Carol shook her head. “Just last week, when Mr. O’Brian said we were compulsive overachievers, we made up our minds to change our ways, didn’t we? We’ve got to learn to make time for leisure and not let our work encroach on that.”
    “You’re right,” Paul said. “But just this once—”
    He broke off in midsentence because he saw that Carol was determined. She was rarely intractable, but when she did decide not to compromise on. an issue, she was about as movable as Gibraltar. He sighed. “Okay. You win. We’ll leave tomorrow morning. I’ll just bring along the typewriter and the manuscript. I can finish the scene up at the cabin and—”
    “Nothing doing,” Carol said, emphasizing each word by tapping her spoon against her ice cream dish.
    “If you bring it along, you won’t stop when you’ve reached the end of the scene you’re working on. You’ll keep going. You know you will. Having the typewriter within easy reach will just be too much of a temptation. You won’t be able to resist it. The whole vacation will go down the drain.”
    “But I just can’t put that scene on hold for ten days,” he said pleadingly. “By the time I get back to it, the tone and the spontaneity will be lost.”
    Carol ate a spoonful of spumoni and said, “All right. Here’s what we’ll do. Jane and I will leave for the mountains first thing in the morning, just as we planned. You stay here, finish your scene, and then drive up to join us whenever you’re ready.”
    He frowned. “I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”
    “Why not?”
    “Well, is it really wise for the two of you to go up there alone? I mean, the summer season is over. Theme aren’t going to be many campers in the woods now, and most of the other cabins will be deserted.”
    “For heaven’s sake,” Carol said, “there’s no Abominable Snowman lurking around in those mountains, Paul. We’re in Pennsylvania, not Tibet.” She smiled. “It’s nice to know you’re so concerned about us, darling. But we’ll be perfectly safe.”
     
----
     
    Later, after Jane had gone to bed, Paul made one last attempt to change Carol’s mind, although he knew the effort would be wasted.
    He leaned against the frame of the closet door and watched as Carol selected clothes for the suitcases.
    “Listen, be straight with me, okay?”
    “Aren’t I always? Straight about what?”
    “The girl. Is there any chance she’s dangerous?”
    Carol turned from the clothes rack and stared at him, obviously surprised by his question. “Jane? Dangerous? Well, a girl as pretty as she is will probably break a lot of hearts over the years. And if cuteness could kill, she’d leave the streets littered with bodies behind her.”
    He refused to be amused. “I don’t want you to be flippant about this. I think it’s important. I want you to give it careful thought.”
    “I don’t need to give it a lot of thought, Paul. She’s lost her memory, sure. But she’s a stable, mentally healthy kid. In fact, it takes an amazingly stable personality to handle amnesia the way she’s handled it. I don’t know that I’d do half as well if I were in her shoes right now. I’d either be a nervous wreck or sunk neck-deep in depression. She’s resilient, flexible. Resilient and flexible people aren’t dangerous.”
    “Never?”
    “Hardly ever. It’s the rigid ones who crack.”
    “But after what’s happened in your therapy sessions with her, isn’t it reasonable to wonder about what she might be capable of doing?” he asked.
    “She’s a tortured girl. I believe she’s been through a truly terrifying experience, something so awful that she refuses to relive it, even under hypnosis. She obfuscates, misdirects, and holds back vital information, but that doesn’t mean she’s the least bit dangerous. Just scared. It seems evident to me that she was the victim of either physical or psychological violence at some time in her life. The victim, Paul, not the perpetrator.”
    She carried a few pairs of jeans to the suitcases that were open on the bed.
    Paul followed her. “Are you going to continue her therapy while you’re at the cabin?”
    “Yes. I think it’s best to keep chipping away at the Wall of confusion she’s thrown up.”
    “No fair.”
    “Huh?”
    “That’s work,” he said. “I’m not allowed to take my work up to the cabin, but you’re going to work. That’s a double standard, Dr. Tracy.”
    “Double standard, my ass, Dr. Tracy. I’ll need only half an hour a day for Jane’s