“Remember me, Terry,” the adolescent voice begged. “Stay clean, Terry… please, for God's sake stay clean…”

“Stop it! Stop it, you bastard!”

Now Johnny spoke in his own voice again. “It was speed, wasn't it? Then meth. She died of a heart attack at twenty-seven. But she wore it ten years, Rog. She remembered you. She never forgot. Never forgot… never

never… never.”

The medallion slipped from his fingers and struck the floor with a small, musical sound. Johnny stared away into emptiness for a moment, his face calm and cool and distant. Dussault grubbed at his feet for the medallion, sobbing hoarsely in the stunned silence.

A flashbulb popped, and Johnny's face cleared and became his own again. Horror touched it, and then pity. He knelt clumsily beside Dussault.

“I'm sorry,” he said. “I'm sorry, I didn't mean…

“You cheapjack, bastard hoaxer!” Dussault screamed at him. “It's a lie! All a lie! All a lie!” He struck Johnny a clumsy, open-handed blow on the neck and Johnny fell over, striking his head on the floor, hard. He saw stars.

Uproar.

He was dimly aware that Dussault was pushing his way blindly through the crowd and toward the doors. People milled around Dussault, around Johnny. He saw Dussault through a forest of legs and shoes. Then Weizak was beside him, helping him to sit up.

“John, are you all right? Did he hurt you?”

“Not as bad as I hurt him. I'm okay. “He struggled to his feet. Hands-maybe Weizak's, maybe someone else's -helped him. He felt dizzy and sick; almost revolted. This had been a mistake, a terrible mistake.

Someone screamed piercingly-the stout woman who had asked about the Democrats. Johnny saw Dussault pitch forward to his knees, grope at the sleeve of the stout woman's print blouse and then slide tiredly forward onto the tile near the doorway he had been trying to reach. The St. Christopher medal was still in one hand.

“Fainted,” someone said. “Fainted dead away. I'll be damned.”

“My fault,” Johnny said to Sam Weizak. His throat felt close and tight with shame, with tears. “All my fault.”

“No,” Sam said. “No, John.”

But it was. He shook loose of Weizak's hands and went to where Dussault lay, coming around now, eyes blinking dazedly at the ceiling. Two of the doctors had come over to where he lay.

“Is he all right?” Johnny asked. He turned toward the woman reporter in the slacksuit and she shrank away from him. A cramp of fear passed over her face.

Johnny turned the other way, toward the TV reporter who had asked him if he'd had any flashes before his accident. It suddenly seemed very important that he explained to someone. “I didn't mean to hurt him,” he said. “Honest to God, I never meant to hurt him. I didn't know…

The TV reporter backed up a step. “No,” he said. “Of course you didn't. He was asking for it, anybody could see that. Just… don't touch me, huh?”

Johnny looked at him dumbly, lips quivering. He was still in shock but beginning to understand. Oh yes. He was beginning to understand. The TV reporter tried to smile and could only produce a death's-head rictus.

“Just don't touch me, Johnny. Please.”

“It's not like that,” Johnny said-or tried to. Later, he was never sure if any sound had come out.

“Don't touch me, Johnny, okay?”

The reporter backed up to where his cameraman was packing his gear. Johnny stood and watched him. He began to shake all over.

“It's for your own good, John,” Weizak said. The nurse stood behind him, a white ghost, a sorcerer's apprentice with her hands hovering above the small, wheeled medication table, a junkie's paradise of sweet dreams.

“No,” Johnny said. He was still shaking, and now there was cold sweat as well. “No more shots. I've had it up to here with shots.”

“A pill, then.”

“No more pills, either.”

“To help you sleep.”

“Will he be able to sleep? That man Dussault?”

“He asked for it,” the nurse murmured, and then flinched as Weizak turned toward her. But Weizak smiled crookedly.

“She is right, nuh?” he said. “The man asked for it. He thought you were selling empty bottles, John. A good night's sleep and you'll be able to put this in perspective.”

“I'll sleep on my own.”

“Johnny, please.”

It was quarter past eleven. The TV across the room had just gone off. Johnny and Sam had watched the filmed story together; it had been second-lined right after the bills Ford had vetoed. My own story made better theater, Johnny thought with morbid amusement. Film footage of a bald-headed Republican mouthing platitudes about the national budget just didn't compare with the film clip that WABI camera man had gotten here earlier this evening. The clip had ended with Dussault plunging across the floor with his sister's medal clutched in his hand and then crashing down in a faint, clutching at the woman reporter the way a drowning man might clutch at a straw.

When the TV anchorman went on to the police dog and the four hundred pounds of pot, Weizak had left briefly and had come back with the news that the hospital switchboard had jammed up with calls for him even before the report was over. The nurse with the medication had shown up a few minutes later, leading Johnny to believe that Sam had gone down to the nurses” station to do more than check on incoming calls.

At that instant, the telephone rang.

Weizak swore softly under his breath. “I told them to hold them all. Don't answer it, John, I'll…

But Johnny already had it. He listened for a moment, then nodded. “Yes, that was right. “He put a hand over the receiver. “It's my dad,” he said. He uncovered the receiver. “Hi, Dad. I guess you… “He listened. The small smile on his lips faded and was replaced by an expression of dawning horror. His lips moved silently.

“John, what is it?” Weizak asked sharply.

“All right, Daddy,” Johnny said, almost in a whisper. “Yes. Cumberland General. I know where it is. Just above Jerusalem's Lot. Okay. All right Daddy…

His voice broke. His eyes were tearless but glistening.

“I know that, Daddy. I love you too. I'm sorry.

Listened.

“Yes. Yes it was,” Johnny said. “I'll see you, Daddy. Yes. Good-bye.”

He hung up the phone, put the heels of his hands to his eyes, and pressed.

“Johnny?” Sam leaned forward, took one of his hands away and held it gently. “Is it your mother?”

“Yeah. It's my mother.”

“Heart attack?”

“Stroke,” Johnny said, and Sam Weizak made a small, pained hissing between his teeth. “They were watching the TV news… neither of them had any idea… and I came on… and she had a stroke. Christ. She's in the hospital. Now if something happens to my dad, we got a triple play. “He uttered a high scream of laughter. His eyes rolled wildly from Sam to the nurse and back to Sam again. “It's a good talent,” he said. “Everybody should have it. “The laugh came again, so like a scream.

“How bad is she?” Sam asked.

“He doesn't know. “Johnny swung his legs out of bed. He had changed back to a hospital gown and his feet were bare.

“What do you think you are doing?” Sam asked sharply.

“What does it look like?”

Johnny got up, and for a moment it seemed that Sam would push him hack onto the bed. But he only watched Johnny limp over to the closet. “Don't be ridiculous. You're not ready for this, John.”

Unmindful of the nurse-they had seen his bare tail enough times, God knew Johnny let the gown drop around his feet. The thick, twisting scars stood out on the backs of his knees and dimpled into the scant swell of his calves. He began to rummage in the closet for clothes, and came up with the white shirt and jeans he had worn to the news conference.

“John, I absolutely forbid this. As your doctor and your friend- I tell you, it is madness.”