'Yes,' Weizak said. 'I dialed it direct. Did you know you could do that now? Yes. It is a great convenience. You dial one, the area code, the number. Eleven digits and you can be in touch with any place in the country.
It is an amazing thing. In some ways a frightening thing.. A boy - no, a young man - answered the telephone. I asked if Mrs. Borentz was at home. I heard him call, "Mom, it's for you." Clunk went the receiver on the table or desk or whatever. I stood in Bangor, Maine, not forty miles from the Atlantic Ocean and listened to a young man put the phone down on a table in a town on the Pacific Ocean. My heart ... it was pounding so hard it frightened me. The wait seemed long. Then she picked up the phone and said, "Yes? Hello?"'
'What did you say? How did you handle it?'
'I did not, as you say, handle it,' Weizak replied, and smiled crookedly. 'I hung up the telephone. And I wished for a strong drink, but I did not have one.
'Are you satisfied it was her?'
'John, what a naive question! I was nine years old in 1939.I had not heard my mother's voice since then. She spoke only Polish when I knew her I speak only English now ... I have forgotten much of my native language, which is a shameful thing. How could I be satisfied one way or the other?'
'Yes, but were you?'
Weizak scrubbed a hand slowly across his forehead. 'Yes,' he said. 'It was her. It was my mother.'
'But you couldn't talk to her?'
'Why should I?' Weizak asked, sounding almost angry. 'Her life is her life, huh? It is as you said. The boy is safe. Should I upset a woman that is just coming into her years of peace? Should I take the chance of destroying her equilibrium forever? Those feelings of guilt you mentioned ... should I set them free? Or even run the risk of so doing?'
'I don't know,' Johnny said. They were troublesome questions, and the answers were beyond him - but he felt that Weizak was trying to say something about what he had done by articulating the questions. The questions he could not answer.
'The boy is safe, the woman is safe in Carmel. The country is between them, and we let that be. But what about you, John? What are we going to do about you?'
'I don't understand what you mean.'
'I will spell it out for you then, huh? Dr. Brown is angry. He is angry at me, angry at you, and angry at himself, I suspect, for half-believing something he has been sure is total poppycock for his whole life. The nurse who was a witness will never keep her silence. She will tell her husband tonight in bed, and it may end there, but her husband may tell his boss, and it is very possible that the papers will have wind of this by tomorrow evening. "Coma Patient Re-Awakens with Second Sight."'
'Second sight,' Johnny said. 'Is that what it is?'
'I don't know what it is, not really. Is it psychic? Seer? Handy words that describe nothing, nothing at all. You told one of the nurses that her son's optic surgery was going to be successful...
'Marie,' Johnny murmured. He smiled a little. He liked Marie.
... and that is already all over the hospital. Did you see the future? Is that what second sight is? I don't know. You put a picture of my mother between your hands and were able to tell me where she lives today. Do you know where lost things and lost people may be found? Is that what second sight is? I don't know. Can you read thoughts? Influence objects of the physical world? Heal by the laying on of hands? These are all things that some call "psychic". They are all related to the idea of "second sight". They are things that Dr. Brown laughs at. Laughs? No. He doesn't laugh. He scoffs.'
'And you don't?'
'I think of Edgar Cayce. And Peter Hurkos. I tried to tell Dr. Brown about Hurkos and he scoffed. He doesn't want to talk about it; he doesn't want to know about it.'
Johnny said nothing.
'So... what are we going to do about you?'
'Does something need to be done?'
'I think so,' Weizak said. He stood up. 'I'll leave you to think it out for yourself. But when you think, think about this: some things are better not seen, and some things are better lost than found.'
He bade Johnny good night and left quietly. Johnny was very tired now, but still sleep did not come for a long time.
Chapter Nine
1.