Part 11 (1/2)

Gates leaned back again, twirling that d.a.m.n key ring.

”I told you that you would resist the facts. Your sister went through a period of denial too.”

Kara's revulsion was now turning to anger.

”I will not have my father defamed! He was a good man who's been dead a dozen years and can't defend himself! Besides, Kelly would have told me!”

”Kelly didn't know.”

That brought Kara up short. She stared at Dr. Gates without speaking.

”Listen,” he said, ”and perhaps you will understand why I asked you here. The regularly repeated trauma of such magnitude can cause a child's mind to create a second personality as a defense mechanism. The second personality takes over during the times of recurrent trauma. There is no communication between the personalities. The secondary personality s.h.i.+elds the primary personality, forming a barrier between it and an intolerable reality, thus allowing the child to go about her everyday life as if nothing happened. And in a sense, nothing does happen to the primary personality-the second personality absorbs all the trauma.”

”it never happened!” Kara said.

”When the trauma stops, the second personality is no longer needed. But it doesn't dissolve, it doesn't go away, it merely becomes dormant, ready to leap to the surface should the first personality be traumatized again. I believe that the traumatic break-up of Kelly's last relations.h.i.+p-the lies she had believed, the betrayal she felt-awakened Ingrid. Kelly managed to handle the emotional trauma in a mature manner, but Ingrid was awake. And Ingrid wanted out. It was that tug of war going on in her subconscious, and the unexplained lapses in memory when Ingrid managed to take over, that eventually brought Kelly to me.”

Kara sank back into the chair and closed her eyes.

Kelly... Ingrid... it had to be true. It explained so much. But the rest of it... sickening...

”All right,” she said slowly. ”I'll grant the existence of this Ingrid personality. But she's a liar. You said she was s.e.xually promiscuous-”

”Many s.e.xually abused children grow up to be promiscuous, a reflection of how they were taught to relate to a male during their formative years. Just as physically abused children grow to be violent adults.”

”Kelly was not abused, dammit! I was there! I grew up with her! The Ingrid part of her is lying!”

”Perhaps. I have no way of knowing. Ingrid often spoke of how her twin sib was also regularly abused by their father.”

Kara was out of her seat again. She wanted to hurl herself at Gates and throttle that bland, matter-of-fact expression off his face.

”Are you deaf? It. Never. Happened!”

It couldn't have happened! Not Dad. Never. She saw his weathered face, his easy smile, his gentle blue eyes. He never even raised his voice. Dad was a... a prude! a prude! She remembered how embarra.s.sed he'd be whenever she and Kelly as teenagers would pa.s.s him in the upstairs hall in their underwear. He'd shout at them to get their robes on. He couldn't have- She remembered how embarra.s.sed he'd be whenever she and Kelly as teenagers would pa.s.s him in the upstairs hall in their underwear. He'd shout at them to get their robes on. He couldn't have- ”She said her twin sister was named 'Janine,' ” Dr. Gates said softly.

”There! What did I tell you! This Ingrid is all screwed up! If she can't even get my name right, how can she have any credibility about the rest of her story?”

Kara turned and headed for the door. She had tolerated as much as she could of this nonsense.

”Thank you for your time, Dr. Gates. I've heard all I want to hear.”

He did not raise his voice but, as her hand reached the door k.n.o.b, Kara heard him with numbing clarity.

”What if the Janine she speaks of belongs to you, Miss Wade?”

Kara froze. Her anger vanished as if it had never been, replaced by a cold, sick fear crawling through her chest. She turned and leaned against the door, facing him.

”Why are you doing this to me?”

”I am not doing anything to you. I am giving you the information you demanded yesterday, information that might be of vital importance to you.”

She hung there, weak-kneed, trying to comprehend the unthinkable, but the thoughts would not take form. Her mind fought them off, drove them away.

”Please sit down,” Dr. Gates said. For the first time there seemed to be real concern in his voice.

Kara shook her head. ”No. Just finish this and let me go.”

”All right. I'll put it all in a nutsh.e.l.l. Your twin sister developed a separate personality to s.h.i.+eld her from a ma.s.sive childhood trauma. I dealt with that personality. I know it existed. Therefore, since you and your twin grew up so closely together, and since you have no memory of your sister's trauma, I thought it fair and prudent to warn you that it is entirely possible that you, too, may have developed a second personality to s.h.i.+eld you from that same trauma.”

”Okay,” she said slowly. ”You've warned me. Maybe there was a trauma. Maybe we've both repressed it. But that doesn't mean it absolutely had to have been... incest.”

”Judging from Ingrid's promiscuity, I'd say there's a high probability that-”

”But you can't be absolutely sure sure can you?” can you?”

Grant me that! Please grant me that!

”No,” he said after a pause. ”It's hard to be absolutely sure of anything in this case. Especially with Kelly gone.”

Thank you.

Now. There was one more thing she had to know before she fled this place, this man, this city.

”How could I tell if I had another personality?”

”If you have black-outs, memory lapses, new items around the house that you don't remember purchasing, you might suspect, but short of a chance encounter with a friend or relative when the other personality was in charge, you couldn't actually know know. Except perhaps...” His voice trailed off.

”What? Tell me!”

”Hypnotism can sometimes bring the other personalities to the surface, but it's not foolproof. And it can be risky.”

Kara turned and opened the door.

”Good-bye, Dr. Gates. And thank you for your time.”

She forced her feet to carry her from the office, to the elevator, and out to the street. Everything around her seemed blurred, as if she were moving through a fog.

I'm sleepwalking, she thought. This is a nightmare, and any minute I'm going to wake up This is a nightmare, and any minute I'm going to wake up.

She took a cab back to Kelly's apartment. She couldn't face Jill and Ellen now, not feeling as sick and... defiled as she did. She had to pull herself together, put things in perspective.

But how?

As soon as Kara stepped through Kelly's front door she realized she had made a mistake. She didn't want to be here. Not now. Not alone. She needed someone to talk to, she needed to bounce all this off someone. But who? Certainly not her aunt. Ellen was practically a basket case as it was.

Only one person in this lousy city was fit to hear it. She didn't want to call him, but there was no one else.

1:51 P.M.