Karras probed with alert, quick interest.
"We are quite a little group in the piglet," it said, nodding. "Ah, yes, quite a stunning little multitude. Later I may see about discreet introductions. In the meantime, I am suffering from a maddening itch that I cannot reach. Would you loosen one strap for a moment, Karras?" "No; just tell me where it itches and I'll scratch it."
"Ah, sly, very sly!"
"Show me Regan and perhaps I'll undo one strap," offered Karras. "If---"
Abruptly he flinched in shock as he found himself staring into eyes filled with terror, at a mouth gaping wide in a soundless shriek for help.
But then quickly the Regan identity vanished in a blurringly rapid remolding of features.
"Won't you take off these straps?" asked a wheedling voice in a clipped British accent.
In a flash, the demonic personality returned. "Couldjya help an old altar boy, Faddah?" it croaked, and then threw back its head in laughter.
Karras sat stunned, felt the glacial hands at the back of his neck again, more palpable now, more firm. The Regan-thing broke off its laughter and fixed him with taunting eyes.
"Incidentally, your mother is here with us, Karras. Do you wish to leave a message? I will see that she gets it." Then Karras was suddenly dodging a projectile stream of vomit, leaping out of his chair. It caught a portion of his sweater and one of his hands.
His face now colorless, the priest looked down at the bed. Regan cackled with glee. His hand dripped vomit onto the rug. "If that's true," the priest said numbly, "then you must know my mothers first name. What is it?"
The Regan-thing hissed at him, mad eyes gleaming, head gently undulating like a cobra's.
"What is it?"
Regan lowed like a steer in an angry bellow that pierced the shutters and shivered through the glass of the large bay window. The eyes rolled upward into their sockets.
For a time Karras watched as the bellowing continued; then he looked at his hand and walked out of the room.
Chris pushed herself quickly away from the wall, glancing, with distress at the Jesuit's sweater. "What happened? Did she vomit?" "Got a towel?" he asked her.
"There's a bathroom right there!" she said hurriedly, pointing at a hallway door. "Karl, take a look at her!" she instructed, and followed the priest to the bathroom.
"I'm so sorry!" she exclaimed in agitation, whipping a towel off the bar. The Jesuit moved to the washbasin.
"Have you got her on tranquilizers?' he asked.
Chris turned on the water taps. "Yes, Librium. Here, take off that sweater and then you can wash."
"What dosage?" he asked her, tugging at the sweater with his clean left hand.
"Here, I'll help you." She pulled at the sweater from the bottom. "Well, today she's had four hundred milligrams, Father."
"Four hundred?"
She had the sweater pulled up to his chest "Yeah, that's how we got her into those straps. It took all of us together to---"
"You gave your daughter four hundred milligrams at once?"
"C'mon, get your arms up, Father." He raised them and she tugged delicately. "She's so strong you can't believe it."
She pulled back the shower curtain, tossing the sweater into the tub. "I'll have Wilie get it cleaned for you, Father. I'm sorry."
"Never mind. It doesn't matter." He unbuttoned the right sleeve of his starched white shirt and rolled it up, exposing a matting of fine brown hairs on a bulging, thickly muscled forearm.
"I'm sorry," Chris repeated quietly, slowly sitting down on the edge of the tub.
"Is she taking any nourishment at all?" asked Karras. He held his hand beneath the hot-water tap to rinse away the vomit.
She clutched and unclutched the towel. It was pink, the name Regan embroidered in blue. "No, Father. Just Sustagen when she's been sleeping. Bu she ripped out the tubing."
"Ripped it out?"
"Today."
Disturbed, Karras soaped and rinsed his hands, and after a pause said gravely, "She ought to be in a hospital."
"I just can't do that," answered Chris in a toneless voice.
"Why not?"
"I just can't!" she repeated with quavering anxiety. "I can't have anyone else involved! She's..."
Chris dropped her head. Inhaled. Exhaled. "She s done something, Father. I can't take the risk of someone else finding out. Not a doctor... not a nurse..." She looked up. "Not anyone."
Frowning, he turned off the taps. "...What if a person, let's say, was a criminal..." He lowered his head, staring down at the basin. "Who's giving her the Sustagen? the Librium? her medicines?"
"We are. Her doctor showed us how."
