Probe by Carole Nelson Douglas

Author:Carole Nelson Douglas
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Science Fiction
ISBN: 0-812-53587-1
Publisher: Probe
Published: 1985-06-30T16:00:00+00:00

Lynn Volker

Favorite Expression: Don’t count on me.

Ambition: To see the world.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

* * *

“What’s this?”

Jane had arrived for her Monday session to be greeted by a brown paper bag sprouting mushroomlike from the tufted leather chair seat.

“A present,” Kevin answered promptly. “Have a look.”

She liked presents and immediately picked it up, sat in its place and set it on her lap to unwrap. He doubted that the indifference with which she had regarded a storeful of clothing three months ago would last five minutes inside the Dayton’s doors now. She seemed to have caught conspicuous consumption from her dormmates, the way some susceptible people catch colds.

His program to domesticate Jane, Kevin realized with a wry internal twinge, had created a woman who could slide perfectly into the slot labeled “Lynn Elizabeth Volker.” It was a pity Jane was someone else.

“What’s this?” Her tone was no longer curious, but faintly disowning, though the words were the same. She stared at a brick of homemade bread, then looked to him for explanation, as she always did.

“Taste it.”

Jane thought a moment, then pulled a piece off the end. It looked like damn good bread—if you liked vegetables in your bread; soft but textured… He watched her chew slowly, shrug and regard him with something like the mystification with which he had originally regarded her. Kevin smiled, even though his mood was anything but happy. He was about to put Jane on a calculated roller-coaster, ride—solo—and he basically thought it was kind of mean. But sometimes shock therapy was needed.

“What is it?” This time, she demanded.

“A present from your mother. Zucchini bread.”

“My… mother?”

“Yes. A northern Minnesota couple saw your sketch in the paper. They recognized you, contacted the police and apparently are your parents. They want to see you.”

Jane set the bread in its homely brown paper doily on the ottoman, dead center, but she didn’t notice that. She stood, then walked away, almost into the closed door, staring at the lolling lingual symbols of Mick Jagger and crew. She didn’t seem to see the poster.

“My… parents.”

“Yes. Isn’t that good news?” He said it the same inane way most people would say a thing like that, a question phrased to elicit only happy agreement.

Jane might buy the agreement part; happy—no.

“My parents have been found.” She said it flatly, then came back to stare at the bread.

“Did it taste good?” Kevin asked.

“All right.”

“It’s your favorite.”

Jane looked up, puzzled.

“Your mother said so.”

“Then,” said Jane, “it must be.”

“They’re coming to see you tomorrow afternoon. I thought we could use our next two sessions to prepare for that. Why don’t you put the bread on my desk, sit down and stay a while?”

She did as he suggested, handling the bread with no more tenderness than a… well, than a loaf of bread. She didn’t touch it as if it were the only physical trace of a long-lost mother.

“Nothing concrete has come back to you, about your mother, your father?” He watched her mechanically rhythmic head shakes for evidence of emotion.

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