Chris slid the book across the table to Sharon. 'Here, read it and tell me what happens.'
'And get nightmares?'
'What do you think you get paid for?'
'Throwing up.'
'I can do that myself,' Chris muttered as she pick up the evening paper. 'All you have to do is stick your business manager's advice down your throat and you're vomiting blood for a week.' Irritably, she put the paper aside. 'Would you turn on the radio, Shar? Get the news.'
Sharon had dinner at the house with Chris, and then left for a date. She forgot the book. Chris saw it on the table and thought about reading it, but finally she felt too weary. She left it on the table and walked upstairs.
She looked in on Regan, who still seemed to be asleep under the covers, and apparently sleeping through. She checked the window again. Leaving the room, Chris made sure to leave the door wide open and then did the same with her own before getting into bed. She watched part of a movie on television. Then slept.
The following morning, the book about devil worship had vanished from the table.
No one noticed.
CHAPTER THREE
The consulting neurologist pinned up the X-rays again and searched for indentations that would look as if the skull had been pounded like copper with a tiny hammer.
Dr. Klein stood behind him with folded arms. They had both looked for lesions and collections of fluid; for a possible shifting of the pineal gland. Now they probed for Luckenshadl Skull, the telltale depressions that would indicate chronic intracranial pressure.
They did not find it. The date was Thursday, April 28.
The consulting neurologist removed his glasses and carefully tucked them into the left breast poet of his jacket. 'There's just nothing there, Sam, Nothing I can see.'
Klein frowned at the floor with a shake of the head. 'Doesn't figure.'
'Want to run another series?'
'I don't think so. I'll try an LP.'
'Good idea.'
'In the meantime, I'd like you to see her.'
'How's today?'
'Well, I'm---' Telephone buzzer. 'Excuse me.' He picked up the telephone. 'Yes?'
'Mrs. MacNeil on the phone. Says it's urgent.'
'What line?'
'She's on twelve.'
He punched the extension button. 'Dr. Klein, Mrs. MacNeil. What's the trouble?'
Her voice was distraught and on the brim of hysteria. 'Oh, God, doc, it's Regan! Can you come right away?'
'Well, what's wrong?'
'I don't know, doc, I just can't describe it! Oh, for God's sake, come over! Come now!'
'Right away!'
He disconnected and buzzed his receptionist. 'Susan, tell Dresner to take my appointments.' He hung up the phone and started taking off his jacket. 'That's her. You want to come? It's only just across the bridge.'
'I've got an hour.'
'Let's go.'
They were there within minutes, and at the door, where Sharon greeted them, they heard moans and screams of terror from Regan's bedroom. She looked frightened. 'I'm Sharon Spencer,' she said. 'Come on. She's upstairs.'
She led them to the door of Regan's bedroom, where she cracked it open and called in, 'Doctors, Chris!'
Chris immediately came to the door, her face contorted in a vise of fear. 'Oh, my God, come in!' she quavered. 'Come on in and take a look at what she's doing!'
'This is Dr.---'
In the middle of the introduction, Klein broke off as he stared at Regan. Shrieking hysterically, she was flailing her arms as her body seemed to fling itself up horizontally into the air above her bed and then slammed dawn savagely onto the mattress. It was happening rapidly and repeated.
'Oh, Mother, make him stop!' she was screeching 'Stop him. He's trying to kill me! Stop him Stooopppppp hiiiiiimmmmmmmm, Motherrrrrrrrrrrrr!'
'Oh, my baby!' Chris whimpered as she jerked up a fist to her mouth and bit it. She turned a beseeching look to Klein. 'Doc, what is it? What's happening?'
He shook his head, his gaze fixed on Regan as the odd phenomenon continued. She would lift about a foot
