bed all the time?"

"I guess you think that's easy," Clocker retorted. "You try it sometime.
I did. It's work, I tell you." He folded his charts and put them back
into the inside pocket of his conservative jacket. He looked sick with
longing and loneliness. "Damn, I miss that mouse. I got to save her,
Doc! Don't you get that?"

Doc Hawkins put a chunky hand gently on Clocker's arm. "Of course, boy.
But how can you succeed when trained men can't?"

"Well, take Zelda. She did time-steps when she was maybe five and going
to dancing school--"

"Time-steps have some symbolic significance to her," Doc said with more
than his usual tact. "My theory is that she was compelled to go against
her will, and this is a form of unconscious rebellion."

"They don't have no significance to her," Clocker argued doggedly. "She
can do time-steps blindfolded and on her knees with both ankles tied
behind her back." He pried Buttonhole's hand off Doc's lapel, and took
hold of both of them himself. "I tell you she's teaching, explaining,
breaking in some dummy who can't get the hang of it!"

"But who?" Doc objected. "Psychiatrists? Nurses? You? Admit it,
Clocker--she goes on doing time-steps whether she's alone or not. In
fact, she never knows if anybody is with her. Isn't that so?"

"Yeah," Clocker said grudgingly. "That's what has me boxed."

* * * * *

Oil Pocket grunted tentatively, "White men not believe in spirits.
Injuns do. Maybe Zelda talk to spirits."

"I been thinking of that," confessed Clocker, looking at the red angel
unhappily. "Spirits is all I can figure. Ghosts. Spooks. But if Zelda
and these other catatonics are teaching ghosts, these ghosts are the
dumbest jerks anywhere. They make her and the rest go through time-steps
or sewing or selling shoes again and again. If they had half a brain,
they'd get it in no time."

"Maybe spirits not hear good," Oil Pocket offered, encouraged by
Clocker's willingness to consider the hypothesis.

"Could be," Clocker said with partial conviction. "If we can't see them,
it may be just as hard for them to see or hear us."

Oil Pocket anxiously hitched his chair closer. "Old squaw name Dry
Ground Never Rainy Season--what you call old maid--hear spirits all the
time. She keep telling us what they say. Nobody listen."

"How come?" asked Clocker interestedly.

"She deaf, blind. Not hear thunder. Walk into cactus, yell like hell.
She hardly see us, no