§ § § -- November 7, 1982

Under Roarke's direction, the girls had walked Camille into the house like a life-sized puppet and sat her onto the settee beneath the tall shuttered windows in Roarke's office. Now the girls were explaining to Roarke what had happened to put Camille in her apparently catatonic state.

When they finished, Roarke mulled silently over the situation, gazing absently at Camille. Then he seemed to come back to the here and now, and focused on Leslie. "Tell me what you felt at the moment Frida shouted at Camille," he requested.

Leslie told him, and he nodded. "The rest of you?" he asked, and got a series of solemn nods in reply. "I see. Leslie...how long did it take before you became aware of anything other than Frida's rage?"

"I don't think I was really aware of anything until Frida walked away," Leslie said slowly. "The first thing I remember is seeing her halfway down the lane from here. Up till then, I kind of felt this...I don't know, this mental paralysis, I guess. I couldn't think at all, even if I tried, till she was some ways off."

Roarke nodded. "It would appear," he said, "that since Camille was the direct recipient of Frida's emotional broadcast, she got the full brunt of its effect, whereas the rest of you received something of a penumbral dose. I suspect Camille will recover on her own, except that it will take longer, of course."

"But will she be the same as she was?" Andrea asked anxiously.

"Aren't all of you the same?" Roarke countered.

"But we didn't get the full blast like Camille did," Andrea pointed out. "Maybe we didn't get enough to alter our minds in any way, but since Camille took it head-on, there's no telling what might have happened."

Lauren snorted. "Maybe if we're lucky, it was enough of a shock to make her a decent human being. Like getting hit by lightning cured some woman's muscular degeneration once." The others stared at her, in Roarke's case fighting a smile. "Well, it did," Lauren insisted. "I read about it somewhere."

"If you say so," Andrea said skeptically. "Okay, Mr. Roarke, I guess we'll just have to wait."

It took nearly two hours before Camille came back, all at once. She sat up with a snap, badly startling all the girls and making Roarke raise a surprised eyebrow. Andrea blurted, "Camille, are you all right?"

Camille stared at her with an amazed look and asked in awe, "What'd that girl do to me, anyway?"

This inquiry was greeted with a mutual eye-rolling from most of the girls, but it was Roarke who stepped in. "Tell us what you remember, Camille."

Camille thought about it for long enough that the others were starting to think she had no memory of the incident; then she said, "It was like being crushed by a blue whale. Like she pushed me down without ever touching me. And she was mad...man oh man, was she mad. It was like she set my mind on fire." She blinked back to the here-and-now and focused on Roarke. "I had no idea she could do anything like that. I guess..." here she shrugged sheepishly -- "maybe I better watch out what I say to her from now on."

Amusement gleamed from Roarke's eyes. "Perhaps you should," he agreed humorously.

Camille turned then to Andrea and sighed. "Look, sis, I think I know what you're trying to do. You want me to quit hating Frida just because she's Swedish. And I gotta admit, she had a point when she said I'm being stupid to hate her for something she has no control over. I think that's really what got me." She cocked her head then and studied her older sister. "But you still haven't told us exactly what happened with that guy, and the trial and all. Come on, Andrea, don't you hate him for what he did?"

Andrea slouched in her seat a little, a look of resignation creeping across her face. "I could spend my time hating the guy till I'm a bitter old bat," she said, "but then I'd never get anything done, and I have a lot of plans for my life. I can't stop you from hating anyone, Camille. You can hate the heck out of the guy who raped me if you want to; it's all the same to me. But I've got better things to do."

Camille mulled that over and smiled faintly. "I guess I can understand that. But I think I better steer clear of Frida from now on." She looked at the others, an uncharacteristically meek expression on her usually belligerent features. "I've probably done too much damage with her to fix it now, but maybe you guys would be willing to give me another chance."

They looked at one another, shrugged and smiled, one by one. "Okay, fine, but I still think you should apologize to Frida for what you did to her last weekend," Lauren said. The other girls nodded agreement.

Camille glanced at Andrea, then nodded. "That's fair."

- - - - - - - - -

"It really was just that simple," Leslie mused that evening. "It didn't work quite the way I think Andrea wanted it to, but it did work, more or less."

Roarke regarded her. "Indeed. I must admit, what amazes me is that it worked to any extent at all. The simple fact remains that bigotry, while certainly qualifiable as 'stupid', can be cured only by the person who harbors it. Camille will have to discover this on her own. And the rest of you will simply have to be patient with her." He smiled. "Perhaps you have all learned a little something this weekend. Now I suggest you get a little sleep; tomorrow is another school day, after all."

"You didn't have to remind me," Leslie complained good-naturedly. "But I have to be honest, I'm glad all this is over with." Halfway across the room to the stairs, she paused. "You know, it'd be really interesting to see Andrea's final article about all this."

"Indeed it would," Roarke said and smiled. "Indeed it would."

THE END