Foreword
The door to the hall burst open and Rolf appeared, his eyes wide and startled-looking. "Mom?" he called without looking in my direction. "Rolf! Oh, Rolf, thank God you're here!" He tensed, cords leaping into prominence in his neck and his face turning pale. Very slowly, he turned his head, his stare sliding from my dark bedroom doorway to the window where I stood. When he saw me his mouth dropped open and he gasped violently. Only then did I remember I was naked. My hands fluttered as if to snatch at something to cover my body with, but I stilled them. My terror had dissolved; there was no ghost that could hold a threat either for Rolf or me when we were together. And Rolf had seen-in that matter of seconds-everything there was of me to see. With deliberate calm, I moved away from the window to the center of the room.
It was just a sobbing in the night. Nothing ghostly about it. Nothing to bring a catch to my breath or make the hairs stiffen at the back of my neck. Just the sobbing of a lonely, hopeless woman when the world ought to be decently asleep and mercifully unaware. But oh, God, how lonely a sobbing it was!