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  “JACQUE”                AND WE PLAY TO-
                              GETHER AND SHE ON
                              TOP OF ME ON THE
                              BLANKET SHE SHOWS
                              ME HOW
                              “I loved her she was
                              my sister she died”
     
    “She died when. . . I was twelve when she died.”
    “Jacque.” She reached blindly back and touched his cheek, eyes. “My poor Jacque.”
    They tried five different sexual geometries in the next hour, Carol becoming fairly exhausted after nine or ten orgasms. Jacque was even more exhausted by the strain of none.
    He could start but he couldn’t finish. Not with another person’s thoughts, however attractive, intruding on his privacy; not with his own fantasies being reflected back to him distorted by Carol’s sympathies- and by her revulsion sometimes, though she tried to mask it.
    Carol had no such problems: she was not a very private person to begin with, and she was less sensitive to the bridge. Being tuned in to Jacque was a delicious spice to her, like making love surrounded by mirrors, with an illustrated pornographic story unreeling in her mind.
    Carol lay panting on the cot. Jacque picked up the bridge, walked stiffly over to the aquarium, and dropped the creature into its water. He retrieved his jacket from the camera and sat down next to Carol.
    “We forgot towels,” he said, and began patting her dry.
    She made a purring sound and stretched. “You don’t want to-“
    “No. I’ve had it.”
    “There’s plenty of time.” The clock said 23:14. “If we did it without the bridge you-“
    “Please.”
    “I was just-“
    “Carol, some other time I’d love to but some other time!”
    She flinched. “Don’t be mad at me.”
    “I’m not mad at you.”
    “Don’t be mad at yourself either. You couldn’t help-“
    “Let’s not talk. Let’s just not talk.”
    “All right.” She tried to dry him but he twisted away and went to get dressed. She turned her back to him and rummaged through her purse for a tissue.
     
     
20 - Coda
     
    A more or less independent passage, at the end of a composition, introduced to bring it to a satisfactory close.
    They had eight hours before they were due back at the chamber for Rhine testing. Jacque walked with Carol back to her cottage. It was a misty summer’s-end night, clouds rolling in heavy with rain, heat lightning on the horizon. They walked apart and didn’t say much.
    She took his hand and held on while she thumbed the door open. “I don’t have anything to drink in the-“
    “Carol, uh, look. I’m sorry. It wasn’t you. It was that damned-“
    “Shush.” She slipped her arms around him and leaned her head on his chest. After a moment: “I owe you a meal, Lefavre.”
    “Oh, that-“
    “Free for breakfast tomorrow?” Tugging him toward the door. “Come on. I have real eggs.”
     
21- To the Marriage of True Minds Admit Impediments
     
    The Effect of Telepathic
    Communion on Coitus
    by
    Raymond Sweeney, M.D., Ph.D.
    HIGHLY CONFIDENTIAL
    1. It is not meant to be implied that any general conclusions may be drawn from this report, based as it is on one single episode. Certain aspects of it, however, may be of interest to investigators of human sexual function and dysfunction.
    2. The subjects involved were Jacque (sic) L. and Carol W., the two veterans of the first Groombridge mission most sensitive to the amplifying effect of the Groombridge bridge. They were scheduled for two hours’ sexual experimentation in conjunction with the bridge, without observation, on the condition that they consent to interviews afterward.
    3. The subjects seem sexually compatible, but had no mutual sexual relationship prior to the experiment (in retrospect, this seems unfortunate). Neither