SCENE 2
Once Victoria Winters was gone, Barnabas returned to the drawing room and sat down. "Willie!" he called.
Willie Loomis came in from the other room. "Yes, Barnabas?"
"I assume you heard?"
"I heard, Barnabas." He started clearing the dishes on the table hurriedly. "See, I tole you she wouldn't know anything about you. I knew that when she showed up here for dinner. If she did, she wouldn't have come here."
Barnabas looked at Willie. "But she did learn my secret in the past. That was clear. If she should remember - no, I must make sure that does not happen."
Willie's face registered fear. "Now, Barnabas, you ain't gonna do anything to Miss Winters, are you? Not like you done to Carolyn..." Willie swallowed. "...Or to Daphne?"
Barnabas turned his head sharply. "How dare you bring that up, Willie!"
"I'm sorry." He backed away. Willie had been on the receiving end of too many beatings to remain close. "But you aren't, are you?"
Barnabas sighed. "I don't want to, Willie. You know that." He turned away. "But I may have no choice. I can't take the chance that she will remember."
The servant rushed to his master's side and knelt beside him. "Barnabas, you can't be sure she knows anything. And even if she did, she don't know it now. There's gotta be a - a less drastic way of makin' sure she don't remember." An idea came to him. "Couldn't Julia do that thing she did to Daphne? With the crystal?"
"You mean the hypnosis?"
"Yeah, that's it. If she could get Daphne to remember things, maybe she could make sure Miss Winters don't remember, ever."
Barnabas sat up straighter, a look of hope in his eyes. "Maybe she could..." Then he deflated again. "No, it's too risky. I just can't take that chance."
"But why not let Julia try? If it doesn't work - well, it's gotta work, it's just gotta. Please, Barnabas? Just let Julia try. It can't hurt nothin', and then you wouldn't have to do anything to her."
Barnabas stared for a few moments, thinking. "Alright, Willie. Go and get Dr. Hoffman. I will talk to her, and if she believes it will work, I will let her try."
Willie scrambled to his feet. "I'll go right now, Barnabas." He grabbed his coat. "You'll see. Julia'll make everything all right. You'll see. You'll see." He practically flew out the front door.
"I only pray that you are right, Willie. I pray that you are right."
SCENE 3
The next morning, Vicki was humming to herself as she made her bed, when a knock came at her door. Stopping what she was doing, she went to answer it. "Oh, Dr. Hoffman. Come in."
Julia entered the room. "Good morning, Vicki. Did you sleep well?"
Vicki went back to straightening up. "As well as can be expected, I suppose. I keep thinking I should remember something important, but I don't know what."
"That's why I'm here." That got Vicki's attention, and she turned to face the doctor, a questioning look on her face. Julia continued, "I spoke to Barnabas last night, and he told me of your conversation." She moved closer to Vicki. "I thought maybe I could help. If you'll let me try."
"How?"
"I was thinking we could try hypnosis, as I did with Daphne after her attack." Julia watched for any reaction to the mention of Barnabas' first victim, but there was none. "Perhaps we can bring your memories of 1790 back to the surface. Then, if there is something there you need to know, you'll be able to remember."
"I don't know, Julia." She turned away nervously. "I'm not sure I'm comfortable with hypnosis. That feeling of not being in control frightens me a little."
"But, Vicki, it's not being out of control. It actually gives you more control, over your mind, your thoughts, your memories. And I'll be here with you the whole time, monitoring you. If I see that anything is wrong, I'll bring you back to consciousness immediately." Julia's face grew as sincere as she could make it. "You do trust me, don't you, Vicki?"
Vicki spun around quickly. "Oh, of course, Dr. Hoffman. It's not that. It's just - well, I'm not sure that I want to remember. When I try to think of my experiences in 1790, I get a feeling of tragedy and death - and evil. I don't know that I want to remember any more than I do."
Julia steeled herself against what Vicki was saying. Few people understood the evil she was talking about better than Julia. It was under Angelique's possession that she had killed Joe Haskell. "Barnabas said that you thought that something was important in the here and now. Perhaps it has something to do with the evil you spoke of. Maybe it's something we need to know to keep it from returning to Collinwood."
"I hadn't thought of that." Her eyes grew wide. "Do you think that could be it?"
"I don't know." Julia put her hand on Vicki's arm. "But you do. Can we afford to run the risk of not knowing?"
"No. No, we can't. All right, I'll do it. Do you think it will work?"
"I can't be sure, of course. But I do think there is a chance. And we can't overlook any possibility."
"Ok, Doctor." Vicki drew herself up, as if bravely facing an ordeal. "When do we begin?"
"We can start right now, if that's alright. I think the sooner we begin, the sooner we'll know what we need to. I already spoke with Mrs. Stoddard about my plan, and she said it would be fine if you took a few hours off this morning."
Vicki hesitated only a moment, then agreed. "What do we need to do?"
"Just sit here." Julia brought a chair from against the wall into the center of the room. Vicki sat down as Julia closed the drapes, blocking out the bright morning sun. "Now, just sit comfortably, take a few deep breaths, and relax." Vicki did so, and Julia pulled a crystal pendant from the pocket of her jacket. Pausing for a moment to build up her resolve, she stepped in front of Vicki, holding the pendant up. The light refracted through the crystal, throwing pinpoints of light across Vicki's face. "Look into the light. Try to find the center of the light." Vicki looked deep into the crystal. "Have you found the center?"
"Yes," came the reply.
"Then look deeper, for beyond that center is another center, and beyond that, yet another. Keep looking, until you can go no further." The doctor waited a few seconds until Vicki's face went slack. "Have you found the true center?"
She responded in a monotone voice. "Yes, I have found the true center."
Julia lowered the pendant and put it back in her pocket. "Good. Then I want you to tell me everything that happened to you in 1790."
