said Colette. “What the hell are you talking about, George?” “He’s right,” said Franny. “Anne… Anne Sillenes. It’s so strange to say that name. I had almost forgotten it. It died with me, so long ago. Franny Beatty was a name you chose for me, Bill, picked at random out of the paper. But my real one’s always remained, echoing in the many empty places in my skull.” “But how can this be?” Silenus said. “I haven’t spoken to you for half a century, my dear… I thought you were lost. How can you have come back to me now?” “I haven’t come back to you, Bill,” said Franny, or perhaps it should have been Anne. “I was just reminded. This all started when you took me to the fairies, don’t you remember? It was an arrangement we made, when we first learned about the cancer. About the thing eating me up, behind my eyes.” “It was the first of three visits,” said Ofelia. “You carried her to my mother after she’d passed, still streaked with grave dirt.
