35
“It wasn’t a heart attack,” Dr. Venn says. “That was a convenient lie. Not so convenient that there wasn’t an inquiry, but in the end, heart attack was the easier reason for everyone to believe.”
“What was the real reason?” I ask.
Dr. Venn sighs. “You have to understand how to operate the machine.” His words are coming more slowly now. He’s definitely starting to fade. “There’s a skill to learning to focus and defocus while you’re in it. Dr. Sands … did not have that skill. I tried to instruct him, but he was in too much of a hurry.”
“So what happened?” I ask.
“The short answer, Audie, is that he went somewhere and forgot how to come back.”
I have to sit quietly for a moment to let that sink in. Even though I’m running out of time.
“But you can show me,” I say. “How to go and com
