‘Let’s play a game,’ I suggested. ‘You shut your eyes. Keep them shut tight, and pretend you’re looking down a deep, deep well. There’s nothing but dark to see. Right?’
‘Yes,’ she said, eyelids tightly clenched.
‘Good. Now, don’t think of anything at all except how dark it is and how far, far away the bottom is. Just think of that, but look at the dark. Understand that?’
‘Yes,’ she said again.
‘Now, watch,’ I told her.
I thought a rabbit for her, and made it twitch its nose. She chuckled. Well, that was one good thing: at least, it made sure that she could receive. I abolished the rabbit, and thought a puppy, then some chickens, and then a horse and cart. After a minute or two she opened her eyes, and looked bewildered.
“Where are they?’ she asked, looking round.
‘They aren’t anywhere. They were just think-things,’ I told her. ‘That’s the game. Now I’ll shut my eyes, too. We’ll both look down the well and think of nothing but how dark it is. Then it’s your turn to think a picture at the bottom of the well, so that I can see it.’
I played my part conscientiously and opened my mind to its most sensitive. That was a mistake. There was a flash and a glare and a general impression that I had been struck by a thunderbolt. I staggered in a mental daze, with no idea what her picture had been. The others came in, protesting bitterly. I explained what was going on.
‘Well, for heaven’s sake be careful, and don’t let her do it again. I damned near put an axe through my foot,’ came aggrievedly from Michael.
‘I’ve scalded my hand with the kettle,’ from Katherine.
‘Lull her. Soothe her down somehow,’ advised Rosalind.
‘She isn’t unsoothed. She’s perfectly tranquil. That seems to be just the way it is with her,’ I told them.
‘Maybe, but it’s a way it can’t stay,’ Michael answered. ‘She must cut it down.’
‘I know — I’m doing my best. Perhaps you’ve got some ideas on how to tackle it?’ I suggested.
‘Well, next time warn us before she tries,’ Rosalind told me.
I pulled myself together and turned my attention to Petra again.
‘You’re too rough,’ I said. ‘This time make a little think-picture; a really little one ever so far away, in soft pretty colours. Do it slowly and gently, as if you were making it out of cobwebs.’
Petra nodded, and closed her eyes again.
‘Here it comes!’ I warned the others, and waited, wishing it were the kind of thing one could take cover from.
It was not much worse than a minor explosion this time. It was dazzling, but I did manage to catch the shape of it.
‘A fish!’ I said. ‘A fish with a droopy tail.’
Petra chuckled delightedly.
‘Undoubtedly a fish,’ came from Michael. ‘You’re doing fine. All you want to do now is to cut her down to about one per cent of the power in that last one before she burns our brains out.’
‘Now you show me,’ demanded Petra, and the lesson proceeded.
The following afternoon we had another session. It was a rather violent and exhausting business, but there was progress. Petra was beginning to grasp the idea of forming thought-shapes — in a childish way, as was only to be expected — but frequently recognizable in spite of distortions. The main trouble still was to keep the strength down: when she became excited one was almost stunned by the impact. The rest complained that they could get no work done while we were at it: it was like trying to ignore sudden hammer-bangs inside one’s head. Towards the end of the lesson I told Petra:
‘Now I’m going to tell Rosalind to give you a think-picture. Just shut your eyes, like before.’
‘Where’s Rosalind?’ she asked, looking round. ‘She’s not here, but that doesn’t matter with think-pictures. Now, look at the dark and think of nothing.’
‘And you others,’ I added mentally for the benefit of the rest, ‘just lay off, will you? Keep it all clear for Rosalind, and don’t interrupt. Go ahead, Rosalind, strong and clear.’ We sat silent and receptive.
Rosalind made a pond with reeds round it. She put in several ducks, friendly, humorous-looking ducks of various colours. They swam a kind of ballet, except for one chunky, earnestly-trying duck who was always a little late and a little wrong. Petra loved it. She gurgled with enjoyment. Then, abruptly, she projected her delight; it wiped out the whole thing and dazed us all again. It was wearing for everyone, but her progress was encouraging.
In the fourth lesson she learnt the trick of clearing one’s mind without closing one’s eyes, which was quite a step. By the end of the week we were really getting on. Her thought-shapes were still crude and unstable, but they would improve with practice; her reception of simple forms was good, though as yet she could catch little of our projections to one another.
‘Too difficult to see all at once and too quick,’ she said. ‘But I can tell whether it’s you, or Rosalind, or Michael, or Sally doing it, but going so fast it gets muddled. The other ones are much more muddled, though.’
‘What other ones — Katherine and Mark?’ I asked her.
‘Oh, no. I can tell them. It’s the other other ones. The long-way-away ones,’ she said, impatiently.
I decided to take it calmly.
‘I don’t think I know them. Who are they?’
‘I don’t know,’ she said, ‘Can’t you hear them? They’re over there, but a long, long way.’ She pointed to the south-west.
I thought that over for a few moments.
‘Are they there now?’ I asked.
‘Yes, but not much,’ she said.
I tried my best to detect anything, and failed.
‘Suppose you try to copy for me what you’re getting from them?’ I suggested.
She tried. There was something there, and with a quality in it which none of us had. It was not comprehensible and it was very blurred — possibly, I thought, because Petra was trying to relay something she could not understand herself. I could make nothing of it, and called Rosalind in, but she could do no better. Petra was evidently finding it an effort, so after a few minutes we decided to let it rest for the present.
In spite of Petra’s continued propensity to slip at any moment into what, in terms of sound, would be a deafening bellow, we all felt a proprietorial pride in her progress. There was a sense of excitement, too — rather as if we had discovered an unknown who we knew was destined to become a great singer: only it was something more important than that….
‘This,’ Michael said, ‘is going to be very interesting indeed — provided she doesn’t break us all up before she gets control of it.’
At supper, some ten days after the loss of Petra’s pony, Uncle Axel asked me to come and give him a hand with truing-up a wheel, while there was still light enough. Superficially the request was casual, but there was something in his eyes which made me agree without hesitation. I followed him out, and we went over behind the rick where we should neither be seen nor overheard. He put a straw between his teeth, and looked at me seriously.
‘You been careless, Davie boy?’ he asked.
There are plenty of ways of being careless, but only one he’d ask me about with the manner he was using.
‘I don’t think so,’ I told him.
‘One of the others, maybe?’ he suggested.
Again, I did not think so.
‘H’m,’ he grunted. ‘Then why, would you say, has Joe Darley been asking questions about you? Any idea?’
I had no idea why, and told him so. He shook his head.
‘I don’t like it, boy.’
‘Just me — or the others, as well?’ I asked.
‘You — and Rosalind Morton.’