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By the time I had crawled home through Tuesday morning rush hour traffic, the time was approaching 9:00 a.m.. Before responding to the call of sleep, that had been becoming increasingly persistent in the way it was irritating my body in a variety of annoying ways, I made several phone calls.

The first call was to book a seat for a noon flight to Chicago on Wednesday. The second call was to make a reservation at the Balmer House where the symposium was being held.

Having completed the arrangements, I staggered off to bed, perchance to dream. However, I felt my dreams were going to have a hard time keeping up with the weirdness which seemed to have entered my waking life during the last several weeks.

On Tuesday evening I met with Jennifer. With each new opportunity for being together, I realized the love in my heart for her was growing, seemingly exponentially.

I don't know why this experience had taken nearly fifty years to find its way into my life, but I was very thankful that it had bothered to knock on my door at all. There were many people who lived their whole lives in quarantine from love, and, I suppose, in many ways, until I had met Jennifer, I was one of them.

I had loved my parents and my sister, and I knew they loved me. Yet, as is true for most of us, I constantly was scanning the horizons hoping that special someone would walk out of the shadows of possibility and fill the void in my heart that first seemed to make its presence felt in my teens.

At times, this void had manifested itself as a dull ache. On other occasions, its pain had been given more intense and acute expression.

Emptiness, restlessness, dullness and incompleteness were all symptoms of this void. They were at the opposite end of the spectrum from the sort of void about which the Buddhists speak.

Now, like a Florence Nightingale of the heart, Jennifer had emerged from the darkness. The light of her being brought healing and peace to a soul who was scarred by, and weary from, the battle of life.

I brought Jennifer up to date on all of the latest events. Talking about my trip to Washington, the attempted kidnaping, the rescue, my discussion with Rip, the identity of the Botclofots, and the mysterious mission to Chicago, occupied us until well after midnight.

We both agreed there appeared to be a striking similarity between Beth's memories of dizziness and difficulty in breathing prior to her abduction experience and what had happened to me last night. We felt there was some sort of connection between the two events, as well as, in all likelihood, Brian's disappearance, but we had no plausible hypothesis that would account for all the data.

The possibility of some further attempt to abduct me seemed quite real. Nonetheless, since we had no idea of what was really going on, there were few concrete precautions which could be taken.

As had been true with Beth, the nature of the evidence was so flimsy, going to the authorities probably would be an exercise in futility. I could, of course, tell them about Rip and his having witnessed the incident, but, if possible, I would prefer not to involve him in the matter.

In any event, even if Rip did tell the authorities what he saw, I was far from convinced that this would bring the situation much closer to any kind of satisfactory resolution. Furthermore, in fairness to the police and the FBI, short of giving me protection, that, due to, among other things, limitations of staff and budgets, was extremely unlikely, there appeared to be little they had to go on and little which they could do under the circumstances.

Reluctantly, I left Jennifer around two in the morning. I would have liked to be with her longer, but I had a number of things to do in order to get ready for my trip to Chicago, including latching on to a few hours more sleep than had been possible the previous day.

After driving home and attending to the preparations for my journey, I managed to slip beneath the covers of my bed around 4:30 a.m. I had set the alarm for 9:40, a little over five hours away.

I was uprooted from my slumber by a heavy knocking on the apartment door. Looking over at the clock through the blurred vision of awakening , the time appeared to be 8:53 a.m..

The knocking continued and seemed to become more insistent with each passing second. I grabbed a robe and made my way to the living room.

Upon opening the door, I found myself staring into the faces of Special Agents Williams and Bradley. Perhaps due to a lack of sleep, I found myself saying: "If you guys are serious about continuing to court me, I'm going to insist you clear it with my parents."

Agent Williams started to enter the room. I stepped in his path and said: "I'm pretty sleepy, but I don't recall inviting you in. Unless there is a legal document entitling you to enter my humble abode, you should have the courtesy to either ask to come in, or you should wait to be asked."

Somewhat flustered, Agent Williams flashed a look that suggested equal parts annoyance and contempt. Agent Bradley was his usual, silent, enigmatic, unflappable self.

With exaggerated politeness, Agent Williams inquired: "May we come in Dr. Phelps?" There was an edge of some sort to the way he intoned: "Dr.".

"Please do," I replied. "The furniture undoubtedly will feel blessed by your presence."

The two agents followed me into the living room area, and I motioned them to several chairs that were by the couch. As they sat down, I said: "I would be remiss in my responsibilities as host if I didn't offer you some coffee or tea."

Both of the men shook their heads in a negative fashion. "No thank, you," they said, more or less at the same time.

"Do you mind if I get my coffee machine started?" I inquired. "It will only take a minute."

Agent Williams nodded his consent. Agent Bradley was doing a quick inventory of the room.

I went into the kitchen and set things in motion for brewing the coffee. While there, I turned on the cold water tap and splashed some of it on my face and vigorously rubbed a little on the back of my neck.

Feeling more fully awake, I turned off the tap and picked up a dish towel. I wiped my face and neck and, then, went back to the living room to see what was cooking there.

Almost as soon as I sat down, Agent Williams started in. "Where were you on Monday night?"

The issue of how much to say loomed before me. I opted to start out with giving a minimum amount of information and wait to see if I could figure out why they were here.

"I went to Frames of Mind Cinema over on Gardner," I answered.

"What time was that?" he inquired.

Shrugging my shoulders, I said: "I suppose it was from approximately 7:30 p.m. to about 11:00 p.m.."

"Was anyone with you?" he countered.

"No ... no there wasn't," I acknowledged. "Perhaps, if you will tell me what this is all about, I might be of more help to you."

"Just answer the questions," Agent Williams indicated. "That is all the help we want or need from you."

Shortly thereafter, he followed up with: "Can anyone verify your whereabouts on Monday night, or do you have a ticket stub from the movie or a parking receipt?"

I thought about his questions for a moment. Finally, I said: "I threw the movie ticket away as I left the theater, and I parked on a side street, so there is no parking receipt.

"As far as your first question is concerned, I'm not sure anyone could place me at the theater. I did talk with the guy at the concession stand for a few minutes while he was filling my order, but I don't know if he would remember me. I'm sure he probably talks with a lot of people in the course of an evening."

Reflecting on the matter a bit more, I added: "After the movie, I stopped at a donut shop a couple of blocks from the theater. Oddly enough, there were no police there. I had always heard that the two were something of an item."

"I did exchange some pleasantries with the proprietor of the shop. Once again, however, I'm not sure if the person would remember our little interlude.

"To the best of my recollection, no one saw me either leaving the apartment building on my way to the theater, or returning here following the movie. Therefore, there is no one here who can corroborate my going or coming."

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