He thought back to Oesterreich’s mention of a shaman of the Altai in Siberia who had deliberately invited possession as a means of performing a “magical act.” Examined in a clinic just prior to performing the act of levitation, his pulse rate had spurted to one hundred, and then, afterward, leaped to an amazing two hundred while there were also marked changes in his bodily temperature and respiration. So his paranormal action was tied to physiology! It was caused by some bodily energy or force! But as proof of possession, Karras had learned, the Church wanted clear and exterior verifiable phenomena that suggested … He’d forgotten the wording, but tracing a finger down the page of the Satan book lying on his desk, Karras found it: “… verifiable exterior phenomena which suggest the idea that they are due to the extraordinary intervention of an intelligent cause other than man.” Was that the case with the shaman? No, not necessarily. And what of Regan? Is that the case with her?

Karras turned to a passage he had bracketed in pencil in his copy of The Roman Ritual: “The exorcist will simply be careful that none of the patient’s manifestations are left unaccounted for.” Karras thoughtfully nodded. Okay, then. Let’s see. Pacing, he ran through the manifestations of Regan’s disorder along with their possible explanations. He ticked them off mentally, one by one:

The startling change in Regan’s features.

Partly her illness and partly undernourishment, although mostly, he concluded, it was due to physiognomy being an expression of one’s psychic constitution.

The startling change in Regan’s voice.

He had yet to hear her “real” voice, Karras thought. And even if that had been light, as reported by her mother, constant shrieking would thicken the vocal cords with a consequent deepening of the voice, the only problem here being the unexplained booming volume of that voice, for even with a thickening of the cords this would seem to be physiologically impossible. And yet, he considered, in states of anxiety or pathology, displays of paranormal strength in excess of muscular potential were known to be a commonplace. Might not vocal cords and voice box be subject to the same mysterious effect?

Regan’s suddenly extended vocabulary and knowledge.

Cryptomnesia: buried recollections of words and data she had once been exposed to, even in infancy, perhaps. In somnambulists—and frequently in people at the point of death—the buried data often came to the surface with almost photographic fidelity.

Regan’s recognition of him as a priest.

A good guess. If she had read the chapter on possession, she might have expected a visit by a priest. And according to Jung, the unconscious awareness and sensitivity of hysterical patients could sometimes be fifty times greater than normal, which Jung thought accounted for seemingly authentic “thought-reading” via table-tapping by mediums, for what the medium’s unconscious was actually “reading” were the tremors and vibrations created in the table by the hands of the person whose thoughts were supposedly being read. The tremors formed a pattern of letters or numbers. Thus Regan might conceivably have “read” his identity merely from his manner or even from the scent of holy oils on his hands.

Regan’s knowledge of the death of his mother.

Another good guess. He was forty-six.

“Couldjya help an old altar boy, Faddah?”

Textbooks in use in Catholic seminaries accepted telepathy as both a reality and a natural phenomenon.

Regan’s precocity of intellect.

This was by far the most difficult of all to explain. But in the course of personally observing a case of multiple personality involving alleged occult phenomena, the psychiatrist Jung had concluded that in states of hysterical somnambulism not only were unconscious perceptions of the senses heightened, but also the functioning of the intellect, for the new personality in the case in question seemed clearly more intelligent than the first. And yet did merely reporting the phenomenon explain it?

He abruptly stopped pacing and hovered by his desk, brought up short, as it suddenly dawned upon him that Regan’s pun on Herod was even more complicated than at first it had appeared, for when the Pharisees told Christ of Herod’s threats, the Jesuit remembered, Christ had answered: “Go and tell that fox that I cast out devils!”

Karras glanced at the tape of Regan’s voice, and then wearily sat down at the desk, where he lit another cigarette and blew out a ragged cone of bluish-gray smoke as he thought once again of the Burner boys and of the case of the eight-year-old girl who had manifested symptoms of full-blown possession. What book had this girl read that had enabled her unconscious mind to simulate the symptoms of possession to such perfection? And how did the unconscious of victims in China communicate the symptoms to the various unconscious minds of people possessed in Siberia, in Germany, in Africa and everywhere else in every culture and period of time, so that the symptoms were always the same?

“Incidentally, your mother is in here with us, Karras.”

The Jesuit was staring straight ahead, unseeing, wisps of smoke from the cigarette held between his fingers wafting up into life and then instant death like mistaken recognitions and one’s memory of dreams. He looked down at the left-hand bottom drawer of his desk, holding silent and still for several moments before at last leaning over, pulling open the drawer and extracting a faded English language exercise book for an adult education course. His mother’s. He set it on the desk, waited and then thumbed through the pages with a tender care. At first letters of the alphabet, over and over. Then simple exercises:

            LESSON VI

            MY COMPLETE ADDRESS

Between the pages, an attempt at a letter:

Dear Dimmy,

I have been waiting

Then another beginning. Incomplete. He looked away. Saw her eyes at the window … waiting…

“ ‘Domine, non sum dignus.’ ”

The eyes became Regan’s.

“ ‘Speak but the word…’ ”

Karras glanced again at the tape of Regan’s voice.

He left the room and took the tape to a campus language lab, found a tape recorder and sat down, carefully threaded the tape to an empty reel, clamped on earphones, turned a switch to the on position and then, exhausted and intense, he leaned forward and listened. For a time, only tape hiss. Squeaking of the mechanism. Suddenly, a thumping sound of activation. Noises. “Hello?” Then a whining feedback. Chris MacNeil, her tone hushed, in the background: “Not so close to the microphone, honey. Hold it back.” “Like this?” “No, more.” “Like this?” “Yeah, okay. Go ahead now, just talk.” Giggling. The microphone bumping a table. Then the sweet, clear voice of Regan MacNeil:

“Hello, Daddy? This is me. Ummm…” Giggling; then a whispered aside: “Mom, I can’t tell what to say!” “Oh, just tell him how you are, honey. Tell about all of the things you’ve been doing.” More giggling. “Umm, Daddy … Well, ya see … I mean, I hope you can hear me okay, and, umm—well, now, let’s see. Umm, well, first we’re—No, wait! See, first we’re in Washington, Daddy, ya know? It’s where the president lives, and this house—ya know, Daddy?—it’s—Darn! Daddy, wait, now; I better start over. See, Daddy, there’s…”

Karras heard the rest only dimly and as if from afar and through the roaring of blood in his ears, as through his being there swelled an overwhelming intuition:

The thing that I saw in that room wasn’t Regan!

Karras returned to the Jesuit residence hall, where he found an unoccupied cubicle and said his Mass before the early morning rush. As he lifted the Host in consecration, it trembled in his fingers with a hope that he dared not hope, that he fought with every particle and fiber of his will. “ ‘For this—is—My Body,’ ” he intoned with a whispered intensity.

No, it’s bread! It’s nothing but bread!

He dared not love again and lose. That loss was too great, that pain too keen. The cause of his skepticism and his doubts, his attempts to eliminate natural causes in the case of Regan’s seeming possession, was the fiery intensity of his yearning to be able to believe. He bowed his head and placed the consecrated Host in his mouth, where in a moment it would stick in the dryness of his throat. And of his faith.

After Mass, he skipped breakfast, making notes for his lecture, then met with his class at the Georgetown University Medical School, where he managed to thread hoarsely through the ill-prepared lecture: “… and in considering the symptoms of manic mood disorders, you will…”

“Daddy, this is me … this is me…”

But who was “me”?

Karras dismissed the class early and returned to his room, where he immediately sat at his desk and intently reexamined the Church’s position on the paranormal signs of demonic possession. Was I being too hard-nosed? he wondered. He scrutinized the high points in Satan: “Telepathy … natural phenomenon … even telekinesis, the movement of objects from a distance … our forefathers … science … nowadays we must be more cautious, the seeming paranormal evidence notwithstanding.” As he came to what followed, Karras slowed down the pace of his reading: “All conversations held with the patient must be carefully analyzed, for if they present the same system of association of ideas and of logicogrammatical habits that he exhibits in his normal state, the possession must then be held suspect.”

Karras gently shook his head. Doesn’t cut it. He glanced to the plate on the facing page. A demon. His gaze flicked down idly to the caption: “Pazuzu.” Karras shut his eyes and envisioned the death of the exorcist, Father Tranquille: the final agonies: the bellowing and the hissing and the vomiting, the hurlings to the ground from his bed by his “demons,” who were furious because soon he would be dead and beyond their torment. And then Lucas! My God! Father Lucas! Lucas kneeling at the dying Tranquille’s bedside, praying, and, at the moment of his death, Lucas instantly assuming the identity of Tranquille’s demons and viciously kicking at the still-warm corpse, at the shattered, clawed body strongly reeking of excrement and vomit, while four strong men were attempting to restrain him, for he did not stop, it was reported, until the corpse had been carried from the room. Could it be? wondered Karras. Could the only hope for Regan be the ritual of exorcism? Must he open up that locker of aches? He could not shake it or leave it untested. He must know. And yet how? Karras opened his eyes. “… conversations with the patient must be carefully…” Yes. Yes, why not? If discovery that Regan’s speech patterns and that of the “demon” turned out to be markedly different, that would leave possession open as a possibility, whereas if the patterns were the same, it would have to be ruled out.

Karras stood up and paced the room. What else? What else? Something quick. She—Wait a minute! Karras stopped in his tracks, staring down in thought. That chapter in the book on witchcraft. Had it mentioned…? Yes! Yes, it had! It had stated that demons invariably reacted with fury when confronted with the consecrated Host or with holy relics or even … Karras lifted his head and stared ahead with a sudden realization: And with holy water! Right! That could nail it one way or the other! He feverishly rummaged through his black valise. He was looking for a holy-water vial.

Willie admitted him to the house, and in the entry he glanced up toward Regan’s bedroom. Shouts. Obscenities. And yet not in the deep, coarse voice of the demon. Much lighter. Raspy. A broad British … Yes! It was the manifestation that had fleetingly appeared when Karras had last seen Regan.

Karras looked at a waiting Willie. She was staring in puzzlement at the round Roman collar, at the priestly robes.

“Where’s Mrs. MacNeil, please?”

Willie motioned him upstairs.

“Thank you.”

Karras moved to the staircase. Climbed. Saw Chris in the hall. She was sitting in a chair near Regan’s bedroom, head lowered, her arms folded across her chest. As the Jesuit approached, she heard the swishing of his robes, turned and saw him and quickly stood up. “Hello, Father.”

Karras frowned. There were bluish sacs beneath her eyes.

“Did you sleep?” he asked with concern.

“Oh, a little.”

Karras shook his head in admonishment. “Chris.”

“Well, I couldn’t,” Chris told him, motioning with her head at the door to Regan’s bedroom. “She’s been doing that all night.”

“Any vomiting?”

“No.” Chris took hold of the sleeve of his cassock as if to lead him away. “C’mon, let’s go downstairs where we can—”

“No, I’d like to see her,” Karras said firmly.

“Right now?”

Something’s wrong here, Karras reflected. Chris looked tense. Afraid. “Why not?” he asked.

She glanced furtively at Regan’s bedroom door. From within shrieked the hoarse, mad British voice: “Damned Naa-zi! Nazi bastard!” Chris looked down and aside. “Go ahead,” she said softly. “Go on in.”

“Got a tape recorder here in the house? You know, a little one; a portable?” asked Karras.

Chris looked up. “Yeah, we do, Father. Why?”

“Could you have it brought up to the room with a blank reel of tape, please?”

Abruptly, Chris frowned with incipient alarm. “What for? Hey, wait a minute, now. You mean, you want to tape Regan?”

“It’s important.”

“No way, Father! Absolutely not!”

“Look, I need to make comparisons of patterns of speech,” Karras said to her earnestly. “It could prove to the Church authorities that your daughter is really possessed!”

They both turned to the suddenly loud sound of an excoriating stream of obscenities directed at Karl as the house-man opened Regan’s bedroom door and emerged with a laundry sack filled with soiled diapers and bedding. His face ashen, he closed the door behind him, muting the continuing tirade.

“Get a fresh one on her, Karl?” Chris asked.

The manservant’s fearful glance went from Karras, then to Chris. “They are on,” he said tersely. He turned and walked quickly down the hallway to the staircase. Chris listened to his thumping, quick steps going down, and when the sounds had dwindled into silence, Chris turned to Karras, and with her shoulders slumping, looking downcast, she said quietly and submissively, “Okay, Father. I’ll have it sent up.”

And abruptly she was hurrying away down the hall.

Karras watched her. What was she hiding? he wondered. Something. Then noticing the sudden silence within, he moved to the bedroom door, opened it, entered, closed the door behind him quietly, and turned front. And stared. At the horror; at the emaciated, skeletal thing on the bed that was watching intently with mocking eyes that were filled with cunning and with hate and, most unsettling of all, with a posture of towering authority.

Karras moved slowly to the foot of the bed, where he stopped and then listened to the quiet rumbling of diarrhetic voiding into plastic pants.

“Why, hello, Karras!” Regan greeted him cordially.

“Hello,” the priest answered calmly. “Tell me, how are you feeling?”

“At the moment, very happy to see you. Yes. Very glad.” And now a long, furred tongue lolled out of the mouth while the eyes appraised Karras with naked insolence. “Flying your colors, I see. Very good.” Another rumbling. “You don’t mind a bit of stink, do you, Karras?”

“Not at all.”

“What a liar!”

“Does lying bother you?”

“Mildly.”

“But the Devil likes liars.”

“Only good ones, my dear Karras; only good ones. Moreover, who told you I’m the Devil?”

“Didn’t you?”

“Oh, I might have. I might. I’m not well. By the way, did you believe me?”

“Oh, I did.”

“Then my apologies in case I misled you. In fact, I’m just a poor struggling demon. A devil. A subtle distinction, but one not entirely lost upon Our Father in Hell. Nasty term, that—Hell. I’ve been mentioning we ought to think of changing it to the Scottish Dimension, but he never seems to listen. You won’t mention my slip of the tongue to him, Karras, now will you? Eh? When you see him?”

“See him? Is he here?”

“In the piglet? No such luck. We’re just a poor little family of wandering souls. By the way, you don’t blame us for being here, do you? After all, we have no place to go. No home.”

“And how long are you planning to stay?”

Face contorted in sudden rage, Regan jerked up from the pillow as she shouted in fury, “Until the piglet dies!” and then as suddenly, she settled back onto her pillows with a thick-lipped, drooling grin, saying, “Incidentally, what an excellent day for an exorcism.”

The book! She must have read that in the book!

The sardonic eyes were staring piercingly.

“Do begin it soon, Karras. Very soon.”

“You would like that?”

“Intensely.”

“But wouldn’t that drive you out of Regan?”

“It would bring us together.”

“You and Regan?”

“You and us, my dear morsel. You and us.”

Karras stared. At the back of his neck, he felt hands, icy cold and lightly touching. And then abruptly they were gone. Caused by fear? wondered Karras. Fear of what?

“Yes, you’ll join our little family,” Regan continued. “You see, the trouble with signs in the sky is that, once having seen them, one has no excuse. Have you noticed how few miracles one hears about lately? Not our fault, dear Karras. We try!”

Karras jerked around his head at a sudden loud banging sound. A bureau drawer had popped open, sliding out its entire length, and the priest felt a quick-rising thrill as he watched it abruptly bang shut. There it is! A verifiable, paranormal event! And then as suddenly, the emotion dropped away like a rotted chunk of bark from an ancient tree as the priest remembered psychokinesis and its various natural explanations. Hearing a low, sustained chuckling, he turned back to Regan. She was grinning. “How pleasant to chat with you, Karras,” she told him in that guttural voice; “I feel free. Like a wanton, I spread my great wings. In fact, even my telling you this will serve only to increase your damnation, my doctor, my dear and inglorious physician.”

“You did that? You made the dresser drawer move just now?”

The creature called Regan wasn’t listening. It had glanced toward the door, to the sound of someone rapidly approaching down the hall, and now its features turned to those of the other personality that had once before appeared. “Damned butchering bastard!” it shrieked in that hoarse, British-accented voice. “Cunting Hun!”

Through the door came Karl, moving swiftly with the tape recorder. Eyes averted from the bed, he handed it to Karras and then, ashen-faced, rapidly retreated from the room.

“Out, Himmler! Out of my sight! Go and visit your club-footed daughter! Bring her sauerkraut! Sauerkraut and heroin, Thorndike! She will love it! She will—!”

Karl had slammed the door shut behind him, and now abruptly the thing within Regan turned cordial. “Oh, yes, hullo hullo hullo! What’s up?” it said cheerily as it watched Karras setting down the tape recorder on a small round end table next to the bed. “Are we going to record something, Padre? How fun! Oh, I do love to playact, you know! Oh, yes, immensely!”

“Oh, good!” responded Karras, pushing down on the tape recorder’s red RECORD button with his index finger, causing a tiny red light to come on. “I’m Damien Karras, by the way. And who are you?”

“Are you asking for my credits now, ducks?” it said with a giggle. “Oh, well, I did play Puck in the junior class play.” It glanced around. “Where’s a drink, incidentally? I’m parched.”

“If you’ll tell me your name, I’ll try to find one.”

“Yes, of course,” it said, giggling again. “And then drink it all yourself, I suppose.”

“Why not tell me your name?” Karras asked.

“Fucking plunderer!”

With this, the British-accented identity vanished and was instantly replaced by the demonic Regan. “And so what are we doing now, Karras? Oh, I see. We’re recording. How quaint.”

Karras pulled up a chair beside the bed and sat down.

“Do you mind?” he said.

“Not at all. Read your Milton and you’ll see that I like infernal engines. They block out all those damned silly messages from ‘him.’ ”

“Who is ‘him’?”

The creature loudly broke wind. “There’s your answer.”

Abruptly a powerful stench assailed Karras. It was an odor like…

“Sauerkraut, Karras? Have you noticed?”

It does smell like sauerkraut, the Jesuit marveled. It seemed to be coming from the bed, from Regan’s body, and then it was gone, replaced by the putrid stench of before. Karras frowned. Did I imagine it? Autosuggestion? “Who’s the person I was speaking to before?” Karras asked.

“Merely one of the family.”

“A demon?”

“You give far too much credit. The word demon means ‘wise one.’ He is stupid.”

The Jesuit grew tautly alert. “Oh, really? In what language does demon mean ‘wise one’?” he asked.

“Why, in Greek.”

“You speak Greek?”

“Very fluently.”

One of the signs! Karras thought with excitement. Speaking in an unknown tongue! It was more than he’d hoped for. “Pos egnokas hoti piesbyteros eimi?” he asked quickly in classical Greek.

“I am not in the mood now, Karras.”

“Oh, I see. Then you really can’t—”

“I said, I am not in the mood!”

Karras looked aside, then back and asked amiably, “Was it you who made the drawer come sliding out?”

“Oh, most assuredly, Karras.”

Karras nodded. “Most impressive. You must be a very, very powerful demon.”

“Oh, I am, my dear morsel; I am. Incidentally, do you like it that at times I sound exactly like my older brother Screwtape?” A burst of high-pitched guffaws and raucous laughter. Karras waited for it to subside. “Yes, I do find that interesting,” he said; “but in the meantime, the drawer trick?”

“What about it?”

“It’s incredible! I was wondering if you’d do it again.”

“In time.”

“Why not now?”

“Why, we must give you some reason for doubt! Yes, just enough to assure the final outcome.” The demonic personality chuckled maliciously. “Ah, how novel to attack through the truth! Yes, ‘surprised by joy,’ indeed!”

Karras stared, icy fingers once again touching lightly at the back of his neck. Why the fear again? he wondered. Why?

Hideously grinning, Regan said, “Because of me.”

Karras stared, feeling wonder again, and then promptly chipped it down: In this state, she just might be telepathic.