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"I don't know why I'm following you," Seri said. "You're going to leave me, aren't you?"

I said nothing until I had to: Seri looked exhausted and miserable.

"I've got to find Gracia," I said at last.

"There is no Gracia."

"I've got to be sure." Somewhere here was London, somewhere in London was Gracia. I knew I would find her in a white room, one where blank paper lay scattered across the floor, like islands of plain truth, auguring what was to come. She would be there, and she would see how I had emerged from my fantasy.

Now I was complete.

"Don't go on believing, Peter. Come back to the islands with me."

"No, I can't. I've got to find her."

Seri waited, staring at the litter-strewn pavement.

"You're an athanasian," she said, and it seemed to me that she said it in desperation, a last attempt. "Do you know what that means?"

"I'm afraid it means nothing to me now. I don't believe it ever happened."

Seri reached up to me, touched me high on my neck, behind my ear. There was still a sensitive place there, and I winced away.

"In the islands you will live forever," she said. "If you leave the islands you become ordinary. The islands are eternal, you will he timeless."

I shook my head emphatically. "I don't believe any more, Seri. I don't belong."

"Then you disbelieve in me."

"No, I don't."

I tried to embrace her but she pushed me away.

Seri said--"I don't want you to touch me. Go and find Gracia."

She was crying. I stood there indecisively. I was scared that London was not there, that Gracia would have gone.

"Will I find you again?" I said.

Seri said--When you have learnt where to look.

Too late I realized she had receded from me. I stumbled away from her and stood by the side of the road, waiting for a gap in the traffic. Carts and trams rushed past. Then I saw there was a pedestrian underpass, so I went through, losing sight of Seri. I began to run, clambering up to the surface on the other side. For a moment I thought I knew where I was, but when I looked back

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Christopher Priest is the author fo five previous novels, including _The Perfect Lover_, and most recently of _An Infinite Summer_, a colledtion of stories published in 1979 to wide acclaim.