The intelligence officer left and came back with the little Karee. Besseh crooked his neck to look at George.

A violent tide of tears rose in the ambassador's eyes. He blinked, scattering light. "I can't remember. Oh, Jesus God. I can't remember."

Besseh put out a calming hand that stopped some inches above George's arm. "Yes, yuma," it told him softly and with some hint of compassion. "I eat the memories. I tell you this."

"Get out!" George screamed at the two other humans. Both men hesitated a moment before they left the room.

The little Karee stood before him, less mysterious in the light from the open door. "You simpering, ugly dwarf," George said. "You made me forget her. Goddamn you. I know you hate us, but how could you do that?"

"Sit. You will be tired."

He sat on the cot. Besseh sat on the stool next to him. In a moment George gave in to exhaustion and laid down. The ceiling of Besseh's room was black with soot.

"The memories are good, George," Besseh told him. It smacked its lips. "Tasty memories. I understand yuma flow. Only sometimes is your words pus. But Lauren is different. More like a Karee, I think. Hah. You love her for make you laugh, and hate us for laughing. Stupid, the yumas, like I say."

George flicked a glance to the side. Besseh was smiling, more sure of itself. Irony suited the magician better than servitude. "I can remember the last few months with her. I can remember that. But I can't remember how we met, or the first house we lived in."

"We don't finish because the stupid yuma come and think you dead."

"How much, Besseh? How much besides Lauren do you remember?"

With a groan the Karee rose and walked to a barrel of drinking water. Besseh dipped in a cup. "You don't tell me you be ambassador, ta?"

"I tried. You wouldn't listen."

Besseh stuck out its lower lip. "Well, the body is stupid, but sometimes the mind, it stupid, too. When I eat memory, I have to eat everything."

The ambassador knew the governmental secrets were important. He knew that, but it didn't seem to matter. His mind was besieged with Lauren's death and the rest of his thoughts were laid waste.

He pictured her, but the image of her face was faded somehow, as if usage had dulled the colors. "In my mind she's got four months to live. I'll always remember her as dying."

One hand to its contorted back as if its spine were sore, the Karee shuffled its way back to the stool and sat. "I never stop in the middle before like this. Maybe I shouldn't eat more."

"What would you do?"

Besseh sat quietly for a moment, its hands in its lap.

"What would you do if you were me, Besseh Yo?"

The Karee nodded. "I seen this a lot, this sort of bad stomach like you got. I would live it. The hurt in you should come out like vomit."

The magician was a brown gnome crippled by the weight of vicarious pain. "Is that what it's like, eating vomit? Does it hurt you, Besseh, going down?"

There was a jerk of the bent shoulders. Besseh was surprised by the question. "I don't keep the memory, yuma. When you finish, and I am full, I go and wash her away in the water. All will be gone," Besseh warned him. It leaned forward so close that George could smell the musky, dank odor of its body. "Be gone, understand? Everything. Secrets. Lauren. Everything. Can't get it back never."

"I understand." At that moment George realized how much he had loved Lauren. He loved her enough to give up his happiest memories to end the pain of her loss. "Please do it," be said before he could change his mind.

He closed his eyes and felt the moist press of Besseh's hand on his forehead. George wanted to utter some murmur of gratitude. His mouth wouldn't work.

And Lauren was laughing in the kitchen.

Something hit him hard in the chest. He opened his eyes to see Besseh over him. George put his hands to his face and discovered he had been crying. He couldn't remember why.

"Men still outside, George."

"Yes." He sat up. His staff was angry with him. But why had he come to the Karee's house? he wondered. It was something vaguely connected with a death. "You help me? You protect me? I only do what you ask for."

George hesitated. "I'll protect you," he said. It seemed as if, for some reason, he and the magician had known each other for years. George's trust was instinctual, as it would have been for a good, close friend.

The magician handed him a cup of water and twisted its head so it could see him. "Lauren," it said.

"Yes? Should I remember?"

Besseh rose stiffly and walked over to the barrel. For a moment the magician simply stared downwards. George felt a tug of sympathy and more than a clutch of fear. Then Besseh raised its hands and brought them in a slow downward plunge to the water.

"Wait!" George said.

The gnarled hands paused a scant inch above the liquid surface. Besseh turned towards him.

"Should I?" George asked anxiously. He hated to see those hands come down. The movement seemed so final, but he wasn't sure why. "Should I remember?"

For a moment the magician regarded him. "No," Besseh whispered. His voice was nearly lost in the splash his hands made.