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"Please, call me Winston The perpetrator" His voice trailed off as he considered the word and its implications "You think someone did this to me? You think I’m not just crazy?"

"You aren’t crazy, Winston," I said "We think you were affected by ic But we don’t knohy, and we aren’t sure how"

"There was another incident last night," Ethan explained "Don More people like you heard things that upset the this to people But we aren’t sure what That’s e’re here"

He nodded, pulled a hand across his jaw "All right All right"

"Winston, can you tell us about the voice you heard?" I asked "What was it saying?"

He scratched his temple "The only words I remember were ‘hello’ and ‘I am here’ He said those words a lot"

"He?" I asked "It was uess I didn’t think about that, but yes I think it was a male voice It was deep in that way I had the sense he wanted so and confused and needed to be acknowledged"

"He was hurt?" I asked "He needed help?"

"Maybe, but I don’t really know It wasn’t that specific, if you understand , really"

Ethan nodded "Could you tell where the voice was co from?"

"No, other than inside my head, I mean I know that sounds crazy, but I could hear him--really hear him, like someone turned up the volume on the television It wasn’t like a hallucination, or like I was pretending It was real, except I was the only one who could hear it"

"Was it only a sound?" Ethan asked "Did you happen to see anything? Hear anything else?"

"Well, no It was just the words Just the saain And loud So very loud" He rubbed his earlobe, winced

Ah, but it wasn’t just the noise, was it? "What about s?"

He looked confused "S?"

"When you heard the voice, orit, did you saze slightly unfocused as he considered the question "Now that you o, I worked at a plant in Skokie--we made certain beauty products--nail polish and the like There was usually a whiff of solvent in the air

"When I first started hearing the voice, I guess, I s like that Not the same, but an industrial kind of smell, if that makes sense"

"It does make sense," I said, and Winston’s smile was appreciative