Time Out of Mind by John R. Maxim Page A

asked. But he did not seem upset by the question.
    “ I'm quite serious,” she said evenly. ”I assumed you'd want to get to the root of all this. And it strikes me that a psychiatrist might help you do so more dispassionately than you're likely to manage by yourself.”
    “ It struck me too,” he admitted. “Months ago. But can you imagine how long it would take a shrink to even get around to considering the possibility that I'm haunted? Be sides, it's almost spring. If the ghost only turns up when it snows, I might spend the next eight months thinking the guy really helped me and then be right back where I started as soon as the temperature drops below freezing again.”
    “ This ghost is in your mind, Jonathan. Surely you realize that.”
    “ Yes, I do.” Now he did let go of her hand. He pushed to his feet and wandered the several steps to Gwen's win dow, holding back the curtains long enough to see that the snow rushing past the streetlight had not slackened. “But it's real,” he added.
    “ Jonathan—”
    “ Don't bother saying that it's only real to me. I'm dreaming things, even seeing things, that did happen. I'm seeing details I don't think I could possibly imagine unless I'd lived with them and remembered them. I know almost nothing about horse-drawn vehicles and yet right now I could name almost every kind of carriage or wagon I've seen on those streets. I can tell you how to drive a drag and I could probably show you. I could see some of those carriages in the street and be able to tell you what family owns them from a block away. The Vanderbilts, for ex ample, always had maroon livery. The Astors' was blue. I can remember slang phrases and speech idioms I've never heard anyone use in my life. ‘Throw him down, McClos key' springs to mind.”
    “ Who is McCloskey?”
    “ No one. I mean, it's a saying. It's the equivalent of ‘Watch out’ or ‘That's all she wrote.’ It's probably from a song of a popular joke of the time. I can even tell you who I heard use it. It was a big tough Irishman named John Fl ood who I think taught the ghost how to fight. I know other things too. I can tell you the styles of clothing people wore. I can even tell you what they drank in cold weather. And as long as you've made up your mind that I'm slipping over the edge, I'll tell you that you can also add paranoia to your diagnosis. There's a man out there who hates me and wants me dead.”
    “ The man you thrashed in the bar?”
    “ As it happens, yes.” Corbin's voice remained strong. ”A man I, or someone, beat hell out of several lifetimes ago is still out there and he's after me. How's that for funny-farm material?”
    Gwen ignored this last. “You've considered, I suppose, that you might have lived before.”
    “ Which would make me a different kind of nuts.”
    “ Not at all. A third of the world believes in reincarna tion. Who's to say they're all wrong?”
    Corbin shook his head. “This is not the same. Those people feel they've lived a lot of different lives without really knowing very much about any one of them. I don't feel like I've lived before. What's going on here is that I remember very specific events and even emotions in the life of a man who was definitely not me. But I'm seeing them through his eyes. Whatever that is, it's not like any reincarnation I've ever heard of.”
    “ The house you bought in Connecticut. Was it his house?”
    ” I don't know. I don't think so. Everything about it seemed familiar except the upper floors. It's like I've been there but only as a guest. The damnedest thing about it is that I don't feel like him when I'm in that house. It's a very different feeling. Very happy. Like a...” Corbin let his voice trail off.

“ Like someone else entirely?” Gwen asked. ”A third person?”
    ” I don't know. Maybe. When I try to make sense out of that I just... The truth is I don't even try. I just enjoy it.”
    “ Jonathan”—she rose to her knees—“perhaps