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long as an hour. But it's the aftermath that cripples me. I'm so drained I can't function properly for hours.'
    'What are you taking?'
    'Tylenol Blue. They don't stop the pain but they dull it.'
    He nodded. 'Can you describe the pain?'
    She shrugged. 'It's like a red-hot needle plunging into my brain, injecting small explosive charges. Lights and stars flash before my eyes and I get nauseous. Sometimes, like today, I collapse.'
    Fleming grimaced. 'Sounds fun.' He paused and looked back at the image on his screen. 'The pain's always in the same place?'
    'Yeah.'
    'Where? Can you point at the exact location?'
    'There's still a dull throb here,' she said, raising her left hand to indicate the area. 'This is the exact spot.'
    Fleming nodded and again checked the image on the screen. She was pointing into space a few inches from her left temple.
    'Pretty weird, huh?' she said, looking self-conscious. She picked up the water-glass.
    He shrugged his shoulders. 'Unusual, yes, but not inexplicable.'
    The picture on the screen from Amber Grant's medical file showed an X-ray of two children facing in the opposite direction to each other. Their skulls were fused together, left temple to left temple, a contoured ridge of bone connecting them. But what made these Siamese twins even rarer was that they were fused not only at the skull but also at the brain. A significant section of their temporal lobe tissue overlapped, and yet, according to the records, both girls had had distinct personalities, exhibiting individual character traits.
    Amber Grant placed the glass on the desk, and Fleming noticed how slow and deliberate her movements were. When she sat still she inclined her head slightly to the left, as if listening over her shoulder.
    Her file had provided the details of her life: Amber and her twin Ariel had been born thirty-seven years ago to a poor Brazilian girl who couldn't afford to support normal twins, let alone Siamese. They had been dumped in a rundown hospital in Sao Paulo but, thanks to the intervention of a Jesuit priest, were adopted by a childless Catholic couple in the States.
    For the first eight years of their lives they lived happily with their adoptive parents in California. They used to be called the dancing twins because they moved and walked together as if they were waltzing. Ariel was always the strong one, the leader, while Amber was quieter. Then complications arose with Amber's kidneys. The twins shared their blood supply and for a time Ariel's kidneys functioned for both of them. Then it became evident that her heart was subsidizing Amber's and would soon give out under the extra demands placed upon it. If they weren't separated, and Amber's condition treated, not only would she die but she would kill her sister.
    There was an additional complication: although they were two separate personalities they shared a key section of brain tissue. There was a remote chance that both girls would survive with their minds intact, but the odds weren't good. However, their parents had little choice but to approve the operation. Within two months of the surgery Amber's heart and kidneys had stabilized and she was given a clean bill of health. But Ariel died on the operating table.
    Fleming didn't need Amber's medical notes to tell him she would always harbour guilt for the loss of her sister - who was amputated because Amber was killing her. Presumably this was why she had never had corrective surgery to construct a left ear and further diminish the scarring. According to her medical notes one psychologist had asked her about this. Amber Grant had replied, 'Why should I want plastic surgery? She was the best part of me.'
    Fleming looked at Amber and saw her studying him, her eyes challenging. 'So,' she said, 'any immediate thoughts?'
    He turned the computer screen round so that Amber could see the familiar X-ray image of her skull fused with her sister's. Pointing to an area of Ariel's temporal lobe, he said, 'The location of