Roger looks around as he's trying to figure out who to call next, with Sophie MIA. He spots a note on the fridge under his church key.
Charlie called, 1540. He She needs rum, dice for some hotsy totsy at office. Sounds wild!
The note is signed with a little cutesy cartoon angel holding a triangle so the effect of its the wings match the MARPA symbol.
"Oh, fuck. 3:40? That was hours ago. Wait, Charley? Rum? What kind of sick joke is this, now?" Roger covers his aching head with his hands.
"You don't get to do this, I don't care how big a saint you are."
Roger again considers calling Jo. So risky. But maybe it's serious. He stands there with the phone in his hand until the off-hook tone starts buzzing at him.
Then it hits his slow-as-molasses brain: "Oh, the Hotsy Totsy! Oh. Jo." He thinks about that night, and how much Jo knows about the feel of the loa, and their camaraderie. "Shit, it's Jo. She's too smart for that asshole, and for me. Yeah, I gotta call her." He taps the cradle until the line tone hums. Then he dials Livermore again.
Back at Livermore, Jocasta, consigned to hanging around to make sure Charley is okay and looking forward to another night on the Good Vibes Couch, picks up the line when Roger calls in. "Menos, go ahead," she says wearily.
"Jo! You are there. It's Roger. Man, I am so sorry. I know it's later than, uh, I probably promised. I'm, uh, not in a good way, but I can drive in right now if you or Charley need me to."
"It's your call, honestly, Roger -- I don't want to put you out if you're not feeling well," she replies. "It's just been a really insane day. I assume you heard about Sophie?"
"Yeah, you don't know the half of it. I mean about the insane day, not about Sophie. I mean, I got some bureaucratic answers on her being out, but not the straight dope. Which I'm guessing has something to do with this. Yeah, maybe I had better come in, if you can wait. Doesn't Charley have to head home, though?"
"Maybe. That's what's thorny about this -- Archie seems very distracted at the moment, and there are some issues with Charley that have just come to light that make communications difficult," Jo responds with a tired voice. "She doesn't want to talk on the phone, which I don't think I can blame her for, and she's making some odd requests. By even our definition of odd, I mean. Hold on a second." She again cups her hand over the receiver.
"Charley, do you need to get home with Archie? I've got Roger on the phone, but he's not feeling well. Do you want to wait until tomorrow, or should I ask him to come in? Or do you want to ask Archie if you can come to my house, or to Roger's?"
“What’s wrong with Roger?”
"I'm not sure! He just said he's not in a good way. He might have just partied a little too hard on the 4th. But he says he'll come in if you need him."
“Ok ….” Charley thinks a moment. “Can we go to his place? I’ll talk to Dad. I’ll tell him I’m going to sleep over your place, that we’re going to watch a movie. The Wizard of Oz.”
"If it's okay with Archie, it's okay with me," Jocasta responds, now kind of wanting to drop acid and watch The Wizard of Oz for real. But maybe later. She uncovers the receiver.
"Roger, can we come over there?"
Charley not waiting. "I’ll go ask him!" And runs out.
Roger looks around the mess of his place and cringes. “Yeah, just… man, Jo, I hope Charley can deal with adult stuff as well as she seems. I don’t want to mess her up more with my crazy right now. “
“You know I’m usually good on my promises. So you will know what I mean when I say I won’t promise this will be OK. I’m here, I always will try. So come over. But for once, no promises.”
"Believe me, I'm probably as in over my head right now as you are. We all are, I'm sure of it." She sees Charley running excitedly towards the door. "We'll be there in a bit. Thanks, Roger."
Charley barges into the office. “Dad! Can I go over to Jo’s place? She’s never seen the Wizard of Oz and it’s on tv tonight! It would be fun to watch it with her!! So can I go please?”
"Jocasta's never seen The Wizard of Oz???" Archie's surprised, verging on affronted. Then he thinks maybe it's Charley who's never seen it, and she's just saying it's Jo. "I suppose it's fine with me as long as it is with Jo ... She did invite you? You didn't invite yourself, did you?"
(Obviously I'm not going to get in the way of this excellent team-up - but did we decide if Special Rapport gave Archie any sense of what's up with Charley today? or a Psychology roll right now? is she wearing a tin foil hat?)
Well, I can answer the last question first, she is most definitely wearing a tinfoil hat, but you know, maybe that's just a tribute to Revere Mass.'s own Tin Woodsman himself, Jack Haley.
Special Rapport would have given Archie the weird feeling that Charley had a bit of a weird nightmare during the afternoon nap she took, but overall Charley seems determined and excited, mood-wise!
But Archie could give us a Detect Lies at a 17 if he wants.
And Charley can give an IQ roll (at a 15).
So with that ... Archie doesn't necessarily see that anything is off with Charley.
“Nooo? She asked me! We’re dressing up too. I’m the Tin Man and she’s going to be the good witch!”
He gives her a squeeze and lets her go, then. "Okay ... Have fun, pumpkin!" It crosses his mind to warn Charley that parts of the movie are scary, but then he feels foolish for thinking that.
(If Archie sees Jo on the way out the door, he cheerfully tells her, "Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!")
“Thanks Dad!” And she runs over to Archie to give him a peck on the cheek before she quickly makes her exit.
The phone call lights a fire under Roger's ass. He starts up a pot of coffee percolating, and quickly throws a bunch of bottles, cans, and other party detritus into big plastic garbage bags. He looks at the bedroom, calls it a loss, and just shoves everything under the bed and straightens the bed cover. There's something more important to tend to.
After a good cup of joe, and taking a fresh one with him, he heads to a small closet off the main room. Pulling open twin folding track doors, he reveals his altars. Three tiers, made of a table and closet shelves, are overflowing with bottles of drink and candles in glass, pictures in glass, pictures on cards, and statues and dolls. Fresh cigars and stubs of ones litter small plates and more than one shot glass. Pinned in various spots all over the altars are bills of all kinds of denominations and origins. A few choice pieces of clothing sit perched, ready to wear, on top of all, most noticeable two glorious silk hats, each with a feathered band. The whole melange of sacred accumulation spills across the tiers. Two poles painted white and red are propped leaning in a corner. Under the table are a few buckets of chalk and salt and glass mason jars with flour and corn meal.
But despite all this crowding across, the setup is still mostly split in two: two altars. There is a grouping to the right in shades of white and cream, with images of St. Peter and a lame black man, crowned with the white silk hat. And then to the left a grouping in black, with pictures of stage magic devils, a woodcut of a Black man coming out of woods, a color portrait of one standing at a crossroads, all under a goat-head skull that supports the black top hat of the two.
He takes a bit of a clean white cloth and dusts the glass off a few of the main images in picture frames, but he doesn't touch the dust between most of the items. He lights a candle, first on the right, always to the Opener of the Way first, but then on the left as well. Then, deliberately, he carefully rearranges a few items between the two groupings, crowding them a bit more, to make a small clear space in the middle. He gathers a few ticket stubs from "Live and Let Die", the MARPA pin, and a promotional still of Roger Moore surrounded by the main cast, and lays them out, trying various different ways to best arrange them. He takes one of the empty bottles of vermouth that didn't go into the trash, that he doesn't remember drinking from, and places it down. He digs out a pair of live bullets from an ammo case, and puts them down as well.
"Look," he says to the new altar, then starts again. "Now see here, my good fellow," he tries in a hopefully apt turn of phrase, "I promise to give you a new cocktail shaker, and a gun, and more time with the ladies, but I call on you to rest, for now, for this night." He stops himself, whispers, "No, that's not right. What would you say? Ugh, I wish Sophie could help me here. Oh, I remember." He snaps his fingers. "From the pub." He finds a bell from another section, and rings it, once. "Last orders, gentlemen, last call." He puts a pound coin and some pennies from Wales down on the new altar, then turns to Papa Legba on the right, thanks him, then backs away from the three altars. Leaving the door open, he goes and crashes on the couch, and sips his second cup of coffee.
Jocasta was in a bit of a rush to get to Roger's, and hopefully avoided the law with her foot pressed on the Javelin's accelerator most of the way into the City. Having stopped at a sketchy corner store, she buys a bottle of Bacardi, a pair of dice, a fresh pack of Slims, a new lighter, and a treat for Charley. Packing her bag with her sketchbook, her sidearm, and a small notebook, she finds a place to park near Roger's apartment. A line from The Wizard of Oz flits through her head: "You have no power here." She says it to herself a few times, internally, before she starts to wonder who exactly she's really addressing it to.
She looks at Charley in the passenger seat and asks if she's ready to go up.
"READY."
Jocasta smiles gamely and knocks on the door.
Charley is as excited as a dancing rabbit inside an egg that contains the heart of a wizard.
Roger opens the door widely, and puts on a cheery face. “Welcome, weary travelers. Welcome to my humble abode. Mi casa es su casa. Careful on the stairs there.” Roger leads his latest female companionship out of the eyes of his neighbors. He’s thinking about how he’s sure to hear some kind of word from Mrs. Alvarez later about finding a nice girlfriend with a family. Roger sighs, then apologizes for the sigh. Then apologizes for the state of the place. It’s quite “funky” in both the hip and olfactory senses of the word. He becomes a whirlwind of cleaning up right in front of wherever Charley starts to walk.
Jo and Charley would probably notice the framed (and signed) Mansa poster on one wall, the shiny silver HiFi and the egg crate shelves of LPs as first highlights.
(I imagine Charley close under Roger's foot. And with her child radar catching sight of the thing he'd prefer her not see. Then likely asking "What's that?")
Roger hides the bra she manages to spot before he does. “That’s a friend’s.” He explains the crucifix with Jesus with an Afro more to Jo with, “Well, it’s how I see Him” and a shrug. This could in fact go on for a while: Roger has a lot of eclectic gifts in the clutter.
When Charley points and asks about the flag on the wall and the photos below it, Roger will point out the one with a young(er) Dr. Redgrave in it, looking fairly intense with shorter hair. “Still not regulation cut: I don’t know how he got away with it.”
“So … wait, don’t touch that one. So, what … no, that’s for adults only … so, what brings you here?
"Don't look at me," Jocasta laughs as Roger dashes around tidying up an apartment that's still cleaner than her house. "We were all a little shaken up by the news about Sophie, but I was happy to let you have the day off until Dorothy Gale here insisted on seeing you." She reaches into her bag and pulls out the Bacardi and the bones. "I come bearing gifts -- or, rather, Charley does."
Roger physically winces at the bottle before he can stop himself. But he gets it quickly under control, and looks at Charley respectfully. “Oh, that’s kind. I’m a little … a little too under the weather to enjoy this right fully now. What are you thinking we get up to? A toast to our distant friend?”
"I'll let Charley clue you in to start -- like I said, this was all her scheme. I'm going to use your little girl's room, if you don't mind."
At some point early on, Jocasta is going to excuse herself to use the bathroom at Roger’s place and while she’s in there, she’ll make a very quick sketch of the monstrous observers she saw when she did her thing with Charley. She’ll also jot down:
“Chip in Charley’s head put there by these people. Seem more like the enemy than our people but not sure. They can see and hear what she does. She thinks she’s shut it down for now but I’m not sold. Not sure what to do but assume that what we say to her and show her, they see.”
She’ll then fold it up and leave it somewhere she hopes Charley won’t see but Roger will spot: on an end table, or under a glass on the sink or something.
Charley watches Jo fade into a dim hallway before responding, "A distant friend? Yes, let's do that, Roger. Water for me, water for you, and rum for a distant friend."
Feeling further inspired jumps up and goes towards the LP collection. "And how 'bout a little music!"
"Do you have anything from the Jazz Age?"
“Well, maybe. A bit before my usual, but I have an album or two of old stuff. I’m pretty sure there’s some Billie Holiday from her early Columbia days. Some trumpet players my mom liked. Are you looking for something for you, or for our mood?”
"Oh I don't know? I guess the mood?"
"I just thought Jazz met most get-together moods." Charley, looks unsure of that last statement.
“Here.” He makes a spread of some of the LPs in a fan. “Pick a card, any card.”
Smiling, "OK. This one."
“Sure. Uh, could be a little loud with the trumpet solos. Let me just play with the treble and bass a bit.” Roger goes to the stereo and fiddles with the needle. Once the record is going, he takes a good look at Charley.
“Is this good? Charley. Are you OK? What do you need, coming here?”
Charley watches the record spin and lets the music speak to her as she searches for a way to explain. Then impulsively takes Roger's hand, squeezes it tightly, looks up at him, and says, "I need Papa's help."
Roger nods. “I thought it might be. He told me not to shut up his house.” Roger squeezes her hand back. “Come over and see.”
Jocasta emerges from the bathroom, having freshened up, and sits respectfully on a chair, waiting for Charley's lead and taking a look around the apartment. Her mind keeps running back childhood memories of her parents taking her to see The Wizard of Oz.
Gently holding Charley's hand, Roger guides her over to the open closet. "You've seen the house, but here, meet the roommates." He grins, then he slightly bows to the altars, "No disrespect meant, mes très chers saints. These are not my roommates, naturellement... they really have houses all their own, ici." Roger swings his arm wide, palm up, indicating the whole scene, like a host or a stage magician. Charley and Jo also notice Roger dropping more French, like it's a fancy restaurant or something. Maitre d' Roger acts a bit like he's serving up a four course dinner, maybe at some Parisian jazz joint, what with the music.
Roger reaches over and unfolds two folding chairs, kept convenient against the nearby wall. Both have a knitted seat cover with an abstract pattern in rainbow colors. "Here, I have seats. Ah, the covers? Made by une chere voisine, uh, a good neighbor I have. I do this quite a bit, you see. I think I told you once, I've been doing this kind of talking to the saints for folks, since I was just a little older than you. I don't remember the first time my grand-mère held my hand and showed me her saints, but she did, many times. I do remember I always had a hundred questions for her, but she was strict. She only answered the serious ones, and chided me for the rest."
"Have a seat. Remember, this is a sacred space. What is said here will be kept private. Now, take your time to prepare your questions in your mind... " Roger catches himself going on. "Oh, sorry, force of habit." Roger seems to relax a bit and drop a little of his airs. "Hey, Charley, don't pay my showman act any mind. You go ahead and ask your questions: I know you're smarter than I was, probably than I ever will be."
Charley, briefly admires the colors and geometry of the cushions before taking a seat between Roger and Jo. And as Roger presents the small honorific houses she imagines three men. One peers from a window, one stands arms crossed in his doorway. And the third sits on his porch, smiling in a old light blue rocking chair. She sees them as they might be. Then hearing her name switches her attention to the host and says, "I don't know Roger. I don't feel very smart." Then fusses with her tin-hat that has become increasingly uncomfortable. Then under her breath says, "I feel frightened.”
She notices the man is out of the chair and has come close to the edge of his abode and is leaning forward with his ear cupped in a speak up kinda gesture. She then let’s it out. “I’m frightened, Papa Legba! I’m frightened!”
Given he already promised to dispense with ceremony, Roger cuts to the abbreviated liturgy. He looks to one of the several printed vevers of Papa Legba on the altar, and concentrates. He whispers, “her gift is still on the counter, but it is here. Come, Legba, come. Come to your supplicant, open the way…”. He repeats “Legba” until he can fall into a trance.
Roger lurches unexpectedly to one side, and has to catch himself on the table. "Pardonne moi, I did not mean to startle." Roger's voice is huskier, cracked with old age. He reaches over into a corner, and plucks up a cane. He takes the white hat from its perch, but only to doff it to the ladies present. He looks to Jo: "ah, mon cherie, enchanting as always. And the little one? La petite écolière." He lets out a deep laugh. "Yes, the petit-beurre, do you know them? With chocolat, they are "little schoolboys." A little schoolgirl is even more charmante! Papa loves all the sweets."
"Now, mon petite écolière, what have you to fear? I am here. Tell Papa."
Charley has inadvertently moved her chair closer to Jo during Roger’s transformation. She studies him a moment before saying anything.
“I’m ah, in trouble … And as much, as I THINK! AND THINK! About, all the ways to get out of it ... I lose … And I … I CAN’T.” Charley stops, looks at the alter again. Papa Legba’s house is flickering in and out. The second house is on fire. Shattered kerosene lamps, lay about the yard, where the man from the doorway, dances wildly, suddenly stops and then turns to smoke. Last is the house with man in the window. He is still there, but now wears a Heckle (or is it Jeckle) mask.
Charley takes a breath before she continues. "I know you help Roger. And well. I thought maybe you can help me with what I want or with what I really want?"
Papa clucks his old tongue, as he leans on his cane and takes a good look at the postulant. "Tsk -- so serious, and so troubled, for one so young ... but ah, not so young are you. I see a soul, an old one. Ma oui, been through my gates before, many times. So the child has grown up quick. Tsk, tsk -- seems so long for this one before rest. But who is Papa to say? C'est les vies." Papa chuckles at his own joke. "The way is opened, the way is closed, all to the grand design."
Papa bends over to bring Roger's head close to the top of Charley's. "Hmm, and not just the one soul." He suddenly taps the side of Charley's head, lightly, with the head of his cane. "Petite écolière, there's too many in your little schoolhouse."
At that comment, in Charley's mind, Houdini-Chip mutters a bit, says (maybe a bit petulantly) to Charley, "Maybe you should tell him that my presence here is at least partially keeping all of them from being spied upon."
Papa Legba rises up, but slowly, a hand on his back, and never getting quite straight upright. He hooks the cane on an arm, and takes the white hat back up. He snatches some things right off his altar, hard to tell what, tosses them in the hat, and starts shaking and rolling it. He is humming some strange air to himself. With a flourish, he pops the hat back on his head, then off again, and with a flick of his wrist, spills the contents of the hat back out on the altar, the coins and bones and bits of string (?) flying randomly over it. He pops the hat back on Roger's bald head, and secures it in place with a tap on the top. A great deal of dust is disturbed by this all and he peers into the chaos intently. Other than some humming, hemming, and tsking, he does nothing else for a minute or two.
Then in the middle of what seems like another bit of song, he stops, points with the cane at the altar, and knocks over a pile of coins. They cascade down from one level to the next, then off the table, but before they hit the floor, his hand has snapped out rapidly and caught them. "Mais oui, secret treasure. We wouldn't want that getting out ... tsk tsk. Or maybe that's the best thing?" He lets the coins he has drop from his hand... but then his hat is somehow right underneath to catch them as they fall. He peers into his hat, then he puts it on his head. One of the coins is half-visible, almost slipping out, but caught by the headband. He reaches up, takes that coin, and tosses it back on the altar.
"Well, as the omens go, pas terrible à voir, hem, not so frightening. So. You wish help with what you desire, or what you truly desire? You did think, indeed: high marks, mon écolière, because you have reasoned enough to see those may be two different things. I see you desire to be safe, but also to know; desire family, but also aventure. But, ah, what do you truly desire? And what should you risk for it? You have thoughts plenty, but thinking will only spin you. You have deep cares, but dwelling in your heart will only frighten you. It is not the little brains or the feeling heart that you need here. It is the will, to do, to act: le courage."
Jocasta sits raptly, watching Papa Legba take possession of Roger's mind and body. Another quote from The Wizard of Oz flits across her memory, something about courage and wisdom, but she can't remember exactly how it goes.
Roger's voice goes bold and strong, and his eyes open wider: "I am the Opener of the Way. And I am also the Guardian of the Threshold. To me were given the keys to bind and to loose. I know all locks, all things bound." But then, he goes softer, kinder again. "I see you have bound up a treasure, precious to you-- so precious you do not even want to speak of it, for fear of its loss. And I see those who you fear taking it, that they already have the key. These are terrifying things, n'est-ce pas? It gives me no joy to remind you of them. But this is the teacher's lesson today: it is written, do not store up treasures, where thieves break through and steal. And, dear one, it is also written, you should not hide your light under a bushel. You will have to be strong, and courageous, and live out and in the open, in the light. You have a beautiful light. But non, this does not mean that your enemies gain your precious treasure. No, they will only receive your light, and in it the glint of fool's gold. Are you brave to try this? If so, Papa will tell you how."
Charley clasps her hands together as Papa Legba speaks. Her face grows hot, and her eyes are wet. When he finishes, she pulls from her pocket a set of fixed dice (she intended to switch with the good) into Roger's hand. "I'm sorry, and I'm ready."
"Another gift?" He shakes the dice. He tosses them into his hat, and shakes the hat. He looks, tries again. "Ha ha! Une fille filou! J'adore! Hidden tricks: you will need that certainement! But not for me; save that for my neighbor"-- he rolls Roger's eyes at the black side of the altar-- "and your thieves."
"No, there is no hidden price you must pay me, nor must you trick a reward from me. You will find the price you have to pay hard enough. But if you know what you desire more, still you will choose to pay it."
"I gave you three short lessons, but a good teacher will expound; so too will I. Because of the thieves, I must needs use la parabola, the parable, but ask mon cheval", and he taps Roger's chest, "and he should understand."
"The first lesson: do not store up treasures, where thieves break through and steal. Here is the price: you must empty the store house, and give away your treasure, until you have separated the dross from the gold. And you must never horde as high a pile again. Your mind, your heart, the treasure itself: they will cry to keep them, but you must separate the chaff from the wheat."
"The second lesson: do not hide your light under a bushel. Here is the how: go to la maison du coq, the rooster's house. There, catch the lightning to fashion a lamp from fool's gold, a lamp to shine brighter than your treasure, but only in the shade beloved of thieves. Wear this as a gres gres and walk freely, shining forth."
"The third lesson: you desire safety, knowledge, family, aventure, which is true? Here is the why: the one that leads to all the others is your truest desire; let it be your deepest motivation."
"Now, mon petite écolière, I have given you three lessons, so like a good schoolmaster, I give you leave to ask questions three to match. But be mindful what you ask, as my lessons are only for you."
Charley forms her hands into fists and asks her first question, "Is my mother dead?"
“Oh, cherie.” Papa looks crestfallen and sad. “I do not know. This may give you hope, that she has not passed by my gates. But to be true as I promised, a good teacher, I must say, there are other ways to cross, other ferrymen. And as you know, sometimes the body is lost, but the spirit does not come, finding other shelter. I would rather have given you a sure answer, that she walks the earth for you to find, or does not, but about the next realm, to mortals, no answer is ever sure ... except the last.”
Charley swallows her heartache and says, "Oh." then studies the floor as she searches for a second question. She thinks of timelines and gods, and what Papa Legba might know of these things, then a simple question comes. "What would you, ask you, if you were me?"
Papa Legba is clearly quite charmed by Charley's innocence; Roger's eyes twinkle. "To give up one question to get the best question: très ingénieuse! -- but also dangerous. I am flattered by the trust you put in me; I would not try such with other loa, if I were you, as you say."
Papa Legba takes some time, and he twists his cane in his hands as he considers. "As your current schoolmaster, I must chide you: in such matters, you should add a specific of benefit, and not word things so existentially. I cannot be you, and I do not have to give you a question to your benefit. But, lesson learned, non, mon écoliére? I will take your question as, 'what is the best question for my benefit that I should ask you next, considering what you know, Papa Legba, not what I know?' But, tristement, having given to me the work a good student should have done herself to craft a question, you will have to give me the time to think on it. So now, malheureusement, I must bid you adieu to do so. Do not fear, I know the value mortals put on time: it will be soon. Au revoir."
With that, he doffs his hand to the ladies one more time, bowing as he is able, then he puts up the hat and cane. A beat later, Roger straightens up, and looks about.
The silence in the room between Charley, Jocasta, and now-Roger-again is palpable after Papa Legba departs. Roger looks a little worn out but certainly the exhaustion is nothing like his escapades the past 24 hours with the Agent. The LP on Roger's stereo continues to spin after Papa Legba's brief three-minute-long (more or less) sojourn in our world.
Roger is lost for a bit, more than usual. He would really like a drink to reset things, but the pain behind his eyeballs has still not abated. Finally, he comes to, remembering he's still the host here. And the priest. Years of training snap in, he feels the flow of the ritual again, and bows before several of the images of Papa Legba, repeating, "Merci. Merci beaucoup, seigneur le plus généreux." He pops over to the counter, cracks open the bottle Jo bought and Charley brought, takes a swig, and comes and blows it out over the altar. He pours a small amount into some of the shot glasses on the altar as well. As he moves and repeats the familiar closing words, he becomes a bit more grounded.
For once this week, he has memories of what's just happened with the loa. Papa has always shared his experiences, keeping the way open. Which is Papa's nature: the Opener. And not the Agent's, Roger realizes: his nature is keeping secrets. But, he thinks, he's seen there are those he does share everything with. Roger makes a mental note-- "Like Felix, like the Special Relationship"-- for his next round of covenant building.
But right now: Charley and Jo.
"You all right, Roger?" Jocasta says cautiously.
"Yeah. Uh. No, I'm OK. But, hey, can't leave the needle playing nothing! We need some more music!" Roger retreats over to the turntable, and paws through some more LPs, leaving Jo and Charley just sitting.
Jocasta will turn, and quietly but not in a whisper suggest to Charley that Roger is feeling sick and probably needs some good sleep, and unless this has to be urgently pursued, we should check back in with him in a day or so. She'll also suggest the same to Roger about Sophie and the rest of ... everything.
When Jo gets a chance to look at Roger over by the LPs, she'll see he looks more rattled. He'll block the eye line of his body to Charley, then flash, low by his chest where Charley shouldn't be able to see, ASL for 'Got your note. Talk later?'
She'll nod discreetly.
Roger gets on a record, something a bit more funky, then says to Charley: "Usually at this point the petitioner and me have a rap about what they heard. I'm cool with you hanging, but can we talk tomorrow about it? We both maybe need a bit of time to think about Papa's lessons, cool?"
Charley, being tired from the day's revelations and dazed from the communing ritual she has witnessed, nods to Roger and waits to follow Jo out.
“Hey, Charley. I know one thing right off the top of my head: there’s a way out. Papa was clear, and he’s the expert on the subject of opening doors, right, Jo? There is a way out.”
Roger puts all his remaining sincerity into that last line, beginning to believe it himself because he said it out loud.
Jocasta gathers her things and gives Roger a nod. "He's right, Charley. This may seem like a big problem, but that's our job: fixing big problems." She gets Charley's stuff together too. "Roger, get some rest, man. Sorry we dragged you out of bed. You don't look bad," she grins, "but you've looked better. Check in when you can."