36. A World of His Own

Coming home, Victoria West spots her husband, playwright Gregory West, through the window sharing a drink, and flirting in his study with Mary, an attractive young woman. Gregory quickly destroys a tape, which displeases Mary. When Victoria barges into the room, Mary is nowhere to be found.

Victoria looks around the room for hints of where she might have gone but does not yet confront him. Soon, she questions him. Gregory denies everything until Victoria throws in a trick, which causes him to admit the truth. Victoria is furious, but Gregory explains to his wife that any character that he describes into his dictation machine will appear according to his description. To make the character disappear, all he has to do is cut out that portion of the tape and throw it into his fireplace. Victoria doesn't believe him and is ready to divorce him and commit him to an asylum.

Gregory demonstrates his power, summoning Mary again and "uncreating" her, but not before Mary requests that Gregory not bring her back again, as she has grown weary of her segmented existence. Appalled, Victoria tries to escape, but Gregory uses his power to summon an elephant to stop her. Gregory discovered this talent when Phillip Wainwright, a character from Gregory's play Fury in the Night, into whom he had put a great deal of effort and attention, approached him as a real flesh-and-blood person with his own independent will, shook his hand and thanked him.

Believing none of this, Victoria tells Gregory that he is insane and she is going to have him committed. In response, Gregory pulls a section of tape from his safe and explains that it contains her description, revealing her to be one of his creations, but that recently she has begun to exert her own independence from him. Refusing to believe him, Victoria snatches the tape away from him and throws it into the fire, and promptly begins to feel faint. She realizes too late he was telling the truth, and disappears as the flames consume the tape. Frantic, Gregory rushes to his dictation machine and begins to re-describe Victoria. He quickly reconsiders and instead describes Mrs. Mary West as his wife. Mary appears and fixes her husband a drink, apparently lacking any memory of her previous interval of existence.