"Here's your suitcase." I turned to go.

"Wait," she said, catching her breath. "How did my father die?"

"He got very sick. We thought he had the flu at first. Mama did all she could with her medications."

"I bet she did."

"Your father wanted it that way. He took some medicine he had from the pharmacy, but nothing helped and he died." I made no mention of the cause being the contradictions created by the mix of cures.

Let her learn it from someone else. I thought.

"Why did he put all that junk in his will? Why did he do this to me? Did she make him do it?"

"No. Actually, it came as a surprise to us." It had to me.

"I won't live like she wants me to. I won't and I won't be her little slave."

"For the time being, it would be better if you just did what she asks. It's not so terrible."

"Leave it to you to say something that stupid."

She wiped the tears from her cheeks and sat up. She took a deep breath. "I'm not going to stay here long. I don't care. I'll find a way."

"What happened to your car?"

"I had to sell it. I ran out of money."

"I see. Well, don't you know who the father of your child is?" I really meant it as a way for her to get some additional help.

"I know what that's supposed to mean. You think I just sleep around with someone new every other day?"

"No. I meant that whoever he is, he should bear some of the burden and responsibility."

She looked thoughtful. "Well. I'm not sure. I think it was a guy named Bobby Knee or something. I met him at a party and it was after it would have happened. Bobby Knee was just passing through. I can't even remember whose friend he was."

"But I thought you were going with Roy then or..."

"Oh, you're so native. I didn't say I was going steady with anyone. No one's going to own me. Ever!"

she cried. "Especially not your weird mother."

"You're lucky you have her helping you." I said angrily. I started out.

"I bet she killed my father somehow. I bet she did!" she screamed after me, then she started to cry again.

I closed the door softly behind me. My own heart was thumping. Despite her meanness and her bad behavior. I couldn't help but feel somewhat sorry for her. And what sort of a future would that child she had named Panther have?

When I went downstairs. I found Mama and Baby Celeste in the living room. Mama was feeding Panther and Baby Celeste was beside her, captivated by the infant's suckling.

"I brought up her suitcase. Mama."

They both looked up at me and smiled.

"I"m surprised at how healthy-looking and adorable this child is," Mama said. "She certainly doesn't deserve a baby." She nodded at the ceiling.

She looked down at the baby again. "I'll have to watch him," Her eyes slowly lifted toward me. "We"ll have to be sure nothing evil has settled within him and used him to enter our world. There might be a reason why that horrid girl returned to us just now."

The heaviness of her threat and warning surrounded my heart like a sticky, murky mist. I looked at the unsuspecting infant in her lap.

"Surely he's too tiny. Mama, too new."

She laughed at me and glanced at Baby Celeste, who looked to be laughing at me as well.

"It's especially when we are as helpless as he is that evil has its way with us. I"ll do what has to be done to make sure it hasn't happened and won't, but as always. Noble, you have to help me, help me and Baby Celeste. It would be horrible if we exposed her to anything terrible, if we were negligent, would it not? Well?"

"Yes. Mama."

"Finish your garden work. We have a lot to do, a lot to do."

She turned back to the baby. I watched her for a moment and then went outside.

Just as I turned toward the garden. I heard Betsy's scream of frustration come pouring out of the opened window in her room.

It was shrill and desperate, but it was caught up in the breeze and carried off to die away in the forest where no one could help her.

For a moment I felt like screaming myself, like being some sort of relay runner, accepting her cry and carrying it forward. After all. I had been crying out myself, but containing it within my own troubled heart. I was caught somewhere between wanting to ally myself with Betsy and with being loyal to Mama.

I took the hoe in my hands and began to work again.

Don't think, I told myself. don't think.

Work.

Perhaps that was what Betsy finally told herself as well. Later, when she emerged from her bedroom and descended the stairs, she was wearing one of the clean, conservative dresses that had been hanging in her closet. She had bathed and brushed her hair, pinning it back. She wore no makeup. Dry-eyed and pale, she looked in on her sleeping baby. Mama had placed him between two large pillows on the sofa, and he did look contented. After that. Betsy went into the kitchen and began to bring in the place settings, the silverware, and the dishes and glasses for our dinner.

She worked quietly, carefully. obediently. To me she moved like someone under a spell, walking in her sleep. but Mama was pleased.

"We'll make do with what we have," she declared at dinner. "We'll take care of each other and well make your father proud yet," she told Betsy, who ate methodically.

"How can he be proud if he's dead?" she asked Mama.

Mama smiled at her, smiled at me, smiled at Baby Celeste. "The dearly departed see us. The ones we love are always with us. Death dies the moment our hearts stop. It holds us only an instant."

Betsy smirked. It was easy to see what she was thinking, but she wisely kept it to herself. All she did was glance at me with some hope that in my face she would find some sympathy and agreement. Terrified that she might. I quickly looked away. Our first dinner without Dave passed with no further comment or question. Toward the end of the meal, we heard Panther cry and Mama told Betsy to see to him.

"He probably needs a diaper change." "I know,"

Betsy quipped.

"Then you know to do it," Mama told her, "When you're done, see to clearing off the table."

"What about the baby?"

"I"ll see to him," Mama said. "Noble, go upstairs to the turret room and find Baby Celeste"s crib. Set it up in Betsy's room for her. I'll bring in the bedding soon and prepare the crib."

"Yes, Mama." I said.

Betsy shook her head at me and then went to change Panther's diaper.

"How lucky you are," Mama told her later, "that we have everything your baby needs here:: "Yeah. I'm the luckiest girl in the world,- Betsy said dryly. Mama smiled. "You don't know how true that is."

Betsy's first night back was difficult for all of us, although Mama never acknowledged it. No sooner had we all gone to bed than Panther began to wail. He cried and cried. I kept expecting Mama to get up to see to him, but she kept her bedroom door shut.

Finally, I rose and went to Betsy's door.

"Is something wrong?" I waited, but all I heard was the baby's crying. For a long moment. I couldn't decide whether to return to my room or open her door.

The baby's wailing didn't subside. Still. Mama didn't rise and come out to see what was wrong. I heard Betsy's groan. so I slowly opened her door and peered into the room.

Mama had put candles in both her windows.

The glow of light spilled over the bed. where I saw Betsy lying with her hands over her ears. I stepped in slowly.

"Betsy?"

Panther did seem to be in some agony. I drew closer and finally Betsy looked my way and removed her hands from her ears.

"What's wrong with him?"

"What's wrong? Look at the stupid crib your mother set up."

At first I saw nothing, but as I approached it, I saw the greenish yellow layer over the railings and smelled the mix of herbs, the garlic, and lilac. Each scent in and of itself was tolerable, but the combination Mama had created was so acrid and sharp, I nearly choked on the smell myself. Mama had created her formula and then apparently painted it on the crib. I knew she believed that certain herbs had protective powers and could be used to exorcise evil.

"He can't stand the stink and neither can I!"

Betsy screamed. "What did she put on there?"

I wasn't sure exactly, but beside the garlic, the stench and some of the recipes I recalled suggested some wintergreen, some toadflax, snapdragon, and tamarisk. Mama created her own formulas, always expanding and improving on what had been handed down to her, so it was truly impossible to determine it all.

However, it wasn't hard to see the baby was uncomfortable. He squirmed to avoid the odors that flowed over him. I looked back through the open doorway. Mama had still not risen and come out of her room. I couldn't stand by and watch this. The baby's face was contorted. I reached in, lifted him out, and brought him to Betsy.

"He'll quiet down if he sleeps with you," I told her.

Then I pushed the crib farther away from her bed, closer to the windows. One of the candles, as if in disapproval, flickered and went out. Throughout it all, my heart thumped and raced, pounded and knocked, with my fear of being discovered. Almost immediately. however, Panther stopped crying. His sobs ran down to a whimpering, and then in moments, probably out of exhaustion, he fell asleep.

"Thanks," Betsy said.

I said nothing. I just nodded and slipped quietly out of her room, closing the door ever so softly. Then I waited to be sure Mama hadn't seen me before I hurried back to my own room. In the morning at breakfast. Betsy let loose a torrent of complaints about the things Mama had done. Mama didn't stop her. Of course, I was terrified Betsy would mention what I had done, but she didn't, either because she didn't care to give me credit for helping her or she knew I would be in trouble. Mama didn't appear to be listening. She ate quietly and gave all her attention to Baby Celeste.

However, when Betsy finally stopped, Mama nodded, smiled, and said, "After you clean up the breakfast dishes, you can go upstairs and wash down the crib. It was only good for one night."

"What was only good? What was that stink?"

Betsy screamed.

"It's not important for you to know. I doubt you would appreciate it anyway. I'm going into the village today. Would you like to visit your father's grave? I won't be heading in that direction often so you should take advantage of this opportunity."

"No," Betsy said. "What for? He can't hear me, and if he could, he'd be sorry anyway because of what I would have to say."

"Oh, he can hear you. And I'm sure he's already sorry. I'll pick up things for the baby."

"He's name is Panther. Panther. Call him by his name."

"Panther," Mama said with a smile. "You know, I'm beginning to like it."

She couldn't have said anything more annoying to Betsy than that. It was just too much for Betsy to accept that she had done anything to please Mama.

and Mama seemed to know it. Betsy won't be any sort of match for her now either. I thought. She was already defeated, but she simply didn't know it or know how much. It wouldn't be long before she would understand that and then... what then?

Would she become one of us, or would she wither and die like her father?

We were all in a garden of one kind or another, I thought. Some of them were of our own choosing, some were places in which we found ourselves transplanted. In the end it was always the same: dust unto dust.

Betsy looked to me, her eyes no longer full of anger, but now, perhaps because of my actions the night before, full of pleading. I could hear her crying for my help, but Mama's eyes were on me. too.

I returned to my work, and later Mama brought out Baby Celeste.

"I'm leaving now. Don't you dare do any of the work for that girl that I have assigned her. She carries her own weight around here or else."

"Yes, Mama."

"You're a good boy, Noble, and your goodness will so shine in contrast to her laziness and wastefulness, she can do nothing else but improve herself. Remember that."

"I will."

"Good. I'll be back in a few hours at most.

Watch over our precious Baby Celeste."

I always do. I wanted to say, but I just nodded.

Soon after Mama left, I heard and saw Betsy emerge from the house carrying a bag of garbage. She put it in the container and looked my way. I concentrated on my work, but I could feel her eves lingering on me.

"Betsy," Baby Celeste said. I turned and saw she was approaching us.

"Why did you help me last night?" she asked a"

or more like demanded. "I saw how the baby was unhappy. That's all."