"Get away," I cried, but softly, so as not to wake up Mama. She saw that.

"If you don't behave. I'll scream and your mother will come in here and find us together, I"ll tell her you invited me."

"Please, I don't want to be shown anything."

"I like it when you beg like that. Noble," she said, lowering herself to the bed, "It gets me more excited."

I thought I would leap out of the bed and rush out of the room. If I did that. Mama wouldn't think I had anything to do with Betsy coming into my room. I started to throw the blanket off me and turn to get out of the bed. but Betsy reached out quickly and put her arms around my neck, pulling me down and then bringing her lips to mine. She pressed hard and swung her left leg aver me. I struggled to free myself, which only made her laugh and kiss me again.

When I twisted to my left to turn my body, she threw the blanket off me and, before I could stop her, shoved her hand between my legs. For a long moment, she was still and I was still. Her fingers moved like the legs of some big spider and then she pulled her hand back sharply.

In the glowing moonlight, I saw her face contort, her eyes go wide, and then she. smiled, her lips twisted. The realization exploded in her brain and she shot her hands out, tearing my pajama top apart, the buttons flying every which way. She gazed in awe at my strapped bosom.

"You're..." The words gagged her. Disgust washed over her face and she fell back on her haunches. "Take that off." she ordered.

I shook my head, my voice having fallen so deeply in' side me. I was unable to raise it. "Do it!"

she ordered. "Or I will."

She started to reach toward me. so I sat up and undid the strapping. It fell away and my breasts, like two squeezed balloons, filled to their full shape.

"Holy shit, you're a girl." She laughed. "You're a girl!"

I brought the blanket up to cover myself, but she pulled it out of my hands. "Look at you! You're so weird. I feel so weird. Why did you do this?"

I fell back to my pillow and stared up at the dark ceiling.

"Did my father know about you? I bet he was shocked when he found out. huh?" She stepped off the bed and began to put on her nightgown, "So what's this about? Does it have anything to do with the spirits? Your mother is making you do this?"

"No."

"No? What are you going to tell me? She doesn't know what you are?"

"I didn't say that."

"You're really nuts and so is she. You're both bonkers. I'll call that lawyer now. I'll tell everyone."

"Don't." I begged.

"Don't? Don't? No, I won't. I'll just continue to be a slave here." She turned to go out, then stopped and turned back to me. "Did my brother know about you?. . .Well? Did he? You might as well tell me all of it, the truth. Did he?"

"Yes."

She returned to my bedside.

"When did he find out?"

"I don't remember exactly when."

She continued to stand there and stare down at me. I could almost hear her brain clicking away. She glanced at the door and then she turned back to me.

"Whose baby is Celeste? She's yours, isn't she?"

she said, answering her own question instantly. "And Elliot's. She's my niece. She's my father's granddaughter. Well? Tell me!" she said, raising her voice.

My heart stopped. Mama could have heard her.

If she came in now and saw this... "Please," I begged.

"Please? Please? When I begged you to help me, what did you say? We'll see? Huh? You let her treat me like this, take away my things, keep my money from me, and you say please?"

I bit down so hard on my lower lip, I could taste blood.

Elliot was standing by the window watching and listening, a big- smile on his face.

I shook my head at him and Betsy grimaced and then turned and looked at the window. "What are you looking at?"

I tried to breathe, but my lungs were so full of heat, they wouldn't expand any further. I felt the blood pounding in my temples. I started to gasp and wheeze and it frightened her.

"What's wrong with you? Stop it."

I bent over, clutching my side. I thought I was going to start to vomit.

"Stop it!" she ordered. "Okay, okay," she said when I didn't stop. "I'll keep your stupid secret. Relax.

I said I'll keep your secret." She pulled at my shoulder.

I fell back on the pillow. My breathing improved and my lungs stopped aching.

"You're a basket case." She stood there thinking. "Look," she said, stepping up to the bed again. "I don't really care what you and your crazy mother do to yourselves and even to that special child.

You can swim in this madness all you want, but you're going to help me from now on. understand?

You're going to get her off my back. You're going to take me to see my friends, and you're going to help me get my money, because if you don't, have you committed as well as your mother.

"Now, when you get up in the morning, you find out where she put my clothes and you get them back to me immediately. And from now on, whenever she gives me a stupid chore to do, you do it. Also, were going to town tomorrow night, so get that into your thick skull. You're driving me there. That's what you'll tell her and don't let her say no.

"Don't let her say no to anything I want ever again. Make her understand what will happen if she does. Is that clear? I want to hear you say yes or I'll just start screaming my head off in here. Well?"

"Yes. That's good." She smiled, "This might turn out better than I thought, even better than you thought. For one thing, you don't have to wrap up your boobs for me anymore." She laughed. "Now that we have more in common, I might be a better friend to you than ever." She walked to the door. "Good night. Noble. Or should I say. Celeste?"

She laughed again and slipped out of the room, closing the door behind her. "I told you this would happen," Elliot said.

He crossed the room, and to my utter shack he got into my bed and lay beside me. "Now we can be together again." he said.

He was gone in the morning, but all night long, I was sure I felt his breath on my cheek and my neck.

And his hand holding mine.

18.

Betsy Turns the Tables .

Betsy was already dressed and waiting for me outside her door by the time I rose in the morning.

She had Panther in her arms. His eyes were wide open, and in the morning light flowing through my bedroom windows and out my bedroom door, they looked like two shiny ebony stones glittering under the surface of the clear creek water. Unlike Celeste.

Panther didn't usually smile at everyone he saw.

Instead, he looked anxious. Most of the time I thought he stared with distrust and anger. I had to wonder how often he had been left alone, left crying his eyes out, hungry and uncomfortable.

"Remember. I want you to find my clothes and return them to me this morning so I can get out of this stupid costume," Betsy said, and started down the stairs. Mama was already downstairs with Baby Celeste.

Panic froze me. How could I do what Betsy wanted? How could I not do it?

I wasn't sure Mama had hidden her clothes in the turret room. but I couldn't think of anywhere else.

When I went up to look. I discovered the door was locked. I felt certain of it now because locking the turret door was something. Mama did only when I was in there with Baby Celeste and she didn't want us coming out before the workers doing the rugs and curtains had left. My mind was in turmoil. I was hoping to give Betsy the clothes and then tell Mama she must have found them herself. How was I going to get the key away from Mama or talk her into returning Betsy's clothes without getting Mama angry?

When I went downstairs. I found they were all already at the dining room table. "What took you so long. Noble?" Mama asked. I glanced at Betsy.

"Yes, Noble., why are you so late?" she teased.

"I just didn't realize the time, Mama." She held her gaze on me, then turned back to fixing Baby Celeste's cereal and fruit.

"So tell me." Betsy asked with her eyes mainly on me as soon as Mama took her seat, "how long did you try to find out what happened to Noble's twin sister. Celeste?"

Mama looked up quickly from her mixed-grain cereal. She gave me just a slight glance and then turned to Betsy. "'We've never stopped trying to find out what happened to her."

"Well. I don't understand it. Why don't I ever see her picture on a milk carton or something? You should be calling the police every week and asking what they've been doing."

"What makes you think I didn't and don't still do?" Mania countered.

Betsy shrugged. "You never talk about her. and Noble here never says anything either."

"I think I told you once that it is very painful to relive it all," Mama said.

"What was she doing that day? Weren't you with her all the time. Noble?" Betsy continued as if she was leading the investigation. Her impish smile wasn't lost on me, and the moment I shifted my eyes away from her. I could feel Mama pull herself up.

"That's enough. This isn't a topic I care to discuss with you or have you discuss at my dining table."

"I'm just trying to be more caring." Betsy said.

"Losing a child at that age had to be devastating for you. I can't imagine how I would feel if someone just upped and took Panther one day. I don't think I'd rest a minute or do another thing until I had found him."

Mama glared at her. "I don't rest and she's never out of my mind, but I have many responsibilities,"

Mama told her, each word as sharp as a slap.

Betsy smiled to herself and nodded. She looked down and Mama relaxed her shoulders, but I knew this was not going to end.

"Here's what I really wonder. Sarah. You have such faith in your spirits, why haven't they told you where Celeste is?" Betsy looked up again. She made herself look as interested and as sincere as she possibly could.

I quickly swung my eyes to Mama. How would she answer such a question?

The spirits that guide us, that exist among us, are only here," she said softly. They do not wander the world like lost souls looking for a home and bring back news of the world. This is their home. We are their family."

"But a""

"That's enough!" Mama slapped her hand on the table so hard, a dish bounced. Baby Celeste's eyes widened and I looked down.

A long moment of silence passed. Mama began eating again.

"Whatever,' Betsy said. "Noble has offered to take me and Panther into town today," she continued almost in the same breath. "I need personal things now, not later."

Mama looked at her and then at me. "Noble, did you tell her such a thing?"

Words twisted like rubber bands in my throat.

He told me this morning, didn't you. Noble? I asked him to think about it last night, didn't I. Noble?

When we had a nice chat. right. Noble?"

I felt as if the barrel of a pistol were pressed against my temple.

"Yes," I said, and looked quickly at Mama, "I thought, if she was finished with her work, we could just make a quick trip to the supermarket'

"No, its the mall I need to go to. Noble. I told you that."

"Well, you're not finished with your work,"

Mama told Betsy. "I want you to clean out the pantry today, dust off the shelves, and then rearrange everything so it is all neatly set. The floor has to be washed in there as well. This is not a day to go anywhere. Besides." Mama continued like someone putting the finishing touches on a well-prepared response that anticipated Betsy's request, "I will be using the car today. I have to meet with Mr. Bogart and discuss our business."

Betsy's eves radiated her anger, but she kept herself calm and smiled.

"Okay. By the time you return, I'll have all that done and then Noble can take me. right. Noble?" she hammered in my direction.

I looked at Mama. "Would that be all right.

Mama?"

"We'll see." she said. pursing her lips. She was mad at me, but I felt caught like a fly in a spider's web. Struggling only ensnared me more.