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"You stay with me. Celeste. I told you we'll go to the garden later."

She glared up at me, then shifted her eyes toward the stairway as if she knew this was all Betsy's fault. Her eyes grew small and dark and her lips tightened. How much she looked like Mama. I thought.

"Help me with Panther," I said more gently. "Make him stop crying."

She thought a moment and then, with some reluctance, reached up to touch his hand. The moment she did so, he stopped wailing. His sobs wound down as he looked at her. She never shifted her eves from his.

me,

-

"See, he likes you. You can be a great help to I said, and returned to the kitchen. I put him back in his bassinet and placed it on the kitchen floor. Baby Celeste stood beside it and looked down at him. He reached up and she took his hand into hers.

"Thank you. Celeste." I said, and started on the pantry, Before I was finished. Panther had fallen asleep and Baby Celeste had curled herself up beside the bassinet and fallen asleep herself.

After I had taken everything off the shelves and dusted as Mama had wanted. I washed the pantry floor. Just as I finished. I heard Betsy calling down from the top of the stairway.

"Noble Celeste. I'm hungry. Bring me my lunch," she shouted. "Quickly." Baby Celeste woke up, but thankfully Panther did not. I prepared the egg sandwich for Betsy and made one for Baby Celeste. too.

"We'll ao out to the garden when you're finished with lunch," I told her.

I carried up Betsy's lunch and brought it to her room, but she wasn't there, "I'm in here," she shouted from Mama's bedroom.

Slowly, anticipating something terrible. I walked to the bedroom. Betsy was sitting at the vanity table. She had almost every jar of cream open, powder splattered over the table, lipstick tubes open, and tissues everywhere. She had done up her face after much experimentation, but that wasn't the worst of it. She was also wearing one of Mama's pretty dresses, one that she had bought when she had first begun dating Dave.

"It didn't quite fit," Betsy said, standing. "but I fixed that." She had taken a scissors to the hem and chopped it back.

"The bodice isn't bad. I'm surprised your mother wore such a dress and showed so much cleavage."

All I could do was think about what would happen if Mama returned and saw this.

"Well, is the pantry done?''

"Yes," I said, but shook my head at her and at what she had done. "You've got to clean up this room and you can't wear that."

"Oh. really? What will happen? Will I be fined? Will she take back some of my trust fund? Will she give me some new chores? Which we now know means she'll be giving them to you. Noble Celeste."

"Please put everything back the way it was. I have your lunch."

"Just put it on the table. And go look for my clothes. Find them before she gets back or greet her at the door with headline news that will bust her heart."

I stood there, debating with myself whether I should tell her what Mama had told me and what Baby Celeste had almost revealed, but before I could decide. Panther's screams were suddenly so shrill, I practically threw Betsy's lunch tray onto the table and then ran downstairs.

When I reached the kitchen. I saw Baby Celeste standing beside the bassinet and looking down at him. His screaming continued.

"What's wrong with him. Celeste?" I asked, and approached.

His face was crimson, the crests of his cheeks as red as raw meat. Tears flowed down his cheeks so quickly, it looked as if he could drown in his own sobs. At first I had no idea what was wrong, and then I saw the black candle beside the sole of his left foot. The tip of the candlewick still glowed like an ember in a fireplace, and the heal of his sole was crisp and bright red. The shock of it sucked the wind out of my lungs.

Betsy had reluctantly followed me down, swaggering in the dress and holding half of her sandwich.

"What is it? Why does that kid cry so much?" she demanded, coming up beside me.

She looked down and for a few moments just stared at him and continued to bite and chew her sandwich. Then she saw the candle and slowly knelt to pick it up and looked at it closer.

"What's this?"

I shook my head.