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“When you were little and you misbehaved, we told ourselves it was normal growing pains, adjustments. My and your mother’s only real experience with children had been with Carson. He has an entirely different personality, different nature, some of that because he is a male, I suppose.

“Other people, friends, used to tell me all the time that little girls were harder to bring up than little boys. In stories, movies, little boys are always made out to be the ruffians, miscreants, handfuls of trouble. Girls were supposed to be dainty, fragile; but in reality, everyone assured me, that was simply not so.

“And so, we accepted you as you were and tried to teach you, contain you every which way we knew, and even people who were supposed experts knew.

“When you were older, a preteen and then a teen, and you got into trouble, it clearly became more serious. Your mother, mainly, decided we should turn to child psychologists and even a psychiatrist. We sent you to the people we were told were the best, but there wasn’t the dramatic turnaround we were expecting, hoping, to see.

“I took a more forceful position, especially after

the more recent episodes. I thought okay, you’re self-centered. Eventually you’ll realize you can’t do well for yourself and enjoy yourself if you continue to get in trouble and do poorly in school and you’ll change solely to make yourself happier, but that didn’t happen, either.

“Your mother—once again, more than me—hoped that if you were placed in a more controlled, richer, more advantageous environment where you would get more individualized attention, you would come around, but you didn’t.

“In my heart I hoped you would care about this family, care about us at least enough not to really do us harm. That would be sort of the bottom of the barrel, the last straw, so to speak, wouldn’t it?

“Then, you did this,” he said, and held up the manila envelope. “You knew what this was, didn’t you, Teal? You must have, because you knew where it was. You must have spied on me or something, right?”

I didn’t care to answer. The truth was, I was having trouble forming words. My throat was closing up tightly. I looked away.

“Actually, I’m glad you’re not speaking. All I’d get from you right now are lies, fabrications, excuses. Don’t say anything.”

He sat back.

“I’m going to do one more thing for you. You will realize that it’s the last thing I’ll do, I’m sure. I have, through some influential friends, been introduced to what we can call the court of last resort when it comes to you and kids your age who are like you.”

I looked up. What was he talking about now?

“I’m sending you to another school. This one is away from home, Teal, so you won’t have to answer to me for a while.”

“What school?”

“The name doesn’t matter. What it can do for you is all that matters. If you fail there… well, you fail. At least I will know that we did the best we could for you.”

“I don’t want to go to any new school,” I said.

“What you want and what you don’t want have no bearing on the matter anymore. It never should have had any bearing. That might have been one of my mistakes—caring about what you wanted.”

“I want to talk to Mommy,” I said.

“She’s not here.”

“Where is she?”

“She’s gone to her sister’s, your aunt Clare, for some very much needed R and R.”

“I want to talk to her,” I whined. “Call her on the telephone.”

“She won’t speak to you. She didn’t want to be here when you were returned this time, Teal. She couldn’t stand the idea of it.”

“No.”

“Yes,” he said. “It’s true.”

He leaned forward on his elbows, folded his hands together, and glanced at his watch.

“There’s a car outside, a limousine, waiting for you.”

“What are you talking about, Daddy? Now?”