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"You'll be trained in ballet as well as modern interpretative dance," he explained. "Our teachers are world renowned?'

I remained tongue-tied.

"Doesn't this sound exciting to you?" Grandmother Hudson finally asked, impatient with my lack of reaction.

"Yes, but...I never really thought of acting as a career for myself."

"What did you expect you would do with yourself, Rain?" she followed with her lips tightening, "marry and raise a herd of children?"

"No, I thought maybe I'd become a teacher," I said.

"One can always fall back on that if she should fail or get discouraged," Mr. MacWaine said. "Frankly, I don't think that will be the case for you. I haven't made many errors of judgment when it comes to candidates. I have some rather well-known former students on the London stage at present and a number in film and television."

"Well?" Grandmother Hudson pursued, thumping the table with her fingers.

"I guess, I suppose, I..."

"I understand. It's a great deal to have thrust on you like this," Mr. MacWaine said, smiling.

"Nonsense," Grandmother Hudson said. "It's the only way for it to happen. Either she does it with a full heart and determination, diving right in, or she doesn't attempt it at all."

"Can't I think about it for a while?" I begged.

"How many applicants do you have applying and on a waiting list at present, Conor?" Grandmother Hudson asked him.

He sat back and thought for a moment.

"About four hundred," he said.

"And how many will you take?" she followed.

"Not more than ten new students," he replied.

She looked at me.

"I'm just so surprised by all this," I moaned.

She softened and turned back to Mr.

MacWaine.

"The truth is the girl has rarely had any good fortune in her life and when it appears, she is skeptical and afraid," she explained. "I'll call you tomorrow with her decision," she promised him.

He turned back to me.

"I won't disappoint you, Rain. You will benefit from your experiences at my school and with Mrs. Hudson as your benefactor, you will have great advantages," he said.

I nodded. I didn't want to appear ungrateful. It was just the idea of going to another country and being so far away from Mama while I attempted to do something people only dream about doing. What would Roy say? And Mama?

I couldn't wait to get Mama on the phone and tell her all about it. I went upstairs after dinner and tried to call again, and again, the phone rang and rang with no one picking up. Why hadn't Mama tried to call me all this time? I wondered. Maybe she had decided in the end to go see what she could do for Ken, after all. No matter how bad he was, she still had her memories and she wasn't the kind of person who could just write someone off forever, I thought. I decided I would call every night until I spoke with her.

I wanted to get right to studying for my finals, but my mind drifted back to the discussion at dinner. Was I really that good? Why was Grandmother Hudson determined that I do it, and so determined that she volunteered to go to England with me and see that I was well situated?

Maybe all she was really hoping to do was get rid of me, I thought. Maybe she and my mother had concluded that this would satisfy Victoria and would certainly keep me away from Brody. If I was as far off as England, they could keep the secret of my identity locked away. It really wasn't that I had talent. It was just a convenient solution. Was I wrong to think this? What a horrible thing to do to me: send me off to try to become something I could never become. They couldn't do that, could they, and yet how could I believe in anyone who was comfortable sleeping on a bed of lies?

I wanted desperately to trust Grandmother Hudson, to believe she really did care about me now. She had put me into her will, hadn't she? I asked myself.

Or was that a phony thing, too? Was all this designed to win my confidence and then to send me away full of false hope? Beni always accused me of being too naive, believing in people too much. Was she right? Was I a fool and an easy mark without someone like Roy looking over me?