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"I wasn't until today," I said. "He wants to pick me up in the morning for school. I said okay. Is that all right?"

"Sure," my grandfather said quickly. Then he looked at my grandmother. "Right, Elaine?"

"I suppose so," she said. She looked nervous. "Especially since you jumped in so quickly to say it was."

"Hey," he told her. "You're the one who had Rachel turn her into Miss America."

"I did not. Anyway, what are you implying, Michael Stern?"

He laughed and then winked at me.

"I'll be right down to help with dinner," I told my grandmother.

"There's nothing to help with. I was just cleaning up a bit. Your grandfather is taking us to have Chinese food in Monticello. We'll leave about five-thirty."

"Okay," I said and hurried up the stairs to the attic. Suddenly, I felt I had to be up there. It was the only place where I could think clearly and be comforted. My mind was reeling with a kaleidoscope of mixed emotions. The girl in me was excited and even fascinated with the way Craig Harrison spoke to me and smiled at me. I had no idea he had been watching me, thinking about me all this time. And of course, I had no idea he had developed such interest in my mother's story and secretly done so much in the way of research.

When I had first seen it, I was bothered by what he had done. I thought, just as his mother accused, that he might have a macabre fascination with it all, but he seemed so sincere when I spoke with him It was not only comforting but intriguing as well. After all, what if his theory was right?

Isn't that what I had wished for so long?

His explanation as to why no one would believe anything she had said made sense, too. I had no trouble considering the possibility that my mother had exaggerated and created so much more in her story than what might have been. Craig didn't hear my aunt Zipporah speak about her. He didn't understand how much she depended upon and used her imagination.

But that didn't mean it was all untrue

necessarily.

Did it?

Would there ever come a time when I could confront her and win her trust enough to ask her?

And if I did and she told me her side of it all, would I believe her?

I'd be predisposed to do so. I couldn't be objective--or could I?

I sat on the sofa, where my father had sat when he was up here with me, and I looked at the window and tried with all my imaginative powers to see her standing there the way he obviously had. I envisioned her turning to me and smiling.

"I knew you would come up here," she would say. "I always had faith that someday you would come to my defense, my only real ally, my daughter. You'll find a way to show them all. You'll set me free so I can walk out of here and outside again. I'll leave the attic.

"Finally, we'll be together, mother and daughter, walking and talking and laughing about everything that happens to you as you grow up. be there at your side when you fall in love and get married and have children of your own.

"And then I'll make sure that you never, ever get trapped in any attic."

Tears streamed down my cheeks when she turned away. I had lost her so quickly again.

What could I do to bring her back?

I looked around the attic and at the picture of the tree both my-grandfather and my father so admired, and then it came to me. Maybe it came from her.

I would paint her standing there by that window. I wouldn't let my grandparents, Zipporah, my father, anyone know until the picture was finished.

That way, I would lock her forever and ever in my eyes, my mind and my heart.

And she would never disappear again.

6 Showing Craig the Attic

. I had just finished outlining the picture when my grandmother called up to tell me to get ready to go to dinner. I hated leaving the work, but I knew it would be exactly the wrong sort of message to send if I told them I'd rather stay home to paint. They were so determined to get me out of this house, and