enormous things! Even Alicia had told her that.
  
  "One minute, dear, you are a little computer whiz, and the next moment, you're 
screaming 'cause you can't find your dolls. I told you your dolls are in the cabinet. 
Nobody took your damned dolls! Oh, I'm so glad I don't ever have to be thirteen again! 
You know I was thirteen when you were born!"
  
  Tell me about it. And you were sixteen when I was three and you left me downtown in 
Maison Blanche and I was lost there for two hours! "I forgot, OK! Like I don't take her 
downtown that much!" Who else but a sixteen-year-old mother would give an excuse like 
that? It wasn't so bad. Mona had ridden the escalators up and down to her heart's content.
  
  "Take me in your arms," she prayed, looking down at Michael. "I've had a terrible 
childhood!" But on he slept as if he'd been touched by the witch's wand.
  
  Maybe this wasn't the night for getting him into bed. No, she'd rather everything be 
perfect for the assault. And not only had she been with David, she was soiled from the 
ground in the cemetery. Why, there were even a few dead leaves snarled in her hair, very 
Ophelia, but probably not very sexy.
  
  Maybe it was the night for searching the attics. For finding the Victrola, and cranking 
it up. Maybe there were old records with it, that record that Ancient Evelyn used to 
play? Maybe it was time to meet Oncle Julien here in the shadows, and not time to be with 
Michael at all?
  
  But he was so luscious there, gorgeously imperfect, her high prole Endymion, with the 
slight bump to his nose, and the soft creases in his forehead, very Spencer Tracy, yes, 
the man of her dreams. And a man in the hand is worth two ghosts in a dream.
  
  And speaking of hands, look at it, his large, soft hand! Now that was a man's hand. 
Nobody would say to him, "You have the fingers of a violinist." And she used to find men 
like that sexy, the delicate kind, like Cousin David, with hairless chins, with eyes full 
of soul. Ah, her whole appreciation of masculinity was taking a turn for the rough and 
the deep and the better.
  
  She touched Michael's jaw, and the edge of his ear, his neck. She felt his curly black 
hair. Oh, nothing softer and finer than curly black hair.  Her mother and Gifford had 
such fine black hair. But Mona's red hair would never be soft, and then she caught the 
fragrance of his skin, very subtle and nice and warm, and she bent down and kissed his 
cheek.
  
  His eyes opened, but it seemed he couldn't see anything. She sank down beside him-just 
couldn't stop herself, even though she knew this was an invasion of his privacy-and he 
turned over. What was her plan? Hmmm... She felt such a craving for him suddenly. It 
wasn't even erotic. It was all a kind of swoony romance. She wanted to feel his arms 
around her; she wanted him to pick her up; she wanted him to kiss her; common things like 
that. A man's arms, not a boy's. They should dance. In fact, it was plain wonderful that 
there was no boy in him, that he was all wild beast in a way some men never would be, 
very jagged and roughened and overgrown, with skin-colored lips and slightly wild 
eyebrows.
  
  She realized he was looking at her, and in the even light from the street, his face was 
pale yet clear.
  
  "Mona!" he whispered.
  
  "Yes, Uncle Michael. I got forgotten. It was a mix-up. Can I spend the night?"
  
  "Well, honey, we have to call your father and mother."
  
  He started to sit up, deliciously rumpled, black hair tumbling over his eyes. He really 
was drugged, though, no doubt of it.
  
  "Wrong, Uncle Michael!" she said quickly but gently. She put her hand on his chest. Ah, 
terrific. "My dad and mom are asleep. They think I'm with Uncle Ryan out in Metairie. And 
Uncle Ryan thinks I'm home with them. Don't call anybody. You'll just get everybody all 
excited, and I'll have to take a cab home all alone and I don't want to.  I want to spend 
the night."
  
  "But they'll realize..."
  
  "My parents? You have it on good authority from me that they will not realize anything. 
Did you see my dad tonight, Uncle Michael?"
  
  "Yeah, I did, honey." He tried to stifle a yawn and failed. He looked very concerned 
for her suddenly, as if it wasn't appropriate to yawn while discussing her alcoholic 
father.
  
  "He's not going to live very long," she said in a bored voice. She didn't want to talk 
about him either. "I can't stand Amelia Street when they're both drunk. Nobody there but 
Ancient Evelyn, and she never sleeps anymore. She's watching them."
  
  "Ancient Evelyn," he mused. "Such a lovely name. Do I know Ancient Evelyn?"
  
  "Nope. She never leaves the house. She told them once to bring you up home, but they 
never did. She's my great-grandmother."
  
  "Ah, yes, the Mayfairs of Amelia Street," he said. "The big pink house." He gave a 
little yawn again, and forced himself into a more truly upright position. "Bea pointed 
out the house. Nice house. Italianate. Bea said Gifford grew up there."
  
  Italianate. Architectural term, late nineteenth century. "Yeah, well, it's a New 
Orleans bracketed style, as we call it," she said. "Built 1882, remodeled once by an 
architect named Sully. Full of all kinds of junk from a plantation called Fontevrault."
  
  He was intrigued. But she didn't want to talk history and plaster.
  
  She wanted him.
  
  "So will you please let me stay here?" she asked. "I really really have to stay here