The three girls decided this was boring. I watched them troop through the door to go to Krista's room. They were so superficially similar, yet so different. All were eight years old, give or take a few months; all were within three inches of being the same height; they had brown hair and brown eyes. But Eve's hair was long and looked as if someone had taken a curling iron to it, and Eve was thin and pale. Krista, blocky and with higher color, had short, thick, darker hair and a more decisive demeanor. Her jaw jutted out like she was about to take it on the chin. Anna had shoulder-length light brown hair, a medium build, and a ready smile.

One of these three little girls was not who she thought she was. Her parents were not the people she had always identified as her parents. Her home was not really her home; she belonged elsewhere. She was not the oldest child in the family but the youngest. Everything in her life had been a lie.

I wondered what Jack was doing. I hoped whatever it was, he wouldn't get caught.

I carried the baby into the living room with me. Luke was still absorbed in the television, but he half turned as I entered and asked me for a snack.

With the attention to detail you have to have around kids, I put Jane in her infant seat, fastened the strap and buckle arrangement that prevented her from falling out, and fetched Luke a banana from the chaotic kitchen.

"I want chips. I don't like nanas," he said.

I exhaled gently. "If you eat your banana, I'll get you some chips," I said as diplomatically as I am able. "After supper. I'll be putting supper on the table in just a minute."

"Miss Lily!" shrieked Eve. "Come look at us!"

Ignoring Luke's continued complaints about bananas, I strode down the hall to the room that must be Krista's, judging from all the signs on the door warning Luke never to come in.

It didn't seem possible the girls could have done so much to themselves in such a short time. Both Krista and Anna were daubed with makeup and swathed in full dress-up regalia: net skirts, feathered hats, tiny high heels. Eve, sitting on Krista's bed, was much more modestly decked out, and she wore no makeup at all.

I looked at Krista's and Anna's lurid faces and had a flash of horror before I realized that if all this stuff had been in Krista's room, this must be an approved activity.

"You look ... charming," I said, having no idea what an acceptable response would be.

"I'm the prettiest!" Krista said insistently.

If the basis for selection was heavy makeup, Krista was right.

"Why don't you wear makeup, Miss Lily?" Eve asked.

The three girls crowded around and analyzed my face.

"She's got mascara on," Anna decided.

"Red stuff? Rouge?" Krista was peering at my cheeks.

"Eye shadow," Eve said triumphantly.

"More isn't always better," I said, to deaf ears.

"If you wore a lot of makeup, you'd be beautiful, Aunt Lily," Anna said surprisingly.

"Thank you, Anna. I'd better go see how the baby is."

Luke had unsnapped the baby's sleeper and pulled it from her tiny feet. He was bending over her with a pair of tiny, sharp fingernail scissors.

"What are you doing, Luke?" I asked when I could draw my breath.

"I'm gonna help you out," he said happily. "I'm gonna cut baby Jane's toenails."

I shuddered. "I appreciate your wanting to help. But you have to wait for Jane's daddy to say whether or not he wants you to do that." That seemed pretty diplomatic to me.

Luke insisted vehemently that Jane's long toenails were endangering her life and had to be trimmed now.

I began to dislike this child very seriously.

"Listen to me," I said quietly, cutting right through all his justification.

Luke shut right up. He looked plenty scared.

Good.

"Don't touch the baby unless I ask you to," I said. I thought I was making a simple declarative sentence, but possibly Luke was good at interpreting voice tone. He dropped the scissors. I picked them up and shoved them in my sweatpants pocket where I could be certain he wouldn't reclaim them.

I picked up the infant seat and took Jane into the kitchen with me to set out the children's meal. Lou had left canned funny-shaped pasta in sauce, which I wouldn't have fed to my dog, if I'd had one. I heated it, trying not to inhale. I spooned it into bowls, then cut squares of Jell-O and put them on plates, adding apple slices that Lou had already prepared. I poured milk.

The kids ran in and scooted into chairs the minute I called them, even Luke. Without prompting, they all bowed their heads and said the "God is great" prayer in unison. I was caught flat-footed, halfway to the refrigerator to put the milk carton away.

The next fifty minutes were ... trying.

I understand that close to Christmas children get excited. I realize that children in packs are more excitable than children separately. I have heard that having a sitter instead of parental supervision causes kids to push their limits, or rather, their sitter's. But I had to take several deep breaths as the kids rampaged through their supper. I perched on a stool, baby Jane in her infant seat on the kitchen counter beside me. Jane, at least, was asleep. A sleeping baby is a near-perfect thing.

As I wiped up slopped tomato sauce, put more sliced apples into Luke's bowl, stopped Krista from poking Anna with a spoon, I gradually became aware that Eve was quieter than the others. She had to make a visible effort to join in the hilarity.

Of course, her mother had just died.

So I kept a wary eye on Eve.

Far from planning to learn something that evening, I was beginning to hope merely to survive it. I'd thought I'd get a moment to look for family records. That was so clearly impossible, I was convinced I'd leave as ignorant as when I'd come.

Krista took care of the problem for me.

Reaching for the crackers I'd set in the center of the table, she knocked over her milk, which cascaded off the table into Anna's lap. Anna shrieked, called Krista a butthead, and darted a terrified glance at me. This was not approved language in the Kingery household, and since I was almost her aunt, I gave Anna the obligatory stern look.

"Do you have a change of pants here?" I asked.

"Yes ma'am," said a subdued Anna.

"Krista, you wipe up the milk with this towel while I take Anna to change. I'll need to put those pants right in the washer."

I picked up the baby in her infant seat and carried her with me down the hall, trying not to jostle her from her sleep. Anna hurried ahead of me, wanting to change and get back to her friends.

I could tell that Anna was not comfortable taking off her clothes with me in the room, but we'd done a little bonding that morning and she didn't want to hurt my feelings by asking me to leave. God knows I hated invading anyone's privacy, but I had to do it. After I found a safe spot on the floor for Jane, I picked up the room while Anna untied her shoes and divested herself of her socks, pants, and panties. I had my back to her, but I was facing a mirror when her panties came down, and since she had her back to me, I was able to see clearly the dark brown splotch of the birthmark on her hip.

I had to lean against the wall. A wave of relief almost bowled me over. Anna having that birthmark simply had to mean that Anna was the baby in the birth picture with her mother and Dill, their original and true child, and not Summer Dawn Macklesby.

I had something to be thankful for, after all.

I picked up the wet clothes, and Anna, having pulled on some dry ones, dashed out of the room to finish her supper.

I was about to pick up Jane when Eve came in. She stood, her arms behind her back, looking at her shoes. Something about the way she was standing put me on full alert.

"Miss Lily, you remember that day you came to our house and cleaned up?" she asked, as though it had been weeks before.

I stood stock still. I saw myself opening the box on the shelf....

"Wait," I told her. "I want to talk to you. Wait just one moment."

The nearest telephone, and the one that was the most private, was the one in the master bedroom across the hall.

I looked through the phone book, found the number of Jack's motel. Please let him be there, please let him be there...

Mr. Patel connected me to Jack's room. Jack answered on the second ring.

"Jack, open your briefcase," I said.

Some assorted sounds over the other end.

"OK, it's done."

"The picture of the baby."

"Summer Dawn? The one that was in the paper?"

"Yes, that one. What is the baby wearing?"

"One of those one-piece things."

"Jack, what does it look like?"

"Ah, long arms and legs, snaps ..."

"What is the pattern?"

"Oh. Little animals, looks like."

I took a deep, deep breath. "Jack, what kind of animal?"

"Giraffes," he said, after a long, analytical pause.

"Oh God," I said, scarcely conscious of what I was saying.

Eve came into the bedroom. She had picked up the baby and brought her with her. I looked at her white face, and I am sure I looked as stricken as I felt.

"Miss Lily," she said, and her voice was limp and a little sad. "My dad's at the door. He came to get us."

"He's here," I said into the phone and hung up.

I got on my knees in front of Eve. "What were you going to tell me?" I asked. "I was wrong to go use the phone when you were waiting to talk to me. Tell me now."

My intensity was making her nervous, I could see, but it wasn't something I could turn off. At least she knew I was taking her seriously.

"He's here now, it's ... I have to go home."

"No, you need to tell me." I said it as gently as I could, but firmly.

"You're strong," she said slowly. Her eyes couldn't meet mine. "My dad said my mom was weak. But you're not."

"I'm strong." I said it flatly, with as much assurance as I could pack into a statement.

"Maybe... you could tell him me and Jane need to spend the night here, like we were supposed to? So he won't take us home?"

She'd intended to tell me something else.

I wondered how much time I had before Emory came to find out what was keeping us.

"Why don't you want to go home?" I asked, as if we had all the time in the world.

"Maybe if he really wanted me to come, Jane could stay here with you?" Eve asked, and suddenly tears were trembling in her eyes. "She's so little."

"He won't get her."

Eve looked almost giddy with relief.

"You don't want to go," I said.

"Please, no," she whispered.

"Then he won't get you."

Telling a father he couldn't have his kids was not going to go over well. I hoped Jack had found something, or Emory would make that one wrong move.

He'd have to. He'd have to be provoked.

Time to take my gloves off.

"Stay here," I told Eve. "This may get kind of awful, but I'm not letting anyone take you and Jane out of this house."

Eve suddenly looked frightened by what she had unleashed, realizing on some level that the monster was out of the closet now, and nothing would make it go back in. She had taken her life, and her sister's, in her own hands at the ripe old age of eight. I am sure she was wishing she could take back her words, her appeal.

"It's out of your hands now," I said. "This is grown-up stuff."

She looked relieved, and then she did something that sent shivers down my back: She picked up the baby in her carrier and took her to a corner of the bedroom, pulling out the straight-backed chair that blocked it, crouching down behind it with the baby beside her.

"Throw Reverend O'Shea's bathrobe over the chair," the little voice suggested. "He won't find us, maybe."

I felt my whole body clench. I picked up the blue velour bathrobe that Jess had left lying across the foot of the bed and draped it over the chair.

"I'll be back in a minute," I said and went down the hall to the living room, Anna's milk-stained clothes still under my arm. I tossed them into the washroom as I passed it. I was trying to keep things as normal as I could. There were children here, in my care.

Emory was standing just inside the front door. He was wearing jeans and a short jacket. He'd pulled his gloves off and stuck them in a pocket. His blond hair was brushed smooth, and he looked as if he'd just shaved. It was like ... I hesitated to say this, even to myself.

It was like he was here to pick up his date.

His guileless blue eyes met mine with no hesitation. Luke, Anna, and Krista were playing a video game at the other end of the room.

"Hey, Miss Bard." He looked a little puzzled. "I sent Eve back to tell you I'd decided the girls should spend the night at home, after all. I've imposed on the O'Sheas too much."

I walked over to the television. I had to turn off the screen before the children would look at me. Krista and Luke were surprised and angry, though they were too well raised to say anything. But Anna somehow knew that something was wrong. She stared at me, her eyes as round as quarters, but she didn't ask any questions.

"You three go back and play in Krista's room," I said. Luke opened his mouth to protest, took a second look at me, and jumped up to run back to his sister's room. Krista gave me a mutinous glare, but when Anna, casting several backward looks, followed Luke, Krista left too.

Emory had moved closer to the hall leading down to the bedrooms. He was leaning on the mantel, in fact. He'd pulled off his jacket. He was still smiling gently at the children as they passed him. I moved closer.