“Oh, Erich, look, he’s crying real tears.” Tenderly she bent over and picked him up. “There, there, Pumpkin. I know you’re hungry, my precious lamb. Erich, he is getting stronger.”

From behind her, she heard the door close. Erich had left the room.

30

She dreamed of a pigeon. Somehow it seemed terribly ominous. It was flying through the house and she had to catch it. It mustn’t be allowed in the house. It sailed into the girls’ room and she followed it. It flew frantically round and round the room. It escaped her hands and fluttered past her into the baby’s room. It settled on the bassinette. She began to cry, no, no, no.

She woke up with tears drenching her face and rushed in to the baby. He was sleeping contentedly.

Erich had left a note on the kitchen table. “Taking your advice. Will be at cabin painting for a few days.”

At breakfast, Tina paused over her cereal and said, “Mommy, why didn’t you talk to me when you came into my room last night?”

That afternoon Rooney stopped in to visit and it was she who first realized that the baby had a fever.

She and Clyde had had Christmas dinner with Maude and Joe. “Joe’s doing fine,” Rooney informed Jenny. “Going down to Florida right from the hospital did wonders for him and for Maude too. Both of them that tanned and healthy. Joe gets rid of the brace next month.”

“I’m so glad.”

“Course Maude says she’s happy to be home now. She told me Erich was real generous to them. But I guess you know that. He paid every cent of the medical bills and gave them a check for five thousand dollars beside. He wrote Maude that he felt responsible.”

Jenny was stitching the last of her quilt together. She looked up. “Responsible?”

“I don’t know what he means. But Maude told me she feels real bad that the baby hasn’t been well. Says she remembers saying awful things to you.”

Jenny remembered the awful things Maude had said.

“Guess Joe admitted that he’d had a pretty good hangover that morning; insists it was likely he’d mixed up the poison and oats.”

“Joe said that?”

“He did. Anyhow I think Maude wanted me to give you her apologies. I know when they got back last week Joe went down and spoke to the sheriff himself. Joe’s real upset about all the rumors flying around his accident. You know, because of the wild thing he said about seeing you. He said he don’t know why he ever said anything like that.”

Poor Joe, Jenny thought. Trying to undo irreparable harm and then making it worse by stirring it up again.

“My, Jenny, do you realize that your quilt is just about finished? Real lovely too. That took patience.”

“I was glad to have it to do,” she said.

“Will you hang it in the dining room near Caroline’s?”

“I haven’t thought about it.”

She hadn’t thought about very much today except the possibility that she was sleepwalking. In her dream she’d been trying to chase a pigeon out of the girls’ room. But had she actually been in the room?

There were too many episodes like this now over the past few months. The next time she went in to see Dr. Elmendorf, she’d talk to him about them. Maybe she did need some counseling.

I am so afraid, she thought.

She had begun to doubt whether Erich would ever forgive her for the notoriety that she had caused. No matter how hard they both tried, it would never be right again. And no matter what Erich said, she believed that subconsciously he was not sure that the baby was his son. She couldn’t live her life out with that between them.

But the baby was a Krueger and deserved the best medical attention Erich’s wealth could obtain for him. After the baby had the operation and was well, if things hadn’t gotten much better, she’d leave. She tried to visualize living in New York, working in the gallery, the day-care center, picking up the children, hurrying home to start dinner. It wouldn’t be easy. But nothing was easy and many women managed it. And anything would be better than this terrible feeling of isolation, this sense of losing touch with reality.

Nightmares. Sleepwalking. Amnesia. Was even amnesia possible? She’d never had any trouble in the apartment in New York. She’d be bone-tired at the end of the day but always slept. She might not have had nearly enough time for the girls but now it seemed she had no time. She was so worried about the baby and Erich kept whisking Tina and Beth off on outings that she couldn’t or wouldn’t attend.

I want to go home, she thought. Home wasn’t a place, maybe not even a house or apartment. Home was where you could close your door and be at peace.

This land. Even now. The snow falling, the wind blowing. She liked the savageness of the winter. She imagined the house as she had started to arrange it. The heavy curtains down, this table at the window, the friends she’d expected to make, the parties she would have given over the holidays.

“Jenny, you look so sad,” Rooney said suddenly.

She tried to smile. “It’s just…” Her voice trailed off.

“This is the best Christmas I’ve had since Arden went. Just watching the children so happy and being able to help you with the baby…”

Jenny realized that Rooney never called the baby by name.

She held up the quilt. “Here it is, Rooney, complete.”

Beth and Tina were playing with their new picture puzzles. Beth looked up. “That is very pretty, Mommy. You’re a very good sewer.”

Tina volunteered, “I like it better than the one on the wall. Daddy said that yours won’t be as nice as the one on the wall and I thought that was mean.”

She bent her head over her book. Every line of her body suggested injury.

Jenny could not help smiling. “Oh, Tinker, you’re such an actress.” She went over, knelt down and hugged her.

Tina returned the hug fiercely. “Oh, Mommy.” I’ve given them so little time since the baby came, Jenny thought. “Tell you what,” she said, “we’re going to bring Pumpkin down in a few minutes. If you two wash your hands you can have a chance to hold him.”

Rooney interrupted their squeals of delight. “Jenny, may I get him?”

“Of course. I’ll fix his cereal.”

Rooney was back downstairs in a few minutes, carefully holding the blanketed baby. She looked concerned. “I think he has a fever.”

At five o’clock Dr. Bovitch came. “We’d better take him to the hospital.”

“No, please.” Jenny tried not to have her voice quiver.

The pediatrician hesitated. “We could give it till morning,” he said. “Trouble is-with infants the fever can go high pretty fast. On the other hand, I’m not crazy about taking him out in the cold. All right. Let’s see how he is in the morning.”

Rooney stayed and prepared supper for them. Jenny gave the baby aspirin. She was chilled herself. Was she catching cold or was she simply numb with anxiety? “Rooney, hand me my shawl, please.”

She wrapped it around her shoulders, sheltered the baby in it as she held him.

“Oh, dear.” Rooney’s face was ashen.

“What is it, Rooney?”

“It’s just that the shawl, I didn’t realize when I made it that the color… with your dark hair… for just a minute it was like watching that painting of Caroline. Made me feel kind of queer.”

Clyde was coming at seven-thirty to walk Rooney home. “He won’t have me out of the house alone at night,” Rooney confided. “Says he doesn’t like my wild talk after I’ve been out alone.”

“What kind of wild talk?” Jenny asked absently. The baby was sleeping. His breathing sounded heavy.

“You know,” Rooney said, her tone lowered to a whisper. “Once in one of my spells, when I just spill out words, I told Clyde I’ve been seeing Caroline around an awful lot. Clyde got real mad.”

Jenny shivered. Rooney had seemed so well. She hadn’t talked about seeing Caroline since before the baby was born.