Lori didn't answer.
"Okay. If we don't ask questions," Cora Lee said, "if we don't pry, will you stay with us? You could come home with me; we have lots of room, and two nice dogs for company."
Lori's cheeks flushed; she looked and looked at Cora Lee, and lifted her hand as if to touch Cora Lee's hand, but she didn't reach out. "I have to go back. All my things are there, I have to go back. I… I'll be fine."
Dulcie wanted to race down the garden and shake the child, tell her to go with Cora Lee, tell her this might be her one opportunity to keep herself safe. Why was she so reluctant? What was she afraid of? At times, this morning, fear had seemed to spill out of the child so powerfully… and yet she did not want Cora Lee and Genelle to help her.
Surely coming here in the dark seeking out Genelle had not been, in any way, asking for grown-up protection. There was something else involved, Dulcie was sure of it.
"Lori?" Cora Lee said softly. "You can get your things, I'll come with you. You can stay with Genelle or with me."
"I… I have to go back. I can't… I have a nice place."
Cora Lee looked steadily at Lori. "Then I'll get my car, and take you there when you're ready."
"No, I…"
Genelle put her hand on Lori's. "Cora Lee can keep a secret. And so can I. Child, it would be so nice having someone here with me. Someone who cares, to stay with me, read with me. And for you… Even if you were to go back, wouldn't it be nice to have someone who knows you're safe, someone who cares about you? Where is it, child? Where are you… hiding?"
Lori looked at Genelle for a long time. "The library basement," she whispered at last, so faintly that Dulcie could barely hear her. "A hole in the basement."
But Genelle laughed out loud, a shout of laughter that startled them all. She choked and coughed, and had to have oxygen again, and was still laughing.
When finally she was better, she looked at Lori. "I used to play there, that was my hiding place, that basement. When I was your age and younger. The hiding hole under the alley."
Lori's eyes had widened; she was very still.
"I grew up in that house, Lori. Before it was the library. I used to play in the basement. That little part under the alley was open then, with a door. It was a walkway long ago, even before my time. A walkway for the servants to go back and forth. But how are you getting in? It was all bricked up. Bricked up from both sides. How…?"
"I take the bricks out," Lori said. "In the wall of the library workroom. They were loose, they were just fitted in."
"And you just walk into the library through the front door? And go down and…?"
Lori shook her head. "I go in one of the sidewalk windows." She looked up at the sky, which was now bright silver. "Before it gets light, though. Before the library opens." She shifted nervously.
"I will take you down the hill when you want to go back," Cora Lee said. She looked at her watch. "But it is getting light, Lori."
"Sometimes I go in when it's open, then I hang around the children's room."
"If I'm with you, it will be different. We'll get you safe inside. I'll just get my car," Cora Lee said, touching the child's shoulder. "I'll be a few minutes, time to shower and dress properly."
But Cora Lee's answer made Dulcie smile. Cora Lee hadn't said she'd allow Lori to say there, and she hadn't said she wouldn't. Dulcie watched the little scene, wondering. Strange, Lori seemed far more frightened this morning. But maybe it was being so far away from the library, up here in the hills in the dark that had scared her. A journey into a strange neighborhood in the middle of the night would be far more stressful than slipping out to run the shore at dawn.
Down at the table, the child looked very nervous, as if she'd like to disappear before Cora Lee got back. Was she afraid Cora Lee wouldn't let her stay there after all, wouldn't let her return to her cave? Dulcie was fidgeting, herself, shifting from paw to paw with curiosity and with worry.
Lori settled down into her chair as if she had decided to cooperate. She looked as if she burned to ask Genelle something. Something that now, when Cora Lee would so soon return, filled her with anxiety. Genelle remained very still, watching Lori. Dulcie, fascinated, slipped closer.
After a little silence, Lori said, "You worked for my pa."
"Yes, until I retired four years ago. You and your mama had already moved to North Carolina. I imagine you missed him, while you lived there."
Lori didn't answer.
"He was a quiet man." Genelle studied the child. "Or he turned quiet."
Lori looked at her with interest. Then, disconcerted, she speared the last two pancakes in a frenzy of movement, slathered on butter, and poured on a deep pool of syrup.
"Was he quiet when you were little, when you were together?"
Lori spoke with her mouth full. "He used to laugh and we went to the park and the beach and he played ball with me, helped me build sand castles. He and Mama laughed a lot."
"When did he change?" Genelle said softly.
Watching them, Dulcie slipped closer still, down the garden through the bushes, to pause just above the terrace. Listening, she grew so intent that a beetle crawled across her paw in absolute safety, the tiny morsel totally ignored. When Lori didn't answer her, Genelle said, "I worked for Vincent and Reed for thirty years. At the reception desk, just in front of Jack's office. You used to come in, you and your mama. The three of you would go out to lunch."
Lori nodded. "There was a tall plant in the room, like a tree, next to your desk, and that room had yellow walls, like butter. We always had our lunch at that little cabin place; I liked their spaghetti."
Genelle nodded. "I took Jack's dictation, typed his letters, did the billing. Learned to use the computer when we changed over." The old lady seemed, in her own way, as hesitant as the child. Something unseen was sparking between them, some unspoken truth that made Dulcie's heart pound.
Dulcie knew Vincent and Reed Electrical from seeing their trucks around the village, and because they had done some work for Wilma when she'd enclosed the carport; Jack Reed had put in their electric garage-door opener. He was a tall man, well over six feet, she thought, very thin, and he walked with a twisting limp. He always looked shy, and he was very quiet. He did work for Ryan Flannery Construction sometimes; she'd heard Ryan say he was reliable. Interesting, Dulcie thought, how much a cat could pick up hanging out with humans.
"I was sorry to see your dad's brother leave so suddenly," Genelle said. "I liked Hal, none of us had any idea he'd take off like that. I always wondered if they'd had a falling-out, he and Jack. But it would have to be a very serious matter for two brothers to remain parted for so long."
When Lori didn't answer, Genelle put her arm around the child. "I liked to think of the company as Reed, Reed, and Vincent, that was my private name for it. Your father is a good man, Lori. A gentle, good man. I haven't seen much of Jack since I retired."
"When did he… Why did he… He wasn't always…"
"Angry?" Genelle asked.
"Yes, angry!" Lori said fiercely, her voice bursting out. "Like he hates me."
"He doesn't hate you, how could he hate you? You are his joy. He had pictures of you all over his office; he used to tell little stories about you, how you loved to chase the seagulls, how well you could read before you ever started kindergarten so they put you in first grade, how good you were at arithmetic, years ahead of the other kids."
"It was after Uncle Hal left," Lori said. "After that, Pa was always angry. Like he hated the world."
"After your Uncle Hal left?"
Lori nodded. Genelle took Lori's hand in both of hers. Lori looked up at her as if she wanted to say more, to tell her something she couldn't bring herself to say.
"Do you remember their arguing, Lori? Do you remember anything about why Hal left?"
Lori shook her head quickly. "I was little. After he left, Pa didn't talk much. He didn't want me to go to school either, or go outdoors. That made Mama yell at him that I couldn't be a captive. And then after a long time, we went away."