BOOK TWO
Hollo Island

PART ONE
THE ISLAND

(From a special report to the Boston Police Dept., dated this month)

Subject: Hollo Island	
	In the seventeenth century, English settlers found a small island situated just within the arm of Cape Cod in Massachusetts. Archaeologists determined that at least two Indian communities called this island home in the past thousand years, but the europeans found the land uninhabited.
	It occupies an area of 307 acres of hilly flat land, from which juts a curiously tall hill of rock known as the Reach. The western part is mostly sand and will support only the sturdiest of plant life, but the land near the Reach is very fertile.
	Currently the island is home to 397 inhabitants, mostly men; women and children number about sixty each. Most of the women are mothers, and many are single parents. Religion and ethnicity are mixed: 20% of the population is Roman Catholic, 8% Protestant, and no other faith represents above 5%. The population is about 40% white, 25% black, 10% asian, and 25% other. While the population size has exploded in the past 14 years, the island fell back last year from its peak of 404.
	Starting last year, the Boston-Provincetown ferry has made regular stops at Hollo Island.  Hollo Island has an open door policy on visitors—a policy which is no doubt being tested by the influx of tourists. Already, many carefree youths have been abusing the island's shores on weekends, and many islanders are very upset.
	The chief industries are fishing and farming, but food products are rarely exported. The only significant exports from Hollo Island are paintings from several, local artists, whose works are becoming increasingly popular in various Massachusetts and Maine towns. Still, the island has lost money every year under its current system and ownership.
	The island is a sanctuary for disillusioned urbanites and anti-patriots. Charles McNeill and Victoria Smith jointly purchased the island from the state nineteen years ago for $1,600,000, after which the island population exploded at the rate of about 30 persons a year for ten years. The island lacks an economy in the modern sense, and it has no recognized government. The two title owners to the island have bound their ownership powers in a contract with the rest of the inhabitants, but this contract is of doubtful legal status. The contract is like a constitution, and it spells out the rights and obligations of all islanders. The law is very simple: "Do not murder, rape, oppress or steal." If someone is charged with one of these crimes, the entire adult population is surveyed; a two-thirds majority decides guilt, and the criminal may be expelled from the community. Expulsion is the only punishment allowed for any crime. Other laws are enforced only by social pressure and conformity: "No money is allowed on the island except in the community fund. No organized trading is allowed, and leaders may be elected ad hoc only." The legal status of this constitution is questionable, yet it has never been tested in court. The fore-mentioned community fund may be tapped only for a democratically approved purpose, and every islander (except, notably, co-owner Victoria Smith) must surrender all earned wealth into the fund. Despite losing money every year, the community fund is worth over $2,000,000.
	The island is currently undergoing considerable social change, and much of what I am relating here may already be out of date. I will continue to monitor the situation closely and will immediately report any relevant change.
							A.S.

NATURE

	Spring weather on the island is, as a rule, wildly variable. The climate would not change gradually from winter to summer; rather summer would jounce in in a random series of cold and mild days. Despite Mother Nature's vagary, the winter-like days of spring were evenly balanced with the hot and mild days. An exceptionally fair week would, during that season, nearly always be followed by an equally exceptional deep freeze. This was the expected pattern for spring weather to take.
	But the month of April had proven a pleasant surprise this year with unvarying seventy and eighty degree temperatures. The only rain to fall during that month was at night. Such nice weather had lured the islanders into believing and hoping that summer was arriving early. The outdoors were everything to the cabin dwelling islanders, and the promise of warm, sunny days soon was taken for granted.
	Then came a big chill.
	While sudden changes were the norm for the New England climate, the overnight drop of fifty degrees was greater than even the most pessimistic had been prepared for. Many hearts sank as deep as the temperature.

CHARLES

	The dream that had occupied my mind that night was one that I'd had often, every time with few variations and always with a sad happiness: Happy because the dream told of what I'd always hoped to have; sad because no matter how I'd try to hold the dream, make it true, the substance of it proved itself a liquid and fell through my tightly shut hands. I was married, in the dream, but my wife's face was unclear, and every night and every dream she became ever more difficult to visualize. But she was always there. I also had a child, sometimes a boy, sometimes a girl, either infant or teenager. The island was for my family, safe and homey, ever content. My wife sang her song, and my daughter was to be married, or my son was leaving home to minister. And I stood back to view my family with a smile, when . . .

	When I awoke that morning, it was twilight. Before noticing the sun's position in the sky—before even opening my eyes, a loneliness captured me and held me tightly. The temperature within my cabin was frigid, as was the uncovered section of bed beside me; and the first sound to come to my attention was the song of a lone and unfamiliar bird.
	Sitting upon a chair beside my bed was a half filled bottle of beer never finished the previous night. Without thinking, I grabbed it and pitched it towards the waste-basket near the cabin door. It shattered above its target on the wall.
	I usually awake very slowly and without all my senses, especially when I'd been drinking the night before; but on that morning, I roused and was immediately aware and upset. The reason for my fear eluded me, for nothing was out of place or peculiar. The cabin was characteristically unclean and in disarray, birds were chirping outside as they did every day, and, likewise, the ocean smell meshed with the rot of the cabin's old wood.  But I was frightened, as if a sixth sense—some sense within—made a discovery incomprehensible to the conscious mind. I had known the cause of my anxiety for one brief moment—that instant between sleep and wakefulness—but now was unable to recall it. So my fear remained, unresolved and persistent.
	I had prepared wood in the fireplace last night, and in the cold I now ignited it and sat at the end of the hearth, awaiting heat. I couldn't relax, as if I had been injected with caffeine in some way; my muscles tensed, and my breathing became too careful. Even the expectation of a small explosion from within the fire aroused my anxiety. I was supposed to be somewhere, I thought, or be doing something. I felt a sense of urgency, which my understanding did not support, yet this feeling only increased as I watched the fire bounce about chaotically.
	Unable to remain still any longer, I began to prepare food for cooking. I wasn't hungry at all, but I had to do something. In the cooler last night, I had stored several frozen bluefish away. I found that they still weren't completely thawed. I put one in a pan and over the fire to boil, estimating blindly that it would be cooked within a half hour, during which time I'd be outside about the island. I would take a walk and extinguish my anxiety with proof that everything was just as it should be.
	My cabin was built beside a road—one of only three on the island. The road led in one direction to Victoria's house, which was surrounded by cabins, an old and nonfunctional lighthouse, and the island's only dock. In the other direction the road led past dozens of cabins to the island's far side. There it climbed a third the way up a steep hill, which jutted from the low, flat land around it as conspicuously as a skyscraper in a prairie—the hill of rock, known to islanders as the Reach, was a climb so high that it was visible from several beaches along Cape Cod bay. It was so high and large that each morning its shadow covered most of Hollo Island, as it was doing now. On spring mornings such as these of april and may, the sunrise was an especial sight, as the sun would emerge from the Reach's peak, drawing all wakeful eyes to it, and its light would wash the shadow away from the island.
	Some have said that the island's first settlers showed a lack of imagination by naming the mini-mountain "The Reach", but I've always considered the name appropriate: Most visitors, when first seeing it, at once are consumed by the desire to climb it. This is no great ambition, unless one wishes to climb all the way to the top; the attempt, however, seems doomed to failure from the start, and the desire to reach never finds realization but neither does it lessen. Everyone tries to climb it at least part of the way up: The least passionate turn away where the walking path ends, afraid of the sight above; the next do the same when any mistake might mean a likely fall; and even the most determined find the last quarter too risky to attempt because of the friable rock and cracks that give no indication that a human could be supported. This section is narrow and rises sharply, offering a challenge to even the best of rock climbers. That first feeling that the climb might hold some reward becomes increasingly difficult to sustain on every inch higher, as the climber's practical side is ever more assured of the senselessness of the attempt. Some, frustrated and unwilling to accept defeat, did surmount the Reach with the aid of ropes and hooks, but this was like trying to win a marathon by riding a bicycle—any fool could do it.
	There was an island hero myth, who's tale was believed about as much as Santa's. In the seventeenth century, an Englishman had claimed to have made the climb to the top. There were a few witnesses, but none were thought of as credible at that time. Supporters found evidence of the climb, but they could show nothing that would make the doubters believe that the seemingly impossible had been achieved. Whether reality or hoax, he was made the hero of many stories told to the island children, who called him the Man on the Reach and believed he still lived there, guarding the island.
	As for my attempts at the climb, every so often I would scale it as high as felt safe and look down at the island beneath me. In my early twenties, I had gone my highest, tempting the loose rock near the peak to release me, not caring much about what I realized might happen at any moment.
	That had been during the early days of the island, when I had thought I saw the future clearly. Death didn't seem to be even a possibility back then, because I had a destiny to fulfill. I didn't realize that all choices have a cost.
	I had envisioned the island to someday become a miniature utopia. In my youth, I had often believed that such was possible, and I didn't understand the troubles that go with being a leader. I had held firm to my dreams, which had seemed then to be so true and necessary, yet all that I saw as my dreams became reality was the beauty of its form. Eventually I realized that all I had seen was the Big Picture (or the surface) of my ideas and fancies; but when the island had taken form, it was the details which proved more significant and outstanding—it was the islanders as individuals, when they were unable to see where and how they fit, who challenged the integrity of my dream. These details seemed so small and unimportant when I saw them as an idealist, yet those details were, in fact, human beings; they were my friends. Was it possible to see them as both an idealist and as a friend? Could I step upon the platform that I saw in the Big Picture, somehow, and call upon the individuals to come together?
	No, maybe not. I was as much a detail as anyone, and I could no better understand my place in the Big Picture. I no longer believed in destiny, and I was more afraid of death. My dreams had come true, but I had neglected to build a reality. I needed a wife to give me strength so that I might hold her above me; I needed children to love and give strength to so that when I was gone, the best I was would remain in them.
	As I viewed the cloud patched sky, which very brightly clothed the Reach, I thought that even if I could now surmount the climb, no one would see nor would anybody care.
	I passed through a part of Joe Bradley's gardens, diverting somewhat from the Long Road, and I felt a cold breeze and a mist in the air. The urgency with which I had awaken was now subsiding, as if suddenly whatever had been wrong was made right.
	As I neared the Reach, I caught a glimpse of someone upon it. The person appeared only once, and then moved beyond a section of rock. I wondered who it might be, as I began to ascend the path up the Reach's base. At once I fancied that it was the Man on the Reach—the hero of the island's legend. I stifled the thought and proceeded in silence, not wishing to be seen first by whoever was ahead of me.
	Not until I was only a few yards away from her could I see the young woman beyond the rock.
	I knew right then that she was a stranger to both myself and to the island. However, I suspected at the same time that I knew something else of her: During the past several weeks, a group of teenagers had twice invaded the beach and left dozens of broken bottles scattered about in the sand, causing many injuries. This girl appeared to be about the right age to be one of them.
	She was standing at the path's end and gazing up at the difficult climb, as if for the first time. Then, before I could make my presence obvious, she noticed me.
	Wrapped about her was a bed sheet, which she clung to herself for warmth. It was clear from the manner that the sheet contoured to her body that she wore little if anything beneath. The breeze allowed me an occasional glimpse of her legs, and the mist in the air caused the chestnut color of her skin to penetrate the white fabric.
	She looked at me without an expression I could read and said, "Hi."
	"Who are you?"
	She didn't respond and instead returned her gaze to the Reach's peak.
	"Why are you here?" I pressed.
	For a moment she remained quiet, but just when I was about to continue, she choked out, "I don't know."
	Now, she was watching me intently. She wasn't lying.
	"How did you get here?"
	Again she looked up at the Reach. She shook her head.
	Her face was flushed with blood, and she swayed slightly as she stood. I figured her to be drunk or stoned.
	"Ever think that this might be private property?"
	She shook her head.
	I tried to present an appearance of cold strength. I tried to see this stranger as a nuisance and nothing more. I felt, however, that there was something more—a whole lot more. The air was filled with energy, and I felt as if lightning were about to crash down from the sky, or as Moses must have felt before the Red Sea parted.
	"Well, I think it's time that you should leave like you came," I said uncertainly, stepping towards her to take hold of her arm. I had thought that I would then lead her down from the Reach to her boat or to whomever had transported her.
	But what had happened was very different.

	I wasn't sure why I reached out, whether to seize her or because of what I thought I saw in her. In either case, I wasn't prepared for the sudden, almost magical change in everything around me and even within myself. As I moved towards her, the sun appeared to me from beyond the Reach in blinding force. When my hand touched her arm, she shook, and the sheet that'd been her clothing fell loose and was carried on a breeze like a leaf to the ground far beyond the Reach. She was shivering and quaking, as the cutting air slashed upon her now exposed skin. Her aware eyes told me of her sobriety and pain. She crossed her arms against her chest, protecting herself from the weather. Only then did I realize that this wasn't a teenager playing games but someone very confused and frightened.
	(And there was something else that is difficult to explain or describe: I had a feeling that this meeting was somehow prepared—not a matter of destiny but perhaps of providence. The anxiety with which I had awaken seemed designed to lead me here, and now it had subsided.)
	I removed my fishing jacket and gave it to her.
	She hurried into it. The jacket, which was large even for me, covered her to the knees, and the sleeves stretched beyond the limits of her arms. She didn't even try to wear it, however, but kneeled to the ground and gathered herself compactly within the created enclosure; she then pulled the collar out and breathed deeply into the jacket. She remained like this for several minutes.
	I kneeled before her, just looking at her face; her eyes were tightly shut and were surrounded by dried tears and mucus; her nose ran steadily, and she wiped it off on the jacket collar when necessary. She was shivering such that I was alarmed. After a minute, she raised her hands out through the collar and covered her face with their warmth. Then, seeing the color of the skin on her hands, I was struck by how cold she must have been, for the skin on her face was quite light and pinkish, while her hands showed what must have been her natural, rich color.
	"I have a cabin about five minutes from here," I said. "It should be quite warm by now." She remained quiet, not even opening her eyes. "If we move fast, the exercise should warm you up." She didn't seem to hear a word I said, and I expected that I would have to carry her back. I put my hand on her forehead and almost panicked. How could a person be so cold and live? I reached into a pocket of the jacket and removed a cloth. "Here, blow your nose."
	She did, then she whispered with a foreign accent that I hadn't noticed before, "Thank you."
	"How are you?"
	"Freezing."
	"Here," I said, as I put an arm around her, "I'll carry you back."
	And then our eyes met directly for the first time. What I saw in hers made me take a step backwards; even she showed surprise and an inexplicable flash of recognition. I don't know how to describe what I saw except to say that I felt a connection with her. Of course I knew nothing about this girl, but maybe I was supposed to. Maybe I had met her in a previous life. Maybe things got messed up in heaven, and she was someone I had been meant to know.
	I didn't have to carry the young lady back to my cabin, as she stood up and appeared capable but dizzy. She leaned against me as we walked, and she seemed more relaxed than I would have expected. After a minute or two, her face returned to its normal color, except on the nose and ears; she was shivering much less than before, although she still held her arms crossed within the jacket.
	We said nothing while we walked, but that was no indication of how we were relating to each other. We seemed to have established a rapport almost immediately . Strange as this situation was, I was not at all suspicious of her, and I don't think she had any worries about me, either. I felt as if I had known her for much longer than ten minutes—yet I knew absolutely nothing concrete about her.
	Soon I understood that this girl had a unique ability to communicate without words or even without seeming to intend communication. Her face and hands were hypnotic and expressive (but not beguiling), and she told me more about herself with a tilt of her head and a sweep of her hand than I might learn from a formal introduction. She was using a body language that was expressive even without words. Her feelings came through clearly, although the words and memories that usually go with feelings remained unknown. Somehow, we seemed to share feelings without any common experiences—a wonderful and rare thing!
	So rare, in fact, that I could not easily accept it. I felt a touch of embarrassment that I was reading so much into the posture of her crossed arms, the impetuous aspect of her gait and the glint in her eyes; the skeptic in me wondered how much could there possibly be there to see. I saw in her a being I knew—but who I had never met, except perhaps in a dream. I had a name for this being, but the skeptic, which often ruled me, suppressed it. I did not know whether I was repressing an unfulfilled wish, as Freud would say, or having a revelation, or even undergoing a psychic experience. Maybe they were all pretty much the same thing.
	But she was watching me as closely as I was watching her. What did she see?
	As if to answer the question, or to show a like sense of confusion, she became unsettled. She looked away from me and shivered within the jacket. I think we both looked a bit frustrated as we neared my cabin, and I wondered if we were frustrated with each other or with ourselves for not knowing how to respond to each other.

	As we entered my cabin, the magical, fanciful state that had affected me now receded, as I found practical concerns to deal with. My mind was safe from those pleasant yet disturbing thoughts in my home, I thought; but I might as well have tried to hide from water, because eventually my thirst for those thoughts would rise beyond my control.
	The cabin was very warm inside, as the fire I had set up earlier radiated more than enough heat for my small home. The young lady sat on my bed, looking weary and disoriented. With her fingers, she explored the various pockets on the fishing jacket.
	My focus upon her was so intense that she avoided my stare altogether now, as she was clearly growing nervous. I was trying to wrestle with the situation and bring it under control, but I was probably adopting the wrong approach.
	"Careful with those pockets," I said, while settling on the bed beside her; "there might be fishhooks in a few."
	She then put her hands on her lap and looked directly at me, like an obedient child.
	"How d'ya like the place?" I asked, attempting to end the staring game with a little dialog. She considered a reply, I think, but never stated one. Rather than waiting for an answer that might not come, I continued by requesting her name.
	With a quiet but clear voice, she replied, "Psyche."
	Psyche? I thought, much surprised. It was an exotic name, and that bothered me. I was trying to establish normalcy, and she was competing with me by saying that her name was Psyche.
	"It's the butterfly's name," she suddenly added, as if it explained everything. "It's Greek for butterflies."
	"Are you Greek?"
	She didn't answer.
	"Okay, well, what's your last name?"
	At first she appeared confused, and then she replied that she had none.
	My reaction was an incredulous stare, and then it became mild irritation. Everyone has a last name.
	"Uh, what is your father's name, then?"
	"I don't know."
	"Your mother's name?"
	She buried her face in her hands, "I don't know."
	She was testing my temper; although I tried to keep it behind an unchanged manner, her now quieter voice told me that she could sense my true emotion.
	Only now was I appreciating how mysterious she was: This girl of about twenty years, give or take a few, had only a first name—and that was an unusual one; I had found her on the island during a cold morning without clothing (the sheet she'd had was probably one that'd been left hanging to dry last night by an islander); she had no means of arrival that I had noticed, and her personality was unusual and exotic enough to suspect her as a martian. I thought that maybe she had amnesia, but that explained little. Maybe she was retarded, I thought, but somehow I knew she wasn't.
	I tried to settle my temper, believing that she wasn't playing with my patience deliberately.
	"What's that?" she asked, indicating an odour.
	At first I wasn't sure what she was referring to, because the scent of fish surrounded me constantly, dulling my sensitivity to it. "Oh, that's my breakfast. Are you hungry?"
	She half nodded.
	Now hunger was a feeling I could fully appreciate. I wasn't hungry myself, so I gave her it all. I figured that she probably would only eat a few bites, as boiled bluefish was not most people's idea of breakfast food.
	But she shocked me when she spit it out onto the floor!
	"Why d'ya do that!" My temper flared, blinding me to the terror in her eyes.
	"That. . ." she sputtered tearfully. "It was alive!"
	"Yeah? Yeah, sure! I caught it three days ago, cleaned it, filleted it, froze it, and then boiled it for half an hour, but I guess it had such a will to live that . . ."
	Psyche had withdrawn completely from the world by then, drowning in her tears. She was grappling senselessly at the jacket, as if it were choking her.
	"Hey! Hey, stop it!" I said, my anger instantly converted to concern. Her hysterics worried me, and she didn't respond to my voice. I would have been less concerned if she cried out, but she was silent and shaking. My God, she was turning blue, as if she couldn't breathe. I sat beside her on the bed, and more forcefully than I intended, I grabbed her head and forced her to look at me. I whispered some wordless sounds, as she desperately searched my eyes and face for a feeling of sympathy. "It's okay," I whispered, then kissed her forehead.
	Then she embraced me. She was clinging so tightly to me, lest that mean tempered guy step back into my body.
	As I held her, I had that unexplainable feeling again. I knew the scent of her body, the feel of her hair and the sound of her voice. Despite the oddity of the situation, everything felt so right. She was like a lost piece to a long forgotten puzzle. 
	When she loosened her hold on me, I brushed away the stray hairs that had fallen on her face, and a tried a reassuring smile, which my unpracticed lips resisted. I then felt compelled to add an apology for upsetting her and a promise not to ask her any more questions, as every question I had asked before disturbed her. This promise, however, I immediately broke because she appeared weary.
	"Tired?" I asked.
	She smiled weakly and nodded.
	"Well . . . Okay, you can sleep on the bed. I won't be using it for a while."
	While looking me strait in the face, she stood and lifted the still zipped jacket over her head and then handed it to me, without regard to her nudity. This had been so unexpected that I could not hold back an expression of shock. She stood unmoving before me, shivering and naked, as her eyes searched mine, seeking out something, anticipating, afraid. I worried about what she wanted: Did she want something involving sex? -- for if she did, I felt no such urge towards her; was I supposed to look away as she disrobed? --and if so, why did she disrobe so quickly and unexpectedly? The only reaction I could think of making was that which I did; I ignored her condition and merely put the jacket away.
	It seemed my reaction was acceptable to her, though perhaps not what she wanted. She settled in bed and pulled the blankets over herself.
	I was a bit wary of her, now. Maybe she wasn't the missing puzzle piece I was looking for; she didn't fit perfectly, and the hue seemed slightly off.
	I sat at the end of the bed and held one of her feet. It was very cold, so I rubbed it in my hands. Her feet were heavily callused and scarred, like those of the island's children, who ran around barefoot most of the time.
	"Your feet are freezing. I'll heat some water in a pot to soak them in," I said as I stood. She sat up quickly and grabbed my arm, ignoring the blanket that had fallen aside. "Stay," she said. "Don't disappear."
	"I'll be right here," I replied with concern. She appeared to have recovered from the cold, but her eyes gleamed almost insanely. Maybe she only suffered from exhaustion. Or then again, maybe the possibility of freezing to death had left her in a state of shock.
	"Stay," she repeated, more calmly.
	I sighed and sat beside her, and then I covered her again with the blanket. "I won't leave you. If you wish, I'll stay here even while you sleep," and, to this, she responded very favorably.
	As I stroked her brown hair, and we looked into each other's eyes (the only thing she seemed to want to do), I felt as though I was her father. And if I was her father, then maybe she was the child of mine that I had had in my recurrent dream. She was even delivered to me in her birthday suit, wrapped in a sheet, with the mystery that always accompanies birth, from that sacred place called the Reach. I smiled at the crazy idea, yet it charmed me. Psyche smiled in response to my smile, as if she was charmed by the same idea.
	She then took my hand in hers and cautiously set it down under the blanket over her heart. She positioned my fingers just such that I could feel her heart beat, which was beating unevenly. I felt myself responding sexually to the soft cushion of her breast, but she meant nothing sexual by her act. She was trying to convey a message. Maybe she was saying "I trust you." Or "this is who I am." "I am opening my heart to you."
	"You'll like it here on Hollo Island," I said while pulling my hand from under the warm curve of her breast and my eyes from her peaceful stare. I moved my hand up to check the temperature of her forehead. Now my feelings were more appropriate. "I'll find a place for you, a cabin like this. You'll have friends, here. You'll be happy."
	She was watching me form each syllable, but I don't know if she heard a word I said. She seemed more involved with the physical communication.
	"There are no rulers, here, no laws to be chained by, no standards of living to conform to," I boasted to her indifferent ears, telling her the words I had told every person new to the island. "Never found a reason for those 'necessary evils'. On Hollo Island, you're free to be yourself."
	Psyche smiled but looked at me as if I was only speaking words. Those words were special for me, like a protective spell, or the blessing of a priest, and right now they seemed especially important to me. I didn't mind that she could not appreciate the power of those words, but I did hope very strongly that they would protect her.
	Psyche took my hand, which groped about her face anxiously, and she put it back over her heart. Her heart was now beating a slow steady beat, and I relaxed. I did not realize until then how concerned I had been.
	A tear formed in her eye.
	She said nothing and neither did I. The birds that sing in the morning had exhausted themselves, yet most of the islanders were still asleep. The only sound was the crackle of the fire.
	I watched her and waited. I waited for the tear to fall, but it never did. I waited for her to say something, but that didn't happen either.
	The rain, which had been threatening all morning, finally fell outside, and a crack of thunder shook the heavens.
	And I smiled.
	When I smiled, Psyche fell asleep. She cuddled the blankets tightly to herself, and pressed my hand to her heart.
	I just remained there in wonder.
	In this state I waited, reluctant to move because where my hand touched her I felt her heartbeat. That sensation so inspired my wonder that the rain eventually ended without my notice, and I had forgotten completely about the arrangements I had made for that morning, which also passed without my notice.
	After all, of what importance were these arrangements when compared to my newly found daughter?

	My daughter. These words ushered me into sleep. Although I had awakened only an hour or two before, that sleep had ended too soon. Now I was having that same dream, again—the one in which I had a family, and this time the child had a face: Psyche's. My daughter. The sadness and longing that had always accompanied the dream had left, and, for the moment, I was allowed to taste the bliss. My wife, my daughter and I sat on the grass under the Reach, eating sandwiches and playing patty cake with Psyche, as if she was an infant. Then suddenly she was an infant, wobbling up to her mother, who was facing away from me. I had an urge; I approached the form that was my wife, determined to see her face, if she had one. I took hold of her, and I slowly turned her around. . .

	Then I awoke. I was intoxicated by an exotic comfort, only slowly appreciating that I had fallen asleep beside Psyche on the bed. My face was in her hair, and my chest was against her bare back. She had curled up to almost a fetal position, trapping the blanket within, and she held my right arm across her chest within the enclosure. My hand cupped her bare breast, the nipple pressing against my palm. I could still barely feel her heartbeat.
	This wasn't right, I thought. My feelings were confused. She wasn't really my daughter, so what was so wrong? Why couldn't I just dream of her as my wife? Why couldn't I interpret the connection I had felt as desire?
	I withdrew my hand, and she stirred; when I freed the blanket that she was hugging and covered her with it, her eyes nudged open and met mine. I could look into her eyes forever and never say a word, and she would be perfectly happy, but it seemed like such a false intimacy. "Go back to sleep," I said with a reassuring smile. She embraced the blanket again, now tightly, and obeyed.
	The fire had died, and the cabin was cool. I felt that I had to keep Psyche warm, so I set up a new log over the old ashes. The blaze quickly returned. I stared into the blaze for a long time, resisting thoughts of the girl, which were almost as disturbing as they were comforting. I watched the flames bounce about chaotically.
	What was wrong with me? I thought. Despite the crazy notion I entertained, the fact was that I didn't know this girl—hell, she was not even like anyone I knew. Yet I felt responsible for her. I felt like she depended on me.
	I looked out the cabin window and saw that it was almost sundown. I had missed the day's activities—or, rather, the lack of activities: On such rainy, cold days, no one works, no one smiles, and every seat on the island is occupied. I doubt that anyone even noticed my absence from the scene.
	My only regret for having slept through the day was that I would be awake with Psyche all night, and the feelings that she inspired within me were confusing. I sat on the bed beside her and worried that she might be ill from the trauma of the cold that morning, but her breathing was steady and her temperature normal. And, of course, I knew her heartbeat was okay. 
	Who was she?
	That was the normal question to ask when you know nothing about a person's past or how she lives from day to day. But the question seemed almost irrelevent to me. I knew that the answer made little difference about how I felt. I only wanted to know why I cared so much for her, and why I was so startled when I first looked in her eyes.
	Now, when I looked at her closed eyes, I felt the urge to clean away her dried tears and mucus.
	Psyche moved about uncomfortably in her sleep, as if aware of that which disturbed me.
	I sighed and took that disturbance outside the cabin with me. Maybe I could relax more easily by moving away from the transmitter of that disturbance, for none of my questions would be answered while she slept. I needed to join in the carnival of island life for a while. I wanted to watch over her, but the best medicine for me was to frolic in the mundane. Then, when my mind was at ease, I would return.

	The sun hung low in the western sky. During its migration from east to west, roughly ten more degrees had been added to the air. A swirling south-westerly wind carried the scent of freshly prepared dinner from Joe's Bradley's cooking house near the Reach.
	With Psyche out of sight, I noticed how hungry I was, and my mind was opened to my stomach's fantacies.
	The cooking house was surrounded by tables with canopies, and the area functioned as an outdoor cafeteria; at dinnertime, the island population gathered to eat all that Joe could farm and all that the fishermen could catch. My stomach growled, and my tongue prepared for over-fried, greasy and unidentifiable fish alongside a pint of beer. Then my tongue's imagination took over, as I envisioned giant lobsters and a bottle of Boston Ale, rather than the dreadfully sweet island brew.
	I hurried down the path, determined to be there before nightfall, when Joe would close down the house. 
	About halfway down the Long Road, I encountered Newton Bart. He was the island's substitute for a newspaper, and thus we nicknamed him Newton News. He always had an opinion of events on the island, and that opinion was always controversial. He was quite a reliable gossip, which meant that he always knew what he shouldn't know, and he reported all that he had learned to his audience at dinner time. The frightening thing was that he was influential, despite all the people he had slandered.
	"Hi, Newt," I said, trying to be polite. "Any headlines I might be interested in today?"
	Newton simply grinned and shook his head. "Uh-uh, nothin' today."
	My expression must have been one of skepticism. Newton always had something to report, even if it was only a weather forecast (and weather was probably big on everyone's tongue today). I figured he must have had a truly distasteful story that he knew I would not listen to.
	Once Newton was out of sight, I easily put him out of mind. My thoughts quickly returned to food, as I realized for the first time that I had not eaten in twenty-four hours.
	The Long Road did not lead directly to the cooking house. Once at the base of the Reach, I had to turn into the bushy area alongside the path and swim through ten yards of chest high, sharp pined bushes. This wasn't the usual route I used to get there, but it was the shortest; the alternative was to walk to the shore from my cabin and follow the beach halfway around the island. That route was too long, and I knew that many people other than myself would've loved to see Joe cut a path through the bushes.
	His reply was always, "Don't want you lazy bums steppin' in my corn. If it bothers you to walk an extra two minutes to eat my whole day's work, I'll surely be the last to make it easier." And that was that, for everyone respected Joe's claim as the island's most diligent worker. He awoke every morning about sunrise, worked until noon on his twenty acre farm, and from then until twilight he and seven women struggled to prepare dinner for the island's population. If anything ever happened to him, four men would be needed to take his place.
	When I arrived at the cooking house, most of the fifty tables surrounding it were unoccupied. Small groups amassed around a few tables, but even those were breaking up. While this was the normal time for such a parting, I was surprised that the exodus was nearly complete. Most tables apparently were not even visited. Usually happy faces overcrowded the place; dinner was the grandest part of each day, despite the standard rations we received, yet today saw no spirit of togetherness. The food prepared by Joe and company was left piled high and mostly untouched on a long table in front of the heartbroken man.
	As I approached Joe, the few people who had come for dinner stared up at me. My arrival seemed to cause a minor commotion, and I began to wonder what was happening to the island I dearly loved.
	"Hi, Joe," I greeted. A greeting sounded out of place. "You don't have to say high back."
	"Hello, Chuck," he replied in a whisper. He was the only person I allowed call me Chuck. Joe was a man with an enduring sense of humour, yet his face looked blank.
	"You're taking this pretty badly," I said.
	Joe sighed. "Look at this!" He gestured to the food and then to the few people sitting around, who looked like figures from a wax museum.
	I nodded. "I've never seen this place look so lonely."
	"You know, Newton came by with all his rumors and what-not, and everyone here—everyone! -- gathered 'round to hear him an' what he had to say. It's frightening."
	I nodded.
	"The last time this happened, a good ole food fight brought back the spirit. I was mad then, but all this fish is just going to waste anyway."
	"Yeah," I smiled at the idea. "But remember the smell that next day."
	Joe remembered and chortled. "It'd be worth it. I need something exciting, something unusual to help me forget this day of the dead."
	I told him, "If ya give me a beer and some of that charcoal you call fish, I'll tell ya 'bout the only interesting that happened today."
	His sixty year old eyes suddenly glowed with anticipation. "What? D'ya get back together with Vicky or somethin'?"
	"Something."

	Joe usually resigned himself to a listening role in a conversation, and his sparse offerings generally were designed to lighten the mood. Joe was not so restrained, today. We sat at a tables, and when my mouth wasn't full of warm beer or cold fish, I told him everything about my introduction to Psyche—except the most personal stuff. Joe was unexpectedly active in making comments on details. He offered many ideas on Psyche, only one of which I thought made good sense: I told him of the incident when she had spit the fish on the floor, claiming that it was alive, and he suggested that she might be a vegetarian. While that was only one answer to my many questions, I was happy to have at least something to focus on. This one thing helped me place the girl in the real world rather than only in my dreams.
	When the conversation ended, Joe put away the fish to spoil. Tomorrow, the food would become fertilizer, I supposed, and some good would come from the loss. Before I left the cooking house, I filled a covered bowl with Joe's own nuts-and-corn-flake cereal, which had been stored away since autumn, and sprinkled cranberries on top. I also filled a pint sized jar with water.
	As I began the walk back home, I was tempted to not return at all—to just walk away and not let Psyche be my problem. She didn't have to be, I told myself. Wouldn't things be easier if she went somewhere else? I let the thought run through my mind and pretended to consider it, but when I arrived back at my cabin, I was smiling.

	Psyche was still asleep when I entered. Although only smoldering ashes remained in the fireplace, the cabin was very warm. Either the cold air rushing into the small space and touching her skin awakened her, or perhaps it was the slight squeak of the door being shut. I worried momentarily that the culprit was my thoughts to abandon her becoming a specter and stirring her from sleep, but when she awoke, her wide smile annulled my fear.
	"How did you sleep," I asked.
	She rubbed her eyes with her fingers and yawned. Her eyes opened only a crack, as if the room was blazing with light, and she stretched out on the bed as if the world was suddenly new. The message was so clear to me that a spoken reply was unnecessary.
	I gave her a sweater from the few I had stored away, and, as I expected, she was not at all hesitant to bare herself before me to put it on. I was a bit surprised by how casually she did it this time, as she showed none of the concern that she showed before; in fact, she yawned as she slipped it over her head. (Normal? Of course not, but I still did not think she was retarded. Strangely, she seemed more ashamed of wearing clothes than wearing nothing. I wondered if she had been raised in a nudist colony or something, but I was only guessing blindly. I doubted very much now that the mystery of Psyche was so simple.)  The sweater I gave her was much too large, almost reaching her knees and completely covering her hands.
	"If the sweater is too warm, I can get some woman's clothes from the storehouse," I offered, not remembering that the storehouse was already locked up for the night; I was worried that she might rather go bare than endure the sweater in the hot cabin.
	She shook her head and added with a grin, "After this morning, I could never be too hot again."
	I laughed. "You have a lovely accent. What's your native language?" The question seemed innocent enough.
	Her smile disintegrated. Suddenly, all the trust and happiness we had found now seemed in danger.
	Alarmed, I quickly sought to change the subject. Hoping that I wasn't venturing further into forbidden territory, I placed the cereal and water before her. "Forget that, I'm sorry. Are you a vegetarian?"
	She hesitated, and I thought I blew everything. She dropped her gaze and muttered a very quiet, "Yes."
	I sat beside her and put my arm around her shoulder in reassurance. "Hey, come on! That's great! I was just curious. There is no meat in this. I don't know if you'll like it. I wouldn't. But you . . . you try it. You'll have to eat it dry, since the island is short on milk."
	I thought she might suddenly throw the bowl away from her,  but she didn't. I relaxed, as she opened the jar of water and drank from it.
	She smiled at me, and I stroked her hair affectionately. 
	Just when I thought my intentions were understood and appreciated, Psyche leaned into me and kissed me full on the lips. The kiss was a bit clumsy, but she obviously meant it to be passionate. More than anything, the kiss was unexpected, and rather than responding in a sensible way, I said nothing and decided to put another log in the fireplace. Psyche turned her attention to the cereal, which she ate and apparently enjoyed, and while she ate, I sat by the fire, anxiously striking the burning log with a stick. I didn't know how to deal with her just then; every minute brought a surprise.
	When the fire had grown from insignificance to a bright a loud blaze, Psyche settled beside me on the hearth, opposite the fire. We relaxed there idly, not daring to do anything that might upset each other. Although my arm nearly touched hers, I felt as if there was a chasm between us; whenever I tried to bridge the chasm, the other side seemed to move further away.
	Psyche looked up at me and touched her lips with her fingertips. She was thinking of the kiss she had given me (I don't know how I knew what she was thinking, but it seemed obvious). Then suddenly she looked away, and her face became a caricature of confusion. "Who are you?" she demanded.
	"Charles. Charles McNeill. You can call me Charlie or Chuck, if you like."
	Psyche looked skeptical, as if I was avoiding the question.
	Then I had an urge that was difficult to contain.   "Or you could call me . . . uncle . . ."
	Psyche looked me right in the face and shook her head. She could see what I was thinking. Her face became a contradiction,  a wonderful yearning, an avid solace. She touched my face with two trembling hands. "Daddy?" she asked.
	"No, Psyche, no. We better stick with—"
	"Daddy, I love you!" Now, her whole body was shaking from the depths of her being.
	I was stunned. I wanted to reply in kind, wrap my arms around her and live that dream; my emotions cried that this was right. From the moment I met her, I knew there was a connection between us. Destiny had corrected a previous error.
	But I also expected the dream to end. I felt that my feelings were making me irrational, and that moment by moment, this situation would come to seem quite ordinary. The magic would escape leaving us both feeling like fools.
	I tried to forget what she said. I shared her dream, but I found it much more difficult to share her words. Dreaming a crazy idea does not make a person insane, I thought, but maybe saying it and believing in the idea did.
	Not knowing what else to do, I avoided her anxious gaze and focused on her legs, which glowed in the firelight. Her legs were unshaven, and short downy hairs the color of her skin created a halo over them. I touched her right leg and followed the length of a scar that was long healed but was once, perhaps, quite serious; the scar was a valley where hairs would not grow, and that valley extended under the sweater she was wearing. I wondered how long it was, and what could have caused it.
	A father would know these things. Men who are first introduced to their children when they are already teenagers would know how I felt; but the connection between them would be physical and undeniable. Psyche and I did not even slightly resemble each other; I was very irish, but I couldn't even guess what race Psyche belonged to.
	"I'm sorry," she whispered, holding back tears and a hint of anger. "I'm sorry, Mr McNeill." She made use of her fascinating legs and leaped from my side. I could not even stand before she had run out the door.
	What she just called me hurt. I told myself that considering how much we knew about each other, that was exactly was she should have called me. Why did it hurt? Why did the truth feel like a slander?
	Because truth is not independent of fantasy. I was fooling myself. Philosophy asks,"If a tree falls in the forest but no one hears it, does it really happen?" But this famous question tempts another: If a person believes that a tree is falling, but nature doesn't stage it, does it really happen? Maybe, but the person is apt to be pretty lonely in that belief.
	Maybe nature didn't stage our relationship, but we both believed in it. Can two people share the same psychosis, or does consensus make the dream respectable?
	I emerged from the cabin, ready to search for Psyche, but she was just outside. She was embracing a maple tree, as if the tree was a person—as if only the tree could understand her. She didn't watch me as I approached her, and when I put my hand on her shoulder, she ignored it. The air outside was still cold and was carried by a strong breeze; it did not seem to affect her. Her eyes were closed, and her fingers gently probed the grooves in the tree bark. The only sound I heard was her heavy breathing.
	"Psyche," I began, as I rested my hand on her shoulder; she shivered once, then she was aloof again. "I'm sorry. What can I say. . .? When I woke up this morning, I was afraid. I'm forty-four, and I thought that all my dreams were behind me. I'm getting too old to start the family I always wanted, and I always wanted a daughter. You are a lovely young lady, and I would be very happy to have you as my daughter."
	Psyche abruptly shook her head, saying, "No. No, you don't understand. You can't choose. We were prepared for each other."
	"By who?" I asked, but she didn't answer. I shook my head and decided to risk sounding foolish. "Psyche, I don't understand it all, but I do know that I care for you. You have some crazy charm over me. Some empty space within me was filled when I met you—at that very moment. Like you say, I felt that something prepared us for each other, and ever since I tucked you into bed this morning, I could only think of you as my daughter."
	Psyche let go of the tree and turned to face me. "I love you, Daddy."
	"And I love you kid," I replied, as I moved in, replacing the tree within her embrace. "I think you'll find that hugging a person has advantages over hugging a tree. People can hug back."
	She smiled and rested her cheek on my shoulder.
	Together, we walked back into the cabin. 

NATURE

	The next morning when the sun rose from beyond the Reach, a few clouds hung low in the sky. The sun was cordial this day, and, quite unlike the yesterday, it showed its happy face everywhere
	Not everywhere, however, was its happy face appreciated.

VICTORIA

	It was just gossip, of course, and may very well have been colored up, but I was sure that it was true. Newton was a character, but he wasn't bold enough to tell such a lie. It must've been true.
	I was now sitting at my usual place for dinner, though it was still early, and the islanders had not yet gathered about in their usual, festive lot. Joe and his lady-slave helpers, who were preparing the food, were the only people other myself near the cooking house. When night begins its descent, accented by bright orange, sunset clouds, then the crowds would gather quickly on this small field and eat the greasy, over-cooked fish and poorly preserved vegetables (which had been picked and frozen last autumn) as if it would be their last meal. Now especially would there be a spirit of thanksgiving, for there'd been no such spirit the evening before.
	I was tapping my fingernails harshly against the hard, wooden table while I watched the smoke rise from the stoves. Behind me the sun was sinking into the evergreens.
	(Charlie had told me once that one day the sun wouldn't fall, because night would be snatched away. He had said that after we made love in a sleeping bag right where I was sitting now. That had been about fifteen years ago, when we were seriously considering marriage. He had been such a romantic. I had thought he was romantic only to please me, but I eventually learned that being romantic was his way of life. I wanted some of that in my life, but Charlie was smothering me; when he embraced me, I was imprisoned in his vision. Charlie's visions were beautiful, but they were untamed by the real world.)
	I watched as islanders began to show up early at the cooking house. Most seemed happy or at least content.
	At the same time the day before, at the same place, but under very different conditions, Newton had appeared. There hadn't been many people about, and those few of us who had come came only to drown our depression in food and to lighten our despair. But the cold air, damp earth and fog offered little respite. Nature was like an angry parent, and we felt like children who were capriciously being punished for some unknown crime. Our smiles were forced, and kind words seemed to have been as cold as the air. The only happening that could have helped us escape our gloom would've been an evil happening. Or a scandal. Newton News, an expert on curing melancholy (often by substituting fury and pain), had discovered a happening that tempted some of those anxious and angry emotions to the surface. His awful cure had probably affected me more than anyone else.
	"Charles is asleep in his bed, that's where he is," Newton had said. "But he isn't alone. Alone in bed, I mean. I was walking by his cabin and noticed that his door was partly open. Smoke was rising from his chimney, so he must've had a fire going. Thinking that he would be losing heat from this cold air, I went to shut his door. And through the crack, I could see him with this young woman. He was smiling with his arm around her." Newton then shivered from a cold breeze that had made his entire audience shiver. "They looked quite comfortable and warm."
	Newton's performance was without mercy, and he seemed as taken by it as were the rest of us. It had been so easy to hide in a mutual contempt. On any other day, we would have recognized the true criminal in this scandal, but Newton caught us all with our defences down. Even Newton was swept into his trap; Charlie had been until yesterday seemingly immune to Newton's attacks, but the future was to witness many more such assaults. Newton seemed blind to the consequences of attacking the most influential man on the island.
	As for myself, I hadn't responded as I wish I had. Charlie had done nothing against me, whether bedding with this girl or not; yet the thought of the situation deeply offended me, as if he had been unfaithful to our marriage that never became. We had no holds on each other, and we were often less than even friends, quarreling about matters concerning the island's future constantly; even so, I had marched home from the cooking house after hearing what Newton had to say, displaying my anger to any onlooker with unusual carelessness (and maybe even confirming the rage among Newton's audience that Charlie had done someone wrong). I drank deeply from a bottle of wine in solitude, and evil spirits carried me into a stormy sleep.
	I had awaken around noontime today. At first I had thought that the whole previous day had been part of a nightmare, for none of it seemed entirely real. If only it could have been unreal, then I would not be accountable for my unholy thoughts and uncomfortable feelings, even if the subconscious that a dream reveals is the same self.
	While taking a bath, I had begun to relax, determined to enjoy the new day, yet images haunted me. I saw a fantom of Newton offering Charlie as a sacrifice to some god before that god's disciples—and I was one of those disciples. I cheered as the fantom's knife carved a hole in Charlie's chest.
	"No!" I had choked, jerking upright in the tub.
	I had remained troubled and confused throughout the afternoon. In a hopeless attempt to cure my condition, I reorganized my living room (which was no small chore) but the cure lasted only as long as it distracted me. The cause of my confusion and distress was Charlie and his new girl friend, and I knew that I would have to meet the situation head on. Charlie sat at the same dinner table as I, and I dressed and prepared myself especially well in anticipation; I hoped he would notice the deception rather than my awkward emotions.
	Finally, as I sat at my usual position at dinner and continued to tap my now sore fingernails against the table, I saw Charlie and Mary Cheene lead a new girl into the scene. I find it difficult to account for my first impression of the girl, as the very sight of her caused a chaotic movement of emotions within me. I found her very beautiful, yet oddly repulsive at the same time. She smiled a beautiful smile as often as she frowned an awful frown. And she was very young, barely an adult. The clothing she wore (dungarees, sneakers and a light green blouse) was very ordinary and offered nothing to her impression; this might have been offset by a confidence in her bearing, but she lacked even that, responding to the situation she was in with timidness.
	Joe greeted them, as they stepped onto the patio of the cooking house. I knew that several eyes in the still small gathering were darting between the couple, who stood hand in hand, and myself. Mary Cheene and the girl walked off with Joe into the cooking house, and Charlie ambled along towards me. I was still the only one at the table. As he neared, it was clear from the way he was looking at me that he was unaware of anything that might now be threatening our relationship.
	He sat on a chair beside me and looked me strait in the eyes. His gaze was so intense that for a moment I worried if he suspected something of me.
	Then he suddenly laughed.
	I asked him what was so funny. He shook his head and smiled. He didn't answer immediately, then,  "Nothing, really. You just look so serious."
	Charlie had a way of saying and doing things that totally surprised and flustered me. I usually pretend to have not given any attention.
	His expression suddenly changed. "You look different," he said. "You've dressed up . . . What's wrong?"
	Then I laughed. "Why's there have to be something wrong? I dress up to look nice on such a beautiful day. What's wrong with that?"
	He shrugged, neither accepting nor rejecting my answer. Then, considering the matter forgotten, he smiled again. "I have a new prospect for the island's population."
	"Do you?" I responded carelessly and with obvious disdain. I was usually more diplomatic. Charlie and I strongly disagreed on matters concerning the island's population, but I found I gained more by diplomacy than by fighting.
	Charlie didn't seem to notice my ill-humour. "She's in her early twenties, I guess," he said in a reflective voice, then he looked up quickly; "Don't say anything just yet—not until I tell you what happened. It . . . it's really different."
	He described his meeting with the young woman, Psyche (of all names!), and I remained silent as he requested. It sounded more like the description of a dream than that of an actual experience, not only because of what he said but also because he spoke of her as a prophet might speak of his visions. Had I not seen the honesty written all over his face, I would've told him straightforward that he was lying.
	Rather, I said to him that he was losing his perspective. He was portraying to me an unreal person—a person without substance. Although I knew Charlie to be an overly romantic dreamer, he rarely dived so deep into the depths of his passions. The Charlie who now sat with me was the same man I knew fifteen years ago—not the Charlie of today who co-owned an island, but the impulsive, irresponsible man who had thought he knew the answers to the world. I had fallen in love with that old Charlie, but that had been many years ago. I thought we had both matured since then,  but he was looking back. This young woman had evidently tapped the youth in him.
	I said,  "She's just a girl. Why are you making such a deal of her?"
	"I don't think of her as 'just a girl'."
	"That's quite obvious. Charlie, think rationally. I understand how you can be attracted to her: She's young and mysterious and unusual. But someday that mystery will be gone, and she will seem much more ordinary."
	Charlie looked at me in surprise and shook his head,  "You don't understand."
	"I do understand," I continued, feeling like a teacher explaining a simple matter to a child. "A young, attractive woman comes along, revealing only the things she wants you to know. She's probably hoping to secure a place to live where she doesn't have to work. You know she's not the first to try. She's playing a part, Charlie . . . Can't you see that? She's playing the part of a helpless, innocent woman . . . And she'd play any part if it would—"
	"Why are you so against her?" he interrupted me angrily. "You haven't even met her yet."
	"You've told me enough."
	"I've told you almost nothing. I know little about her myself—"
	"Which is what I was getting at," I pressed. "I don't think we should let her live here."
	There. I said it.
	Charlie shook his head, apparently flabbergasted. He didn't say a word.
	From within the cooking house came the other six people who'd be occupying our table. Mary Cheene, her husband Ed, and Joe were bringing the trays of food. Philip Johnson, who was a friend of Charlie's, was carrying a tray, which supported a pitcher of water, or maybe cranberry juice, and a couple bottles of beer. Newton was carrying plates and glasses; and Psyche was dragging the chair she would need, for there were only seven already at the table. She sat next to Charlie, and when everyone had settled down, he introduced her.
	She took a particular interest in Philip, and he said to her,  "Hope you like it here, Psyche. Are you planning to stay or are you visiting?"
	Psyche turned to face Charlie. Charlie faced me. After a moment of tense silence, Charlie said,  "She'll be staying with Vicky, tonight, so they can get to know each other. I was thinking she could move into that old cabin, tomorrow, after I get it fixed up. You know, the cabin near the pond halfway down the Long Road, sandwiched between Phil's cabin and mine."

	After dinner, Charlie, myself and Psyche were left alone at the table, as the others set off for their homes before the night completely darkened the island. He explained why he had said what he had just before the meal: He didn't believe that I had given Psyche a fair chance, and perhaps I hadn't. But the fact that he already had her home picked out bothered me—as if one way or another, his little friend had already made it. If Psyche deserved a fair chance to be accepted, then I deserved the opportunity to reject her. But who am I? Just co-owner of the island. I agreed to allow her to spend the night in my house, if only for the sake of fairness, but I made it clear that he owed me.
	Charlie seemed unconcerned about this debt. He gazed up at the stars, which were peeking through the breaks in the clouds, and sighed, as if about to relate something really significant or deep; but when he looked down, he merely said,  "I guess we'll see each other tomorrow." He put a hand on Psyche's shoulder and kissed her on the forehead. "Goodbye, Psyche."
	Psyche shocked me. "Goodbye, daddy."
	Charlie also looked surprised.
	"'Daddy'?" I asked
	"I mentioned that earlier," he said. He had indeed mentioned it before, but I didn't take him very seriously. I was now very concerned that Charlie had found someone who believed in the same crazy things he did; this could not be a positive sign.
	"Bye, Vicky," he said while entering the cooking house to help Joe get things read for those who would clean up there in the morning.
	I waved my farewell perfunctorily, but then I thought that this wasn't the same as any other night; Charlie was leaving me in a more permanent way.
	I glanced at the girl, who was clenching her blouse in her fists and watching me intensely.
	"Come with me, Psyche. My home's on the other side of the island."

	The modern aspects of the house I thought might impress her, but they only seemed to unnerved her. At first she glanced about wildly, letting tears flow; I couldn't guess at the cause. I asked her what the matter was, and she replied that she had some bad memories. She didn't elaborate, and I didn't press her.
	After taking a bath, which she very much needed, having patches of dirt on her skin and sand in her hair, she sat beside me on a couch in my bedroom.
	Looking at this girl now, I realized that my first impression of her had been wrong. She was far too innocent to be playing innocent, and I would be hard pressed to find a compelling, just reason to send her away. She clearly would have difficulty coping in the jungle of civilization, and exactly such people were the stones upon which Hollo Island was founded. I just wish Charlie wouldn't be so eager to find such people.
	"You know, Psyche, with a little work, I could make you a lot more attractive."
	She smiled a shy smile.
	I knew that no matter what I'd say tomorrow, Charlie was going to get what he wanted, somehow. Holding a grudge seemed pointless.
	"Come here," I said, and I led her into the bathroom. I inspected her clothes as she stood very still before me; she was wearing the same dungaree-blouse combination that she'd had on before she bathed. I asked her,  "Where did you get these?"
	"From Mary."
	"Well take off those things. I'll try to find something better that might fit you. We might be able to alter one of my dresses down to your size."
	I left alone in the room for a few minutes, as I looked through one of my closets. I found a pretty dress, which was too small for me anyway, anyway.
	Although she shied away from speech, she was apparently not shy about her body. When I returned to the bath room, she had not only removed her outer clothing but the bra and panties as well. "No, no, put the undies back on. This is a dress, not a swimsuit."
	When she was ready, I helped her with the dress. It didn't quite fit, but when I was finished, it would look far better than what she had been wearing.
	"I guess it is possible to be a vegetarian and still have meat on your body. You have a fine figure, though maybe a bit thin. I can't understand why you're not all skin and bones, eating only plants and as little of them as you'd eaten at dinner, besides. Can you eat eggs and milk?"
	She made a gesture that I couldn't understand, but I guessed it meant yes.
	I stood in front of her. "Look up . . . Smile . . . You should learn to smile more often; it really makes a difference . . . . No acne problem, but your skin is all dry. A little moisturizer will fix that."
	Psyche looked away, showing confusion, and she asked me,  "Why am I here?"
	"Sit here, and I'll tell you while I'm fixing your hair."
	She sat on a chair in front of a mirror. I gave her a razor and told her to shave her legs.
	Her hair was poorly cut and in terrible condition. I merely gawked at it for a moment before deciding what I could do with it.
	Psyche wasn't shaving her legs. She wasn't even looking at them but rather at my reflection in the mirror, as she awaited an answer to her question.
	"When you asked me why you're here, did you mean here with me, now? Well, Charlie and I have this agreement: that is, unless a person has both of our approval, she isn't welcome on the island. But once accepted, always accepted. After a person is approved, we promise her . . . or him the same position on the island as anyone else—as even ourselves. That was Charlie's idea: he's got this belief that we own this island only to protect it from outsiders who might try to capitalize on its weaknesses. Vintage McNeillian stuff. My idea is that I keep this house and leave island affairs mostly to Charlie."
	While I was talking, Psyche still was watching my reflection and sitting still.
	I continued,  "I don't care much for what this island has become. My house is the only thing of value, and everyone else lives in clumsy cabins that were built in an afternoon or two. The whole place is like from somewhere long ago, or like someplace in the third world. Dirt paths. Oil lamps. Outhouses instead of toilets. Hand operated pumps by the stream. But most of the island seems content with things that way. I say that most of them are lazy. We need some people with vision and—"
	Psyche spoke suddenly with a desperate voice,  "Why am I here?"
	"Oh, I thought you understood. You're here because Charlie needs my consent before you can live here." Though I knew Charlie would not accept a rejection, my decision made a difference; he would owe me for taking away my privilege. I would consent, but under duress, and I would make sure he knew that. Managing Psyche's hair in my hands, I smiled. "You're not exactly the tough, worker type I was hoping for, but don't worry about it. I'd like to see such a well mannered young lady here. That Mary Cheene you've met—kind but graceless; but she can hardly be blamed, having a newborn to care for; and then she has to chase her crazy nine-year-old about, which could take the grace from anyone's walk. This island is full of graceless women."
	The razor was shaking in Psyche's hand.
	"And you should stay away from Philip Johnson—the black guy you showed interest in at dinner. He came here after a jail stay for rape, yet Charlie defended him for some reason. I understand forgiving and forgetting, but it's hard to forget that there's a rapist around when you're a woman. I wish Charlie be a little more reasonable. Probably the only available man around is Freddy Andle. He's an orphan, like you.  Most of the others are married or very . . . Psyche? What's wrong? Why are you crying?"
	I merely watched on, as she tore at the dress she was wearing. When I was about to protest, she jumped away from me and, with cat-like agility and speed, she disappeared through the door and fled the house.

PHIL

	Mike, Greg and I were strolling about under the trees that surrounded my cabin. When we were with each other these days, we were like children again back in the old neighborhood in Dorchester. We hadn't much in common anymore, except that we were all veterans of the streets, we all considered ourselves artists in some medium, and we had each found our separate ways into jail. Mike was the colorful one, Greg was cool, and they thought I was the smart one. We did everything and went everywhere together. But now they had much more in common with each other than they had with me. I've changed a good deal in the past few years; amazing how guilt will eat you apart. Mike and Greg never really felt guilt. Their crimes were only crimes against the rich or against themselves. Even when their actions hurt another, that person was far away and never seen, and they were never hurt badly.
	Every few months, Mike and Greg would take the ferry that stopped at Hollo Island. They rarely stayed longer than a weekend. They only came today to convince me to accompany them downtown to a party tonight.
	"This one's going to be really big! A bunny for every rabbit, and your rabbit hasn't been to Eden for a mighty long time. Take a new slice of life." Mike pushed, creatively using one of our old jokes. My "negative attitude" genuinely concerned him, and he felt it was his duty to cure me of this self-denying condition. "I think we still might have some living brain cells, somewhere, and we're going on a search and destroy mission. Maybe, when we're really fucked, we'll chuck bottles at the Hancock tower."
	"Last chance, Phil," Greg added with a push on my shoulder.
	I shook my head. "Not tonight. Didn't you know that Roger Rabbit is really the werewolf?"
	When I contrasted the image of my cozy little cabin to the streets and lights of Boston at nighttime, I wondered if I would ever return to the city. I was no longer fascinated by it. Maybe it frightened me a little. The island was my home now.
	Mike, Greg and I just looked around for a moment, listening to the quiet and watching the stillness. They responded differently to it, as a busy world had accelerated their pulse, so they could relax only to a rap beat.
	"Nice place, Phil," Mike said,  "if you are thinking of retiring. Ain't no place for the living. Make a great cemetery, though; think they'd let me be buried here?"
	"Nope, got to live here to be buried here," I said, and then I realized how stupid it sounded. Yet the idea had its appeal. "Hollo's not as bad as it looks. You get used to the pace."
	"Not me," Mike said. "I mean, there's no action. Nothing goes on."
	"Reminds me of the can," Greg added. "Alot prettier, yeah, and tain't bad just for a camp out. But after a few days, the trees get to looking like bars, and I just want to get out."
	I shrugged and ceded the argument. I understood what they were saying, because I had once thought that way—but that had been a long time ago. I shrugged and gazed up into the trees, thinking how strange it was that I had once been the group's leader.
	I was surprised to find my eyes caught by other eyes, looking down from within the assembly of young leaves. They were human eyes.
	We passed by the tree, and although I didn't point out the spectacle to Mike and Greg, the memory stayed with me.
	My two old buddies left about a half hour later.

	The eyes I had seen in the tree were Psyche's.
	I remembered Psyche's face from our dinner at the same table by the cooking house last night. I remembered her eyes especially, for often enough she had been pointing them at me. I had worried at first that she was only responding to my stare, for her guileless and unadorned image captivated me. Then I suspected that she was a tease, but that idea quickly passed. I was euphoric and terrified when our eyes locked, and her gaze slowly dropped to her plate. This had never happened to me before, but I knew what the signs meant: She was as drawn to me as I was to her.
	Strangely, I comforted myself since then by throwing away this hope. Victoria or Newton or maybe even Charles would have told her that I had been a convicted rapist. Horror stories of rape would be told, then someone would suggest that rapists must rape just as vampires must drink blood. Maybe that is why she was hiding in the trees, and if so, who could blame her? Hell, even I was afraid for her.
	I was afraid for myself, too, and had been for a long time. Someone once said that everyone has fifteen minutes of fame. But what if those fifteen minutes are not glorious but are instead infamous. Those fifteen minutes will be all that anyone remembers. Whenever someone is kind or takes a liking to me, I'm afraid someone will take them aside and say, "You don't know about him; he raped someone,"—as if they knew me any better, as if that were all I ever did.
	The next morning, I decided to visit Psyche. She must have heard about my fifteen minutes by now, but maybe that didn't matter much. I could handle it if she rebuked me, or if that glint in her eyes faded to nothing; but I couldn't bear it if she remained silent, and allowed the glint to be replaced by suspicion and fear. Since my mother had died, I never heard a genuinely kind word from a woman, or felt a kind smile meant only for me. Maybe I never did the right things to deserve the gifts of the gentler sex, but I was afraid maybe now I had done the one unforgivable thing. Still, I would never know by sitting on my hands and hiding in my cabin.
	The sun was now sitting on the Reach and clouds filled the sky around it, occasionally blocking its light. The weather was perfect for either enterprise or elation, whichever today was to be.
	I would walk by her cabin and "accidentally" find her. Somehow I thought I knew exactly how we would meet, what we would say and where it would happen. I began a painting in my cabin, visualizing the scene. I would pass by her cabin while she was walking about, and we'd say our hellos and how-are-yous. Conversation would center on how the island was treating her, and what things I knew that could make her new home more enjoyable. That was the standard ritual, and while there are many variations, I did not expect to be surprised.  Our blatant, polite actions would clothe more subtle, genuine intentions and messages. The only problem I imagined was making our meeting look accidental.
	What actually happened—how we met that day --  was as different as anything could've been.
	I've never dealt with women as people; women came in models, it seemed, like cars or fast food hamburgers, and you always knew what you were getting. There were mother-women, sister-women, lover-women, women for friends, women for sex, and every woman I knew I put into one of these exclusive categories. I must have confused the person with the role, and that was why this woman who wanted to be everyone so amazed me. She shunned the shackles of convention, as she preferred not the path less taken but the path that wasn't yet there.
	Psyche's cabin was hidden behind Charles' and mine in an area not yet cleared of bushes. When I decided to visit her, I found her standing among the apple trees. She was completely nude, and I couldn't see any clothes near her. She did not seem to notice my presence, although I was only about thirty feet away and in clear view. The only object that she seemed at all aware of was an apple tree, and she seemed thoroughly enthralled by it. Her arms were wrapped around the trunk, and her fingers were slipping into the grooves of the bark; she nuzzled the bark in a strangely sensual embrace. A white and pink blossom then fell from the tree, and a breeze delivered it into her hands. She admired the blossom for a moment, and then gazed directly at the sun. She was smiling at first and was obviously expectant of something; but then the smile contorted into an awful expression, and she shielded her eyes. "Where are you?" she shouted. She crushed the blossom in her hand, threw it on the ground, and stepped on it. A cloud then intercepted the sunlight, and she groaned in frustration and from some secret pain.
	That was when she saw me. I had been watching her peculiar drama with both interest and, yes, also desire. I had watched her as though I was watching an actress practice a part for a movie, but I was aware that this drama was very real. Psyche seemed nervous and ashamed, which I assumed was because of her nudity, yet she did nothing to hide her body from my view. If I had been more aware, I might have seen that she wanted me to approach her—to comfort her. Instead, I decided the appropriate action was to leave her alone. "I'm sorry, " I said, "I didn't mean to spy on you." I turned and walked away.
	I entered my cabin and sat on a stool. I tried to understand how I felt about all that I had just seen. God, I only expected to say "Hello" to her, and just introduce myself in a run-of-the-mill way! Now I was a spy. I had seen her naked and had invaded her privacy; when word got out, this would be the final blow to my reputation.
	And how was I going to get that image of her body out of my mind? I hadn't seen even a picture of a nude woman in many months, as I had been trying to clean a nice place for women to inhabit in my mind. The vision of her was haunting, however. She lacked charm or sophistication, yet she had that aura of mystery which alone defined sex appeal; she had that flaw that was perfection; I figured her to one day obtain the ignoble honor of being Hollo Island's first sex symbol. 
	Seeing her there was like some kind of sexual fantasy in a men's magazine; the title of the pictorial would read "Nature Girl" or "The Passions of Eve." But these fantasies were mine, not hers. Having a fantasy was easy: you take five dollars to the drug store, slip it over to the cashier when no one is looking and obtain a few dozen icons to consecrate your dreams and focus your passions; after several such lessons, you can build fantasies of your own, or perhaps advance to graduate fantasy work—stretching your passion's limits. I had been a very productive (and unappreciated) fantasist, because no one had stood over me correcting my fantasies with red X and F marks, no one had stood beside me altering my fantasy to resemble theirs—everyone had stood under me, awed by the power I possessed.
	Sitting on an easel beside my stool was the unfinished painting of my imagined meeting with Psyche. The image showed Psyche's cabin and mine with the two of us between them, and we were engaging in a typical conversation. Psyche wore a long, white Victorian dress with a pleasant smile, and I was dressed in a three piece suit. I had meant for the picture to be amusing, but considering how we actually met, it looked absolutely absurd. I took a brush, dipped it in black paint, and proceeded to insert a fence between them. The fence looked so right that I felt my heart breaking. Every so often, I discovered the fence between every woman and man—or at least every woman and myself. The thought that love and the feeling of union were only delusions of two desperate souls tormented me; it frustrated my need to embrace, assaulted my hope of joy, and sabotaged all my sacred dreams.
	Pressed by such distasteful emotions, I grabbed the wooden frame of the painting, and, with all my strength, I hurled it like a frisbee towards the wall. When my hand released the painting, I discovered Psyche watching me through the window. I felt shock and panic as I saw the broken painting hit the window and send glass flying. Psyche was no longer there.
	I ran to the window and looked out, and I saw Psyche kneeling below the frame. Glass surrounded her naked body. I feared the glass had gouged her face and eyes. "Psyche! Are you okay?"
	She stood up slowly, revealing her healthy face and nodded.
	"Oh, thank God. I'm really sorry. I didn't know you were there."
	She put her fingers in her hair and said in a flat tone, "There's glass here." When she removed her hand, I saw some traces of blood.
	"Oh, shit!" I stuttered, and I couldn't meet her eyes. I touched her hair and also removed smudges of red. My eyes squeezed out two tear drops, one of sympathy and one of shame. I looked away from her, at the sky, then at a cat that was chasing some small animal into a bush, as if not seeing the damage I had caused would make it less real. "I'm so sorry," was all I could say.
	When I regained some courage and forced myself to look at her, again, I saw that Psyche was not concerned or upset; in fact, she acted as though she had forgotten the matter already. She touched my face with her blood stained hand and wiped away the drops falling down my cheek, while a drop of crimson travelled down her own. Her touch was gentle and her gaze, kind,  but I still avoided eye contact, afraid of believing in the emotion she evidenced.
	I looked at the ground by her bare feet and saw splinters of glass everywhere for about two or three yards. I didn't think she should try to cross without help. I felt crazy with panic.
	"Wait there, Psyche," I said with my eyes pinned to the ground. "I, uh . . . better look at that cut."
	I hesitated and then hurried though the cabin's front door. In a few seconds, I arrived behind the cabin, as Psyche unexpectedly tip-toed between the glass splinters. I then led her by hand inside, and asked her to sit on the stool. She obeyed.
	I tried to ignore her nudity, but that was impossible, and she did nothing to ease my effort. As I examined the narrow cut on her head, that was all I would allow myself to see, yet I could not ignore the warmth of her body. As I worked meticulously on removing the shards of glass from her hair, her scent strongly affected me. And, as I washed her wound with water and wiped away some dried blood, my eyes were passengers of the water as it travelled down her body. I would have been thoroughly aroused if I wasn't already terrified. Throughout this agonizing pleasure, she remained silent and looked strait ahead, as though I was a barber cutting her hair.
	The cut on her head was small, and it stopped bleeding after a couple of minutes. "Does it still feel like there is glass in the cut?" I asked.
	She shook her head. "Why did you throw the picture?"
	I paused, then said, "I didn't know you were there. I didn't want to hurt you."
	"Were you angry?" she inquired while still looking strait ahead.
	"No," I said uncomfortably.
	"Were you confused?"
	"No!" I said, as I caressed her fine hair with a closed fist.
	"Am I upsetting you?"
	I closed my eyes and said nothing.
	"Do you want me to wear some clothes?"
	I opened my hand and felt her cool, wet hair in my palm and between my fingers. I nodded and kept my eyes closed.
	She stood from the stool, planted a quick kiss on my cheek, and hurried out the door, saying,  "I'll be right back."
	I slid onto the stool she had been keeping warm and opened my eyes. My pulse and breathing steadied, as I reassured myself that she would not return.
	Then, after about five minutes, I began to believe it.
	I had frightened her off. She was looking for someone else. She wanted a man who was stronger, someone who would take control of her,  and who needed nothing. She wanted a man who's heart flowed over with understanding, someone who could open her eyes to a larger world, or who could make her smaller world seem more whole. She wanted anyone but me, a weak man afraid of holding power and incapable of taming a woman's fire. I wasn't even capable of being a friend. I felt certain of this.
	On the wall beside my bed hung three of my paintings. I stood and leaned against one. All three featured a woman in a full, white dress, smiling mysteriously and standing in front of the Reach. All the women were white, putting them at a greater distance from me than the black women I had always painted back in Dorchester. The women of Hollo Island were predominantly white, and I painted them so that they were sexless. With the black women in Boston, I had not restrained myself and had erred in the other direction, depicting women wearing only tight pants and blouses and bright red smiles. I sometimes responded to women racially, respecting only white women, desiring only black. That's what I tried to think, anyway: all the dangerous women were back in Boston, and I was safe with the women here.
	Psyche did return, now wearing a very large grey sweater and a loose set of jeans. I had seen her completely bare, and now she wore clothes that hid her gender entirely. There! I thought to myself, Now we should be safe! But oddly, her clothes did not make her less appealing—it was like hiding money in a wallet—but they made me much more aware of the kindness in her eyes.
	She moved right up against me and coaxed me into putting my arms around her. At first I merely sheltered her with my arms, as if she might crush like a flower. I was breathing unsteadily, and my hand refused to open fully from a fist. My teeth were clenched, my mouth was dry, and my legs were limp. Then she pressed into me, and I felt the cushion of her breast against my chest, and the softness of her cheek against my stubble. She was breathing calmly, and I tried to match my breathing with hers. I grabbed the slack on Psyche's sweater with my half-closed fist, and soon my starved palms opened enough to feel the shape of her shoulder. Soon, I was holding her tightly. She felt so good in my arms that I doubted that I had ever really wanted anything from a woman except to hold her. I suddenly realized how many years it had been since I had hugged anyone. I buried my face in her strait brown tresses, which were still wet, and the moisture on my cheek felt like tears of joy.
	Then Psyche arched her head, inviting my attention down to the curve of her neck. I stroked her there with my lips, tasting her skin and inhaling her warm scent. Her body went limp, and now I held most of her weight.
	I moved my head back to see her face, and she lifted her hands to frame mine. Her breath was a bit acrid, but I barely noticed. I noticed more that her eyes, which had always been penetrating, seemed to drift and remain only half open.  She stretched her body to touch her lips to mine, and now her breath seemed very sweet.
	When Psyche stroked my leg with her thigh, I lifted her and laid her on my bed. I moved on top of her, and alternately kissed her and absorbed her with my eyes. Her eyes now seemed dazed, but she mostly kept them shut. I had been trying to temper my passion and be satisfied with the simple pleasures of holding her and kissing her, but the vehicle we were in accelerated when Psyche guided my hand to her breast. I opened my shirt, and, between kisses, I helped her remove her sweater. She tensed up as I removed her pants and then explored her body as I had explored her face. Her body, which had so intimidated me earlier, now succored my anxiety and fed my desires. When I sucked on her nipples, Psyche caressed and grabbed at my head while aiming her breasts to further my pleasure. She seemed both nervous and excited as I travelled down her body. When I reached her hip, I discovered her two-foot scar, and I kissed its entire length down past her knee before changing direction on the inside of her thigh. When I tasted her strong juices, she pushed my face in deep. Her fingers clutched my hair so that it almost hurt, but knowing what that meant made me happy for the pain. I tried to please her as much as she was pleasing me, but the vehicle was moving so fast, now, and I was loosing control.
	Finally, I removed my pants, and I moved up again to see her face.
	Her eyes were now wide open, and I saw a trace of fear under the passion. I hesitated for a moment, then I kissed her and began the final stage.
	As I entered her body, my mind wandered between now and another time. . .
	. . .back in Boston, six years ago. . .
	. . .another girl. . .
	. . .moaning quietly in my ear. . .
	. . .moaning in the throes of pain, and demanding "Stop". . .
	. . .all to serve the momentum of a raging emotion. . .
	. . .which abruptly calms. . .
	My muscles relaxed, as I laid beside her with my face in her hair, which was scattered on the sheet. I was breathing heavily, sweating profusely, and, for a moment, felt completely satisfied.
	Then I began to notice things. The door to the cabin was open a crack only a couple feet away. The window was still broken. And there was a blank spot in my memory: I couldn't remember the final moments of our love-making. We should have shared those moments, but I seemed to have disappeared. Now, we were very quiet.
	Psyche sat up beside me, pulled her knees to her chest, and sat perfectly still. I turned over and stroked her back, but I felt as though she was avoiding me.
	"Psyche," I asked, "are you okay?"
	She shook her head, and I was afraid. I sat up and put an arm around her, which she seemed to ignore. Then I saw the blood on her legs and on the sheet.
	"Why didn't you stop?" she asked. I suddenly knew exactly what she was talking about. I closed my eyes, as she spelled everything out in detail.
	"I said, `stop'," she said in a voice too bitter and hurt for tears. "I tried to push you off, but you didn't stop. You. . .you just pushed harder into me. And then. . ."
	"What?" I asked, dreading her answer.
	"Then," she continued with a cold stare and a shiver, "you called me a `cunt'."
	"No!" I choked, suddenly afraid to touch her. I felt a monster was hiding inside me.
	"Yes," she said flatly. "You said, 'keep still, cunt'."
	"Psyche, I'm really sorry."
	"Why do you want to hurt me?" She pressed her palms into her temples and shrunk from my stare.
	"I don't want to hurt you."
	"You threw a picture at me, and now you hurt me again. I don't understand. What did I do?" She pulled her knees against her chest. I couldn't read her expression, but she sat as still and silent as Marina, after I had raped her.
	If Psyche ever said that I raped her, I think I would have killed myself, but I figured that was exactly what I did. "Psyche, I won't ever hurt you again. I'll move to the other side of the island, and you'll be safe. I'll stay far away."
	She turned quickly to face me, and extended one arm to embrace me while positioning the other to fend me off. "No! Don't do that! Please! What did I do wrong?"
	I was startled when she said this—and immensely relieved. I grabbed her too roughly and held her tightly to me, imprisoning her within my arms and stroking her hair with my hands. I wanted to protect her, but I wanted to protect her from me. I said "I'm sorry" I'm not sure how many times. "I don't know what happened to me. You didn't do anything wrong. I lost control."
	"What does it mean?" she asked nervously. "What does 'cunt' mean?"
	"That was a lie. I don't know how I could have said it, because you've been an angel. That wasn't the real me, because I love you, and I wouldn't . . . I wouldn't . . ."
	I startled both of us by saying this, and Psyche seemed to take my declaration of love as an explanation for my violence. "You were a little crazy?"
	"Yes, alot crazy," I said.
	"Then I'm in love with the real you."
	I grabbed her and held her tightly to myself; I clung to her so desperately, afraid that she might vanish like a dream or change into a hideous creature. Maybe I didn't love her; maybe I just needed her so much that I was trying to trap her by declaring my love for her. I didn't deserve her love, and I was dreading the intervention of justice. But justice probably would work from within me, as the fear of losing her would fulfill itself, destroying both my happiness and hers. Now, when I should have been at my happiest, I expected the bubble to burst. Our wet, naked bodies, now spent of their desires, touched only for the sake of giving and taking simple comforts. But whenever I stroked her skin, now, I felt as though I was desecrating her—as though my hand was diseased. When would I lose control again and hurt her?
	"What's wrong?" Psyche asked, as she searched the fear in my eyes.
	"Nothing," I said, and I looked away.
	"Why won't you touch me?"
	"I'm afraid I can only hurt you. You make me so happy, but there's something violent in me. I'm scared that I'll grab you when I want to caress you, and yell when I want to whisper. I'm scared I'll turn you away."
	"I feel really good when you touch me," she said while stroking my back with her fingers. "I like it when you hug me tight; it hurts but it feels good, too. When you kiss me, I feel so light and happy. And when you kiss me down there, it feels so good I shiver. I never felt that way before. Only your penis hurt me. Does it always hurt when a man moves into a woman?"
	This question stunned me, especially because she really thought I would know better than her. I looked at the blood on the sheet and then into her questioning eyes and asked, "Are you. . .Were you a virgin?" 
	She nodded.
	A virgin! God, What kind of jerk was I? I wasn't thinking strait. She was an innocent; suddenly she looked ten years younger to me, like a girl of fifteen. I probably got her pregnant, too.
	"No, Psyche, I don't think it hurts after the first time," I told her with little confidence. "Tell me, are you on the pill."
	She flashed me a quizzical look.
	I sighed. "It's okay. If you are pregnant, we'll work it out."
	Psyche seemed hopeful. "You think I am?"
	Again, she amazed me. How could she know so little about all this, and yet be so sexually forward?
	"Maybe," I replied, "but I doubt it."
	"Then maybe next time."
	"You want to get pregnant?"
	She nodded. "Isn't that what I'm supposed to do?"
	I couldn't answer that question. 	Her questions were suddenly very odd.
	"Are you prepared to be a mother?" I asked.
	"I don't know. I've been baby-sitting for Mary Cheene, and I love little Eddie. I want my own baby."
	I was quickly learning how little I knew of this woman I had made love to and who was leaning against me. "Where are you from, Psyche?"
	The question made her visibly uncomfortable, but she replied, "Florida."
	I was afraid I had touched a sensitive area, and I tried to manoeuvre around it. "I always think about Florida in the winter," I said excitedly. "Especially Disney World. I've wanted to go there ever since I was a kid."
	"What/s Disney World?" she asked without interest, and I was again stunned.
	"`What/s Disney World'? How long did you live there, Psyche, anyway?"
	She shook her head. "A long time."
	"Did you go to school there?" I asked, now more curious than cautious.
	Psyche looked away from me and said, "I never went to school."
	"Psyche, what's wrong?" I didn't even notice what she had said, because she seemed so nervous.
	"I'm not like other people," she replied. "I'm not exactly from Florida. I am an orphan. I don't know what mothers do; I never had a mother. I don't know who I am, sometimes." 	 Psyche was moving away from me, when she said, "Don't be angry with me."
	"I'm not angry, Psyche," I said, moving closer. "I didn't know how hard my questions were going to be for you to answer. I'm sorry. Why don't you ask me some questions, now?"
	Psyche relaxed and, after a moment, even smiled a little mischievously. I don't know if she was trying to get revenge on me for prying in on her private life, or perhaps she really thought her question was as innocent as mine had been. Her question was as unsettling as a swastica in a synagogue, yet she asked it with gentle eyes and voice: "Do black people like sex more than white people?"
	I shrank away from her, shocked. "What kind of question is that? What gave you that idea?"
	She pointed at the paintings spread out on the floor beside the broken window. "All those women look like they want sex, and those white women don't."
	She was right, despite her shocking conclusion. "That's just the way I painted them, Psyche. Maybe I'm a little racist about women when I'm painting. I find black women more desirable, but I can only paint white women elegantly."
	"What about me?" Psyche asked, recognizing that she fit into neither category. "How do you see me?"
	"You're different."
	"Why did you want to have sex with me?"
	I smiled, because the answer seemed obvious. "Because you're a beautiful woman."
	"Why am I beautiful? I don't wear beautiful clothes," she said while analyzing the paintings of the sexy women. "I never comb my hair, I don't shave my legs, and I bite off my nails. How can I be beautiful?"
	Surprisingly, that question was very difficult to answer or even to talk about. Everything she said was true. I looked at the paintings on my wall, and Psyche was right: All the women, black or white, no matter what setting, was indeed everything Psyche said that she wasn't, and it was precisely because those women combed their hair, polished their long nails, etc., that they were beautiful. "I don't know, Psyche. Maybe it's because you have a beautiful body, and it doesn't need to be decorated with clothes and makeup."
	I knew that wasn't the answer, and Psyche almost seemed to take delight in pointing out her body's faults. She was obviously more curious about the subject of beauty than she was vain, and I found myself awkwardly caught in an almost scholarly discussion.
	Psyche pinched one of her breasts, and said, "But these are too small, and this one is bigger than that one. I have a scar on my leg and hip. I have scars all over my feet. My hands are not pretty, and this finger doesn't work. And sometimes I smell bad."
	She exaggerated her body's flaws, but everything she said was true. "I don't know, Psyche. You're right, but, you know, `Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.' Sometimes a blah painting is suddenly perfect because of a silly twist or a broken pattern that works. If a flaw has meaning to someone, then it isn't a flaw at all. There is something about you; you make the most of your flaws, and you make them seem important. You don't show off anything, and you don't hide anything. You are more perfect than those women on my wall, because you're whole."
	Psyche was embarrassed, now. Her face broke out in a blush that seemed to spread throughout her upper body. "I'm not perfect. You're just trying to flatter me. I'm the most imperfect person on the island."
	I kissed her on the forehead and hugged her. "Maybe, but you're perfect for me."
	She seemed to believe what I was saying, but was more comfortable thinking of herself as ugly than beautiful. She said, "I do hide things. I'm ugly inside. I want to be beautiful, but I'm ugly."
	These words amazed me. They sounded so much like my feelings a few minutes ago, after I had hurt her, that I really did feel that I knew her. We were both so stupidly shameful that I felt like laughing.
	Psyche held out her hands for me to see. "Look. My hands are too big."
	I shielded my eyes from her and sneered. "Alright then, you're ugly! Your big, rough hands and your squished face and your bick-red skin make you look like a lobster."
	Psyche giggled, and her laugh was so charming and rare that I loved her even more. "Such a deliciously ugly lobster. Just looking at you makes my mouth water," I said, trying to cause that laughter again. I towered over her like a starved tiger over its prey, and she leaned back in mock fear. I plunged my face into her throat, saying, "if only I had some melted butter!"
	Then there was a knock on the half open door, and we both sat bolt upright. The door opened slowly, revealing Charles McNeill's face on the other side. He quickly looked away, yet he clearly saw me lying in a compromising position with a woman—and she was not just any woman, but the girl he had been trying to gain favor with Victoria and the other islanders—the girl Charles himself told me he thought of as his daughter.
	"Just a second, Charles," I yelled as I hopped out of bed and rushed into my pants. Psyche just sat on the bed and stared at me.
	"Hurry!" I whispered. "Get dressed. You don't want to get caught with me."
	Psyche just sat there and laughed at me and the whole situation.
	I pulled her sweater over her head and gave her my slippers, and whispered loud enough that I might as well have shouted it, "Climb out the window; he doesn't need to know who was with me. Please hurry, it's not worth the trouble."
	Psyche didn't budge. She just sat there, pulled me to her and kissed my lips gently. Then she smiled like a playful child.
	I sat beside her and sighed.
	"Hello?" Charles called out as if not knowing anyone were home.
	"Come in, Pop," Psyche giggled playfully.
	Charles slowly walked through the door, carrying two large, flat boxes and a six pack of Boston Ale. A smile cracked on his lips, as he stared at me accusingly, "What have you been doing to my daughter?"
	Psyche was laughing hysterically, but I didn't see the humour.
	"I'm sorry, Charles. I got carried away."
	"Hmm," he nodded. "Well, whatever you did, it seems to have worked. Good work, Doctor Johnson, you seemed to have made progress with Psyche's laughing problem. Do you think she's cured?"
	I shook my head and smiled, finally realizing that we had nothing to worry about.
	Psyche rolled over on the bed, almost choking on her laughter, and she seemed oblivious to the revealing position of her sweater.
	"Well, I may have cured her laughing problem," I said as I pulled the wool over her legs, "but it seems we have other problems to deal with."
	Psyche didn't notice this comment, and her smile remained wide as she sat upright.
	Charles sat on the stool. "I had a feeling about you two from the start, but I didn't expect anything so quickly. And to think I thought Psyche would have trouble making friends! Every time I turn around, kid, you're with someone new. But you've got to slow down, and really get to know your friends."
	Psyche face was suddenly serious again, as she saw something in Charles' manner that I had missed. She arose from the bed and kneeled beside him. "What's wrong, daddy?"
	Charles caressed her hair and said, "I wish you hadn't run away from Vicky saturday night. She was beginning to like you, but you didn't give her a chance. You two have got to try harder with each other. You're both too important to me to have you fighting each other."
	Psyche shook her head. "She doesn't care about people."
	Charles glared at Psyche, and he grabbed her pants, which were lying on the floor. "Here, Psyche, put these on."
	Psyche shook her head. "No, Daddy, I don't like pants."
	I just on the bed and watched the tension rise.
	Charles seemed torn between love for his adopted daughter and a sense of responsibility. "Psyche, how do you feel about Phil?"
	"I'm in love with him," she said, and I felt a warm and guilty feeling, since she declared that love immediately.
	"Do you want him to be happy, or do you want him to be worried?"
	She looked at me and smiled. "Happy, of course."
	Charles looked at me, and forced me to take a side. "Phil, if Psyche were to continue running around naked and swimming nude, would that make you happy or worried?"
	I wanted to say that it didn't matter, and that I wanted Psyche to be herself, and that I understood that covering her body would be like covering her face with a veil. But I had to admit I would be uncomfortable. We were not just talking about today, but also tomorrow and every other day. "I'd worry. I'm sorry, Psyche, but I'd be jealous, and I'd be afraid for you."
	Psyche glared at both of us, looking betrayed.
	Charles shook his head and smiled, not wanting to look like an ogre. "It's okay, Psyche. I was only suggesting.  It wasn't an order."
	I wondered how Charles could afford to back off. If he didn't do something about her nudity eventually, other islanders would eventually pressure her and make matters much worse.
	Fortunately, Psyche made it easy for us. She took the pants, stood up and clumsily donned them. She then sat beside me, looked strait ahead at a blank section of the wall, and I dared not smile. 
	"I'm sorry," I said, as I took her hand in mine.
	"Only because you want me to," she said, making known that she was doing this as a favor to me.
	"Well, Psyche," Charles said, smiling again, "looks like you'll be with us for a while." 	Psyche face brightened in anticipation. "Victoria said okay, and I went into Boston today and wrote your name among the list of dependents on the island. I hope you don't mind signing your name Psyche McNeill until we can establish your real last name or officially give you one. I'm not really sure about the legal junk, but I'll talk to a lawyer tomorrow."
	Psyche shook her head and seemed to have completely forgotten her bitterness of a moment before.
	What Charles had said confused me. She was an orphan, but even so, wouldn't she go by some last name? I knew that Charles thought of Psyche as his daughter, but was he intending to legally adopt her?
	Could she really be that young? The idea frightened me—had I fallen in love with a girl who was too young to give her consent?
	I had to ask her age, but when the question escaped my lips, I knew immediately that I was treading on shaky ground. This was another one of those innocent questions that explode. Psyche looked around nervously, as though trying to find a place to hide from the question. Charles seemed interested but doubtful.
	Charles and I were both surprised when Psyche finally answered, "I think I'm nineteen. Maybe twenty. No one knows my birthday."
	I was reassured. Nineteen was fine, and I felt that Psyche was trusting me more.
	Charles seemed even happier, but it wasn't clear why. I guessed that Psyche's past was a closed book to him as well, and finally she was allowing us to open its covers a bit.
	But our smiles did not reassure Psyche.
 "I'm not sure. I might be eighteen." Her hand held mine firmly to her shoulder, as if I had any intention of pulling it away.
	Charles removed a bottle of beer from his six pack and gave it to me saying, "Well, it's too bad you're not twenty one, or you could drink one with us. Are you sure you're not twenty one?" he asked while waving an open beer in front of her eyes.
	She didn't understand the game, so I whispered in her ear, "Say `maybe'."
	"But I couldn't be twenty one," she said, utterly confused. "Could I?"
	Charles laughed and gave her the beer, anyway. He opened the two flat boxes he had also come with, and inside were two large pizzas—one anchovy and one with mushrooms. Pizzas were something special on Hollo Island, as were brand name beers. "Today's a special day, because Psyche is now a real Islander," Charles said. "I'm sorry that we didn't plan a party, but I figure you're worth at least a couple of pizzas and a six pack."
	The pizza was cold, but it still tasted good. Psyche and I shared from the mushroom pizza, while Charles ravenously consumed the anchovy.
	Psyche drank the beer slowly but with ease, suggesting that she had acquired the taste for alcohol already.
	"Where were you this morning?" Charles asked me with a mouth full of salty fish. "You never showed up at the jetty. In fact, no one showed up."
	Charles had expected me to go fishing with him this morning, but Psyche had been the only thing on my mind. "I woke up late," I lied. "Besides, we've already got too many fish."
	"That's true, I guess. Yesterday, I saw Joe using some for fertilizer."
	Psyche burped. It wasn't audible, but it was obvious, and I thought it was funny.
	"I'm glad I got the pizzas," Charles said. "And it's nice to see Psyche eating something other than nuts and cranberries. You can't live off just that."
	"I like cranberries," Psyche said.
	Charles smiled.  "I know. Since you've been here, our supply's nearly vanished."
	Psyche didn't seem to understand that Charles was just making conversation. She took his exaggerated concern as real. She wore a pained expression and said, "Sorry."
	Charles stared at the ceiling and sighed; the apparent criticism left his demeanour and was replaced by gentleness. "Come on, Psyche, I'm just kidding around. If you like cranberries that much, we'll buy the Cape for you, and you can eat until you explode."
	We talked until sundown, and then I got some more beers from the cooking house, and we continued talking until the night was quiet.
	Psyche wasn't much of a talker, but sometimes she got on a roll. She didn't have a good command of english, but when she took the time to express herself, her comments and arguments always made sense. She had an unusual mind, but it was a good one. She reminded me of a child genius—very smart about some things, very naive about others.
	For example, late that night, about an hour before we retired, Psyche, Charles and I all had a good buzz. The beer changed Psyche, hardening her heart a bit, but also freeing her from her fears. She did not shy away from saying things, and she was vigorous in backing up her words. I don't deny feeling a little intimidated by her then. But I think it's good to be a bit intimidated by a lover.
	Charles, with good intentions, had started the most amazing debate. He was working on his eighth beer of the night, and his third of the last hour, but Charles argues best on a few beers. He upset the calm by saying: "Psyche is right, because clothes hide who we are. But sometimes we want to hide who we are—at least the sexual part. An unclothed body sends a sexual signal that can't be turned off. How can a tired woman relax confidently on a public bench if she is naked? Some guy might think she was inviting a sexual advance? How could she gain respect on the job, or complain about sexual harassment if her appearance says that she wants intimacy?"
	This argument seemed well thought out, and it also expressed my views. I expected Psyche to just nod and bear it; I expected her wince at the light of reason but slowly accept the necessity of clothing. I didn't expect her to fight back and win the argument. 
	"But clothes don't do anything like that," she said, shaking her head and clinging to my arm for support. "Clothes say our bodies are ugly. Clothes say we are bad and should hide from ourselves. Our bodies don't say anything until we make them say something. People wear clothes so that the clothes will speak for them, and nudity is just another type of clothes, so people wear nudity only when they want sex. But if they never wore clothes, nudity would not mean sex; it wouldn't have any meaning. Nudity could say anything."
	Charles was committed to the necessity of clothing. "That makes a lot of sense, but nudity is more than wearing nothing. A naked woman's body can affect a man and make him want to possess her. There is something about a woman's shape that almost magically draws men to her."
	Psyche no longer clung to me; she held my hand, still, but she was driven now by her own strength. "But why don't men go around naked?" she asked seriously. "Mary says she thinks a man's face is the most beautiful part of a man. I like a man's beard. Why don't men wear clothes on their faces and not their bodies?"
	She took a breath and pushed further, "I think women wear clothes because clothes make you want to remove them. Clothes touch the body like fingers, so people's fingers get jealous of the clothes. Clothes show what the body looks like, but you have to get closer to see. Women want people to want them and get closer."
	"Some people, Psyche," Charles said. "Not everyone."
	Psyche looked at the ground, a little embarrassed. She emphasized her oversized sweater and pants, and she said, "I don't want to hide in these, just so people won't want to make love to me. Clothes look silly."
	I smiled at Psyche and tried to bring the argument to an end. I caressed her hand to gain her attention, and I whispered in her ear that she could sew a rug around her body and she'd still draw me in like a magnet.
	She smiled and started to relax, while Charles withdrew his case with a sigh.
	The last hour was mostly uneventful. Charles left with a "See ya," and I walked with Psyche the fifty yards that were between our cabins. The stars were bright in the sky, and I wanted to see them with her. That's what I told her, anyway, but I was also concerned that something might happen to her those few yards between our cabins. It sounds silly, a rapist fearing the safety of his girl, but I figure I should know as well as anyone what men can do.
	I said my "Good night," and she smiled the same wish back to me. I didn't want to leave her doorstep. I had been floating on air today, and I was afraid the laws of gravity would eventually bring me down to earth. I was also afraid that when that happened, Psyche and I would find that our day in the clouds was just an brief episode in our lives, and that our kiss on her threshold that night was a farewell kiss in an awful epilogue.

	Sunday morning. Sunshine, and great cotton-ball clouds. Birds chirping in ecstacy. Children playing games that made my childhood in the city seem boring and sad in comparison. New leaves in the trees. Dew on the grass. Smiles on faces. And the word "Life" spoken by the wind.
	Psyche answered the rap upon her cabin door. She peeked through the crack in the door and said while yawning, "Hi." She rubbed her eyes and smiled—the smile meant that she was ready to wake to a beautiful morning.
	I handed her a T-shirt that had the letter E drawn on it and a pair of shorts.
	Her face asked a question.
	"Put 'em on," said I. "We're gonna play baseball."
	"Baseball?" she asked while slipping into the shorts.
	"Yeah. We play it every Sunday during the spring and summer. Twenty-five games a year, starting today. Do you know how to play?"
	She shook her head, and then slipped the T-shirt over it.
	"Oh. That's too bad. I'll try to explain it while we play. Don't worry: I don't think anyone else on our team knows how to play, either."
	She tried in vain to pat down her hair, which had been raised by static when she'd slipped on the shirt. She licked her lips in contemplation, then she disappeared into her cabin. Reappearing, she held in her hands a dozen or so cranberries. While chewing on one, she offered a few to me. I ate a few. I hate cranberries, but they were delicious today.
	We began down the path towards the Reach. I rested my hand on her waist as we walked along, and I held her close. I felt her breathing and movements as we walked. These things were proof that she was alive. I felt alive myself because this living person loved me. Love was the center of life.
	Then, suddenly, she stepped away and turned to face me. My hand felt limp as it hung in the air, separated from her side. Psyche looked at me and didn't seem to recognize me. I felt for a moment that I might disappear like a fantom; I felt terror rise within me.
	Then she leaned again against me and returned my hand to its exalted position—my lifeline.
	"I'm sorry," she said. "Bad thoughts."
	"Well maybe this will wash those thoughts away," I said as the sun exploded from beyond the Reach in a magnificent display of light. We stood still as the light baptized the whole island.

Freddy
	
	Today was Sunday. It was the custom on Hollo Island that every Sunday all work was to be put aside. Children would meet with their friends and leave to their parents some measure of peace. Joe would leave the cooking house closed for that day, and he and his many farm hands and cooks would don Sunday clothes—dungarees and turtle-necks that didn't reek of fish. This was a special Sunday, and it ushered in the happier half of the year. Starting this Sunday of every year (the last Sunday of May), the island's fishermen formed two baseball teams, and these teams played every Sunday during the summer and fall until the last game was played on Thanksgiving Thursday. A typical baseball season was about twenty-five games.
	The tradition began unofficially eighteen years ago, and Charles made it official two years later by saying, "Sunday will be the day when people can be lazy without self-reproach. The rats can stop racing and eat the cheese they've worked so hard for." This was the official explanation, but the real reason was that the island s economy just couldn't work on Sundays. Many of the island s Christian population visited the mainland for church services, and many others visited friends and family at the same time. The only boat of Hollo's fleet of twenty-two remaining on the jetty by noon would be the emergency speed boat. Baseball and festivities filled the void, organizing the remaining people and encouraging them to stay on the island.
	This Sunday, I woke up late and missed the boat to the Cape.  I was angry at myself for not taking precautions, but then I remembered that a Catholic church in Cambridge had a five-thirty mass, and I could take the ferry at three o clock and be there on time. I could return at eight-thirty on the weekend ferry from Boston to Provincetown, which stops on the island.
	I had about three and a half hours to spare, so I headed for the field beside the cooking house, where the ball game would be played. This was the first Sunday of the baseball season. The dinner tables that usually covered the field were moved aside to reveal a neglected baseball diamond and a small outfield, and over a hundred fans sat on the Reach s base just beyond the outfield. I sat alone on the roof of the cooking house; I expected others to eventually join me there, but no one did.
	As the players tossed the ball around before the game, I was startled by a cry of surprise. Mary Cheene beamed up at me from the patio of the cooking house; she stood almost directly below where I was sitting on the roof. She sighed, "Gahd, ya scayed me."
	"I scared you?" I replied, startled by her scream.
	"Ya shadow . . . it moved, an  I thought . . . ah, nevah mind. I jus didn't notice anyone up theah." She covered the red on her face. "Sorry I bothahd ya."
	"No bother," I replied, although I was a little annoyed, and I began to watch the game again.
	Mary seemed disappointed. "Hope ya enjoy the game," she said with feigned emotion. Then she left and joined her husband on the Reach.
	I used to enjoy the games, long ago. I came to the island the year the tradition began.  I was five at the time, and in those early years I had thought I needed to see the games every Sunday. If God let it rain, I would have cursed him. I believe I would have sold my soul for baseball every day. I was pretty messed up those days.
	The kids today don't care about baseball. The games just aren't as exciting as they used to be. Most of the players are over forty now, and they are more interested in getting out in the sun than they are in winning. Even worse, the two best players are on the same team, so the Easterners have won only a single game in the past three years. I could count fewer fans today than on any previous opening game—even rainy openers. Maybe this was the first sign that the tradition was dying.
	The beginning of the end began three years ago when the island's only doctor moved to the cabin beside Mary s place on the western side of the island, and, so, began playing for the Westerners. When he had played for the Easterners the year before, he had been most of their offense. Soon after the doctor moved, Newton Bart sailed onto the Island. The walking tabloid was a natural pitcher for the Westerners, and he could throw all the seven innings played in a game on the Island. These were the only non-fishermen to play on Hollo Island, and since their arrival, the Westerners usually beat the Easterners by about a ten to one score.
	I've learned not to care much about baseball over the years. Only a few years ago, I was hooked on all the Hollo Island events, including baseball. A friend of mine brought me to a Catholic church a few years ago, and I realized that how stupid it all was. Now when I watch a baseball game, it all seems a bit silly. The players harden their faces and wills, and they compete for some abstract and ultimately meaningless goal just so that, when it s all over, they can scream out a victory cry. I get my thrills in church, now, and I put my faith in a game that everyone can win—if they would only try.
	Yet, as the two baseball teams finished their warm-ups, and they prepared to play ball, I can t deny feeling a little anxious. They say you are what you eat, and for ten summers I ate, drank, and breathed baseball. I have almost forgotten the damp smell of an old baseball glove, and my finger that was broken by an errant pitch has long since healed.  But smells have long memories, and bones never mend perfectly.
	As the players took the field, I noticed a new player—a person I've only seen in glimpses and knew of  only from rumors.. I think she was Psyche, Charles  new friend. Her skin was tawny, and her hair was long, brunette and in disarray. She wore the Easterners team T-shirt, white shorts and no shoes. She was the first female player to ever be on either team. I imagined this slight person lifting the bat and swinging, and the image was almost comic. It would be like watching Dorothy from Wizard of Oz swinging a bat.
	No, that was the wrong image for her.  Dorothy was a playful dreamer;  this woman was something different.  She was smiling now, but her face seemed inexperienced at grinning.  She leaned into Phil as though she could be intimate with him, but the awkwardness of her posture and the twitch in her smile revealed an intense person within.  She was playing Dorothy, trying to be someone she wasn't.
	Oh, shut up Freddy, I thought.  You've never met her and your sizing her up from forty yards away.  I know it s stupid to jump to conclusions about people, but I did it just the same.  It made me feel less lonely, and it made the game feel more interesting.  I wanted to see her get a hit. No, not just a hit;  I wanted to see her hit a homerun.  Just by being there, she was adding something different to the game, and she peaked my interest.
	But when the game began, I was disappointed to watch the girl remaining on the bench throughout the first inning.  She wasn't gonna play.  Instead, she just sat between the Easterners' first baseman, Charles, and their pitcher, Phil.  The three of them were chatting and smiling, and she was apparently there just for their sake. Just another party girl, spreading her charms around.  She wasn't as special as I was imagining.
	But I kept watching her, even as the game began, and as Charles and Phil took their place on the field.  Psyche just sat on the bench, crossing her arms as if cold. I felt uncomfortable, seeing her like that.  I hated to see anyone alone like that.  It made me anxious and a little helpless.  Then Mary Cheene rose from her husband's side and sat with the girl, and was greeted by a wide smile.  I took a deep breath and noticed that my hands were clenched and sweaty.  I wiped my palms on my jeans, and tried to turn my attention to the game.
	That's when I noticed that something was different about this baseball game than others in the past.  It was subtle, and I wasn't sure exactly what it was.  But I could hardly not notice that Phil retired the first three Westerners by strikeouts.  A fluke, I told myself.
	Newton, to no one's surprise, also retired his three opponents in the second half of the opening inning.
	But the fluke continued, and the second inning was a carbon copy of the first.
	I couldn't deny myself a little excitement, as what the Easterners had fought for for so long in vain seemed a possibility at the very dawn of the new season: They were poised and ready to win their first game in three years.  The teams defense, after a casual first inning, very suddenly broke their absent-minded habits and played respectably.  The sparse crowd, which had expected a rapid collapse under a crushing power, were suddenly absorbed as the Easterners found their pride.
	As the innings passed without a change in the score, whistles and cheers increased in volume.
	Charles had the game's first hit in the third inning, which was a long double (it might have been a triple or even a homerun, if Charles were quicker).  But the inning ended with Charles standing on third.
	I glanced at my watch, as though enjoying the game was a sin. But I felt that old excitement as the easterners breathed new life into an old ritual.  I felt a little more guilty when my mind and eyes kept returning to the girl on the bench.
	I watched as Psyche smiled, then shyly shivered and crossed her arms.  She seemed happy for her friends, who were playing well mostly for her, but she was feeling needs that baseball could not address.  She looked up from the bench, and . . .
	Well, I was being silly.  How could I know what was in her mind.
	The first run of the game came in the top of the fifth on a couple of bloop doubles, which gave the Westerners a commanding one-nothing lead. The fans cheered, but not for the run;  they cheered for Phil, who'd not allowed a single hit for four innings.
	During the bottom half of that inning, Charles hit another double, and he again failed to score.
	Despite the fact that their team was down by a run going into the sixth, Phil and Charles were apparently in good spirits.  Charles ran to home plate and staged a mock tantrum with Joe, who was umpiring.  Phil shook the hands of the Westerner who had scored against him.
	Newton wasn't enjoying the game. I don't think he welcomed the unexpected challenge. He was always intense on the mound, but he looked now as if a gun were in line with his head.
	With Phil pitching in the top of the seventh and final inning, the Easterners were in deep trouble: The Westerners had runners on first and second with no outs; the Easterners were still down one to nothing, and with only this final inning to make up the deficit, they couldn't allow the opposition an insurance run.  Phil thwarted the efforts of the next two batters via ground balls to first base.  Now, the two runners were in scoring position with two outs.  The next batter hit a fly ball deep to left field and then beyond into the bushy area.  Had this been any other game, it was gone, and the score was four to nothing.  But something was driving the Easterners that day, and their outfielder looked like a major league player as he dove into the bushes and kept his team down by only one.
	I nearly fell off the roof of the cooking house from the tension. I joined in as the crowd of a hundred sounded like a thousand.
	Then my cheers fell flat as a jubilant Phil was greeted by his lovely cheerleader at the bench—greeted rather indecently, I might add.
	Now came the moment of truth, with only three outs left in the game.  Holding the Westerners to a single run was quite a feat, but if they didn't score now, it meant just another loss.
	The Easterner's first batter of the seventh took his first three pitches, which were all strikes.
	One out.
	Then Charles came to bat for his third time in the game. Charles had hit well in both of his previous at bats, and the small crowd tried to cheer him on by shouting "CHARL-IE".
	Then Newton threw a pitch that would spark controversy for a long time to come, by throwing the ball towards Charles' head. Charles blocked the pitch with his elbow.  He dropped the bat and paced around in agony.
	Why did Newton do it?  Tactically, it didn't make sense.  Even Charles, hitting the way he was hitting, was much better off on first base than swinging away with the bases empty.  Many people figured that Newton just made a mistake and threw the ball away. But many others figured that Newton was sending an angry message to Charles, and actually meant him harm.
	The island's physician threw off his catcher's mask and flashed Newton a glare, before looking at Charles' elbow.  Everyone on the Easterner's bench gathered around the doctor and his patient, and I almost expected them to suddenly charge the mound.  I doubt any of Newton's teammates would come to his defense.
	When the commotion settled and spirits were brought under control, the game resumed—but with a new surprise.  Charles clearly didn't feel up to finishing the game.  Charles and Phil briefly talked, and then they talked to Psyche.  She took some convincing, then she took Charles' place on first base.  She apparently wasn't familiar with the rules of the game, and Phil stood behind the base as her coach.
	The next batter grounded out to first, and the girl ran to second.  She was almost picked off at second, when she over-ran the base, but the short stop dropped the ball.
	The crowd was hushed.  The Easterners still had one out left, but it seemed like Charles and Phil had just given up the game to the Westerners.  Psyche looked like she had never even seen a baseball game before.  She kept stepping off the base and looking at Phil for instructions.  Then she asked the second baseman a question, and his jaw dropped.  It must have been one heck of a question, because he still looked stunned when Newton tried to pick Psyche off second and the ball bounced on the ground near the second baseman's feet.
	Psyche trotted down to third.  Phil whispered something in her ear, then retired as her coach.  It was Phil's turn at bat.
	Newton stood on the mound, with his hands on his hips. He was furious at the second baseman for blowing such an easy pick off.  When Phil positioned himself at the plate, Newton adjusted his posture.  He glared strait at Phil, ignoring Psyche, who stood several feet away from third base.  Suddenly, the whole weight of the game was on Newton's shoulders. He couldn't rely on his teammates for help, and wasn't about to allow another easy pickoff turn into an error.  He was gonna go strait at Phil and strike him out.
	Phil acted as though nothing was riding on his shoulders.  He was relaxed even as Newton's first pitch smoked right by him for a strike.
	Newton glared at Phil again.
	And Phil changed his posture slightly, wiggling the bat in the air.
	And that's when Psyche bolted toward home plate.  She was amazingly fast, and by the time Newton noticed her, she was already home.
	I couldn't believe what I just saw, and the crowd was totally silent for a moment, as we came to grips with what happened.  Psyche had stolen home, and the Easterners had tied the game at one to one.
	All at once, the celebrating began, even as Phil grounded out in his final at bat.  The game was over.  These baseball games didn't have extra innings, and the game ended in a tie.
	But to the Easterners, a tie was as good as a victory.  They hoisted the dark horse Psyche onto their shoulders and carried her into the crowd that was rushing onto the field in a frenzy.
	Thus baseball was born anew on Hollo Island.

	I waited on the roof of the cooking house, and I watched as the islanders laughed and smiled.  Even the Westerners could afford to share in the celebration of the momentous tie.  Why couldn't I be happy, too?  After all, I too had agonized over every pitch, and I too had felt my blood rushing when Psyche scampered over home plate and into the islanders' hearts.  Yet the sound of their laughter sounded foreign to me.
	What did we really have to rejoice in, anyway?  It was just a game.  A game is just a way to distract from what is true and meaningful.  A game is a substitute from the spiritual, and it muffles the sounds of a screaming conscience.  But how little will the memory of this game mean in just a month or two?
	"Hey, Freddie!"  a voice called, shaking me out of my thoughts. Charles, Phil and Psyche stood below me.  I dropped from the roof to meet them.
	Charles was holding his elbow, but smiling grandly.  "What a game!" he said. "It sure has been a long time since baseball was this much fun!"
	"Yeah," I replied.  "It was a pretty good game."
	His smile weakened.  "Pretty good?  Pretty good?  It was AWESOME! And we played GREAT!  --Not to brag, of course!"
	I glanced at Phil, who seemed a little hesitant to greet me, as if my mood might infect his feelings of joy.
	Then I glanced at Psyche, who's small frame was sheltered in Phil's embrace, and who, from that secure vantage, watched me with open, warm eyes.  My eyes locked on hers, and I was stunned. She was like a jewel, wrapped in a perfect setting.  From a distance, I had pretended she was something else.  She could have been a false diamond, stealing a true gem's role in a perfect setting.  I had suspected that she was a teaser, a spider, or that she had a sharp edge.  But I saw nothing false in her eyes.
	And now, I wanted a piece of that warmth.  Maybe she was the reason that this game had been more than just any game.
	"It was a great game," I said to Charles, suddenly very anxious.  I tried to mirror his enthusiasm.  "It didn't really matter who won."
	Phil was startled, and he added, "Yeah, I wasn't even trying to win, really ... I was just celebrating."
	"Celebrating what?" I asked.
	He shrugged. "Damned if I know . . .  Well, maybe I do know, but its personal,"  he said, as he planted a gentle kiss on Psyche's head and embraced her affectionately.
	Not very personal, I thought.
	"We're going to hang out and drink at the beach," Charles said. "You're welcome to come along."
	I shook my head, "I can't.  I have to catch a ferry for a five-thirty mass."
	"What is a mass," Psyche asked.
	"Its when people get together in a church to worship God,"  I replied.
	Psyche glanced at Phil and Charles, and then back at me.  Her eyes were eager.  "Oh, can I go with you?"
	Phil and Charles were as surprised as I was, and Charles asked her, "Don't you want to be with us?"
	She nodded, but replied, "I want to know about God.  I've never been to a church."
	Charles chuckled, "You don't have to go to any church to learn about God.  He's right here, with us.  If you want to get closer to God, just take a step up onto the Reach."
	I glared at Charles, and his good humor evaporated.  How dare he compare those island myths to the acts of the apostles.  How dare he compare climbing the Reach to the ultimate sacrifice. How dare he compare drinking on the beach to communion.  These blasphemous ideas have been winning the popular fancy lately, but did anyone really believe them?
	Charles saw that I was ready to complain, so he raised his hand to stay my objection.  He turned to Psyche and said, "Its OK, Psyche.  People need to find God on their own, in lots of different ways.  But please promise us that you'll come back to us.  I mean, don't run off and become a nun on us."
	Psyche nodded, and she kissed Charles and Phil goodbye.  As they walked past me, Phil stared at me, as if to say, "Be careful.  I'm leaving a treasure in your care."
	So now I stood alone with the island's favorite daughter.  She just looked at me, asking nothing, demanding nothing, just waiting for me to take her to wherever we were going.  I reached out a shaking hand, and she quickly put her own in it.  And we headed for my cabin.
	She seemed perfectly content saying nothing, but I felt that I needed some conversation. "So, do you belong to any religion?"
	"I don't think so," she said.
	"What would you like to know about God?"  I asked, trying to understand why she was with me.
	Then she faced me and smiled, "I want to know everything about God."
	Her eagerness startled me, but her question was overwhelming.  God was such a big topic.  "What do you know already."
	Her smile grew brighter, and she looked all around her.  "I know that he made everything.  He made you and me.  And I know he's really nice.  I know that he's watching us right now," she said, as she stared right into the sun.  She didn't even blink her eyes.
	Then I realized that she knew almost nothing about God.  She only knew the simple things that everyone knows.  "Do you know about sin?" I asked.  "Or about Heaven and Hell."
	She shook her head.   "Heaven is where we go when we die, right?"
	I shook my head, as we arrived at my home.  "Only if we've been good, and our sins have been forgiven.  Otherwise, people go to Hell, where they are punished forever. They burn in an eternal fire. They starve and are never fed.  They are tortured, but never comforted. etc. etc."
	I opened the door, but Psyche stopped at the threshold.  The wonder in her eyes turned to distrust, and her smile twisted into a look of shock.  She was so upset that she could barely choke out the words, "That's . . .  terrible!  God wouldn't let that happen!"
	I hadn't thought how horrible Hell must sound to someone who didn't know about it.  Its hard to believe that anyone could get used to such an idea, but Hell was such a familiar topic to me that it just didn't bother me anymore.
	"It's OK, Psyche.  God doesn't want anyone to go to Hell.  Anyone can have their sins forgiven.  All they have to do is be baptized and ask Jesus for forgiveness of their sins."
	She relaxed a bit, and she stepped into my cabin.  "He doesn't sound very nice to me."
	I shrugged.  "You don't know very much about it, yet.  God has his reasons."
	Psyche decided to be happy again, and she smiled.  "What is heaven like?"
	"I don't know," I said.  "I know its beautiful, and everyone is happy there."
	I opened my bureau draw, and I pulled out some long dress pants.
	"What are you doing?" Psyche asked, as she sat on the foot of my bed.
	"I'm getting dressed for Church.  Do you have anything to wear?  The ferry should be here, soon."
	She smiled innocently. "Can I just wear these?"
	She was wearing an oversized T-shirt with a big "E" scribbled on the front and soiled from the game.  She wore crude utility shorts (standard wear for the island's fishermen), and she was wearing white socks and sneakers.  I laughed, and said, "I don't think God would approve."
	"Why not?"  She said.  "What if I went without any clothes on?"
	"What?" was all I could say, not believing my ears.
	"God made us without any clothes.  Isn't it better to worship him that way?"
	I looked at her in a whole new way, as though I was struck by a revelation.  The large letter "E" on her shirt hung like a tapestry from her nipples.  I saw the shape of her hips instead of the loose shorts, and I fancied myself a breeze, blowing into the loose flaps.  Church was suddenly the last thing on my mind, and I replied flatly, "I don't think God would have a problem with that."
	She smiled a cocky, vindicated smile, and said, "I didn't think so.  I think God hates clothes.  What do you think?"
	I wasn't thinking strait.  I didn't want to contradict her, as I imagined what I couldn't see. The only Bible stories that came to my mind confirmed what she said.  God never rebuked Adam and Eve for their nudity.  Bathsheba was not rebuked for bathing in public view.  God creates the body, and people create clothes. Clothing is a sign of pride, and nudity a sign of humility.  "Maybe you are right. Maybe God doesn't like clothes."
	She smiled, and asked, "Do you like clothes?"
	I felt a knot in my stomach, wondering what was to come next.  But if God had no objection, I surely didn't. I shook my head.
	Psyche's smile was now wide and confident.  Her questions had been playful and teasing enough; she didn't work my emotions further with a slow strip.  She disrobed suddenly, as though preparing for a bath.  And then she tossed herself on my bed, and sighed.  "Me, too.  I wanted to get out of those clothes so bad!"
	I had never seen a woman naked, before, except in pictures.  But the pictures were tiny.  They didn't capture the smell.  They didn't move suggestively.  They merely suggested a power that now overwhelmed me. I was wrong;  Psyche's nudity was not a sign of humility.
	"Those clothes were itchy," Psyche said.
 	I suggested despite my appealing conscience, "Why don't you scratch your itches."
	She looked wary, but then she smiled and lied down on my bed and began to scratch her breasts and thighs.
	"No, don't do that," I said quickly.
	"Why?" she asked, a little worried.	
	I paused.  "You'll just make the itch worse.  You should rub it gently, with your fingertips."
	She smiled again, and now her fingers plowed gently into her itching skin.  Her skin flowed slightly as her fingers pressed into her well-tanned  belly and her thighs.  My fingers itched, when her fingers sank into her breasts.  I bit my lip when her fingers hovered at her puff of pubic hair.  My penis grew rock hard when her legs opened slightly.
	She suddenly laughed.  "You look funny!"
	I swallowed and unbutton my collar.  "Could you rub yourself, down there?"
	"Where?" she asked.
	"Between your legs."
	She looked cautious.  "Why?  That will make me feel sexy."
	"I've never seen a woman naked before," I said. "I want to know what you look like down there."
	She nodded and spread her legs wide.  Her genitals spread, revealing slightly puffed lips and a hint of pink.  She gently rubbed herself at the very tip of her labia, slightly pulling her pussy up and down.  She moaned slightly with her eyes still closed.
	I kneeled down between her legs, and watched her movements from just a few inches away.   From here, I could see the tiny gyrations of her hips, as the pleasure climbed through her body.  I could see the skin under her fingers get more excited.  Her smell grew stronger, as moisture began to well up inside her pussy, and began to seep out , covering her fingers and beading in her public hair.  Her face now was flushed in heat, and her eyes were almost pleading.
	"Do you want to touch it?" she asked.  She opened her legs a little wider, and continued rubbing the top, leaving the rest to my curious fingers.
	At first I just touched the skin on either side.  But I intensely wanted to see inside her.  I placed my thumbs on either side, and spread her lips open wide.  She was red and very hot and moist.  Her fingers were rubbing more quickly, and she was breathing heavily.
	I opened the catch in my pants.  I have never felt my dick so hard before!  I have fantasized at night about women in this position, I imagined the smells, and I imagined performing the acts, but I couldn't imagine how exciting a real woman was.   I rubbed the head of my penis, and quickly drew some pre-ejaculate.  I was startled;  I have never felt that tiny promise of the main event before.
	Psyche shifted her position.  She had worked herself into a frenzy, and her fingers were shiny with excitement.  Her itch had become a dire need.  She whispered, "Do you want to taste it?"
	I was hesitant, but her suggestion drew me in.   Everything is permissible for me, I thought, quoting the bible.  I touched those moist lips lightly with my tongue, sampling her flavor.  She was a little sweet, very sexy. like nothing I could think of.  She moaned and pulled my face into her, immersing me in her flavor and her heat.  I was lost in sensation,  nuzzling between her legs, her fingers intertwined with my hair, and my hand roughly working on my hard-on.  I couldn't take it anymore. Now, I wanted it all.  She was just lying there, ready for me to take her.
	Solomon wrote, Come, my beloved, let us go forth into the field; let us lodge in the villages.
	So I pulled myself from her grip, and I climbed her body.  I brushed against her nipples, but I was too excited to pause there.  I found her mouth with mine, and I met it tentatively.  I had never even kissed a girl, before—at least not passionately.  We struggled to taste each other, to even breath, as I maneuvered my swollen penis into a hole that suddenly seemed very small.   Our breathing matched each others, as I pumped into her.  I felt a qualm, but I wasn't about to stop.  My muscles tightened, and I moved faster.  Everything is permissible for me, I thought, but not everything is beneficial.  Now I was moaning, trying to silence those thoughts, as I crossed the threshold.
	Then I saw a bright light even with my eyes closed, I felt a rush of love fill my body, and supreme pleasure as I experienced a moment of Heaven.  I pressed tightly against Psyche, trying to keep that moment as long as it would last, but it relaxed into relief.  I rolled off of Psyche's body, as my senses and my mind slowly returned to their normal state.
	Psyche had not reached her destination, yet, and she continued to excite herself with her hands, while I watched and allowed my thoughts to consider what I wouldn't consider before.
	How could I so easily ignore everything that I knew?  The church clearly states that sex out of wedlock is a sin. Nudity isn't a sign of humility; nudity is a sign of shame. The body is not meant for sexual immorality, the Bible says, but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body.
	The taste in my mouth turned sour, and I felt that my whole body was dirty.
	I looked at Psyche, now, with clearer eyes.  She was crying out now, at the height of passion, seeking the fleeting pleasures of the flesh.
	How did she seduce me so easily?  She offered her body, while pretending to be interested in God.  She pretended to have questions about morality, when all she really wanted was to get laid.
	How could I do this, especially on a Sunday?  I should have been at church, together with other believers, instead of lying here with this harlot.  The Bible says, Come together so that Satan will not tempt you because of your lack of self-control.
	Now, finally satisfied, Psyche turned to face me, smiling sweetly, but her smile dropped instantly.  Her face, beautiful only a moment ago, now sent a sharp pain into my stomach.
	"Do you know what happened to Sodom and Gomorra?" I said sternly.
	She shook her head, but my expression made her recoil.
	My emotions were mixed, but my anger was rising rapidly. "Sodom and Gomorra were burned to the ground, with all the harlots and sinners with it.  I can't believe I had sex with you.  I can't believe I let you seduce me.  Women like you go to Hell." 
	Psyches eyes opened wide in horror, and she shook her head, saying, "No! No!"
	I rose from the bed, and hid my shame.  I grabbed a Bible, found the verse, and pointed at Psyche, putting my own shame upon her. "Sodom and Gomorra and the surrounding towns gave themselves up to sexual immorality and perversion.  They serve as an example of those who suffer the punishment of eternal fire."
	I felt a sharp pain in the pit of my stomach, as Psyche covered her mouth with her hands.  She struggled out of the bed, and ran out of my cabin, without even taking her clothes.
	I dropped the Bible on my bed and stared at her empty clothes, just laying bodiless on the floor.  I wondered who was really to blame.  Who had seduced who?  And which of us was nearer to God?   Then, in the midst of my rage and blame, I started crying.

	I saw her again, much later and at night.  I didn't know where she was coming from or where she was going, but I watched as she passed by my cabin.  I saw her while sitting behind the door, cultivating a bitterness within, but looking for something—for anything—that might end it.  It was so dark outside, I couldn't be sure who it was that was walking by my door, until she said, in a nervous whisper, "Hello?"
	I could barely hear her voice over the sound of the ocean.  The ocean was agitated that night, as the waves crashed against the Reach.  My thoughts crashed against my emotions, and held them in a reign of terror.
	When she appeared, I almost forgot all anger and blame, and I wanted to ask her forgiveness, before she walked on by.  Would she be gentle?  Would she forgive?  She stood outside the door, and even her dark silhouette was a bright light piercing through the black cloth of night.  But the reign of terror held my eyes from looking at her or speaking to her.  I shut my eyes, not admitting the harsh bright light of her purity through the window of my soul.  I looked instead to an inner lamp, rooted in scripture and tradition, and I chose to seek God through blind faith.  If only I could open my eyes, faith could have vision.
	But I couldn't.  My desires to reach out to Psyche, to reconcile with her, and seek her friendship found no revolution, and the reign of terror grew stronger.  Psyche passed on by without a word from me.

Mary

	Not quite asleep in bed, I stared out our cabin's one window at Victoria's home which stood just a few yards away, like an alternate Reach, calling attention to the western side of the island.  Once again, I thought that Victoria had it all.
	My husband Ed and I had some small luxuries of our own in our quaint little cabin.  One of only two television sets on the whole island sat on a table beside our small refrigerator.  We had stretched an extension cord from the generator beside Victoria's home into our cabin, which provided us with power for the TV, the refrigerator, and for an electric light.  Maybe I should have been happy with these few comforts;  we had far more than most islanders had.
	But then again, other islanders didn't have Victoria for a neighbor. Our simple cabin sat in the shadow of her mansion, built by a wealthy merchant in the eighteenth century.  This august structure had been modernized with a plumbing and electrical system, while maintaining the beauty an Englishman in colonial times paid handsomely for.  It was simply the best that money could buy.  For something so imposing and contrary to community living to be located beside our small, very ordinary cabin was an offense.  It mocked our simple lifestyle.  And it filled my heart with envy every time I looked out the window.  The few comforts that we derived from our otherwise demeaning position were but insufficient compensation.
	I was thinking about these things this evening while watching one of my two sons, five month old little Eddie, as he drifted into a deep sleep.  My husband Ed and I had been waiting in bed beside each other for the baby to slip into the Land of Nod.  Just watching his peaceful face eased my anxieties, and made our nightly acts bearable.
	"OK?" Ed whispered. He asked with neither excitement nor disinterest.  There was just a matter to addressed.
	I nodded and kept gazing at the baby.  I loved the little wrinkles on his face, and the way he sucked his thumb while dreaming.  He was such a good baby, and he never woke up screaming in the middle of the night.  He would look just as peaceful tomorrow morning as he looked now.
	Ed put out the light, but I pretended that I could still see little Eddie in the crib.  Ed mounted me, and set about his motions.  No foreplay, no extra touching, and no affection.  I didn't really care;  I just kept thinking about little Eddie.  I thought about Eddie, sleeping in the mansion.  I thought about Eddie crawling on the Persian carpets on the mansion's living room.  I thought about bathing little Eddie in the giant bath tub on the second floor.
	Big Ed breathed heavier, more quickly.  He had perfected the art of masturbating inside my body.  He didn't need any help from me.   After letting out a deep groan, he gave me a quick kiss on my cheek, and said, "Thanks."  And then he fell asleep without further ado.
	I bit my lip and stared again out the window, where Victoria's lights still illuminated the night.

	I hoped the daylight would be better.  I had so many things that I could do, while Ed was out working in the storehouse.  Today I was planting seedlings and tulips in patches around the cabin.  My cabin already looked odd beside Victoria's house, but it sure as hell wasn't going to be an eye-sore.  More traffic passed by my cabin every day than by any other on the island, moving to and from the island's docks.  My cabin was part of any visitor's first impression of Hollo Island. So my efforts would be noticed.
	As I was clearing a spot for a seedling, I uncovered a little red jackknife.  It was rusty and it wouldn't open.  I remembered that Doug had lost it a year ago, and he had been really upset about it.
	Doug was my other son.  I only saw him a couple of times a day.  Sometimes he would come home for lunch, sometimes he wanted to watch something on TV, and sometimes I didn't know what he wanted, and I fancied that he just wanted to see me.
	Doug was a member of a group of crazy kids who called themselves the "Youth League."  Seven months ago, the Youth League had chosen him as their leader, and then he demanded that I let him live with them, because a leader doesn't live with his "mommy."  God! I had thought, He's only nine!  Ed, after having had enough of Doug's constant complaining, overruled my "no", and off Doug went to the far side of the island to live with his friends.
	Today, Doug came to visit, and he even helped me plant a few seedlings.  He thought the tiny plants were the neatest things, and he welcomed any excuse to get dirty.  But I knew he had something on his mind, and when he was dirty enough, and when planting seedlings seemed more like work than play, he finally asked his question.
	"Hey, Ma.  When will lil' Eddie be old enough to join the Youth League?"
	At first I just laughed, thinking he wasn't serious, then I chased him down the long path when I found out how serious he was.  Those kids are little monsters, and I knew I'd better stay extra close to little Eddie.  I felt a little panicked that the kid's club would steal another one of my kids.
	But as I returned to my routine again, my worries quickly slipped away.   Doug was just telling me in his own way that he liked his little brother, and that he wanted to share some of his fun with Eddie.  Maybe I overreacted.
	So now, satisfied that Eddie was safe, boredom set in.  I just accepted it; it was the curse of housewives and mothers, and the price of responsibility.  But the pains in my joints, as I pressed the little seedlings into the dirt bothered me.  I could withstand boredom, but the thought of growing old and bored was unacceptable.  What the hell was I doing, wasting away on Hollo Island, anyway?
	I hadn't always been bored and unhappy. My life had seemed so much fuller during the early years of my marriage.  Hollo Island had always offered many diverse activities, and the doors of my neighbors were always open to me.  Living here once had been a dream come true, and Ed and I both knew that the island was a far better place to raise Doug, who was just a newborn when we first arrived, than was our cheap apartment in New Bedford. Back then, my chores seemed more varied.  We were a young, loving family, and the peaceful atmosphere and sense of community on Hollo Island amplified our love.  But at some point, our lives seemed like a needle caught in the endlessly repeating groove of a skipping record.
	Now, our passions were fleeting, and our enthusiasm gone entirely. All that Ed and I had left was our commitment to each other.  Our hearts wouldn't function as before, but we kept our commitment so that one day, maybe, those warm feeling would return, and our circumstances wouldn't be against us.  But it didn't seem to work.  Commitment turned into obligation, and rather than saving what we'd once had, the coldness of obligation was irreconcilable, and was getting colder rather than warmer.
	And then once, while having sex, and the motions had caused more pain than usual, I dared to open my eyes to see what Ed was feeling.  Ed looked tired and hurried, like he just wanted to get the fucking over with.  He wasn't getting any pleasure from sex; he was just thrusting his displeasure into me.  I never opened my eyes again. I just slipped into apathy, matching the coldness that Ed was showing me, and I put my hopes and love into Doug and Little Eddie instead.
	Ed and I still played our roles, pretended and joked, trying to push love back into our lives, but the precious emotion fled us like prey from a predator.   But maybe neither of us wanted to give up, because neither of us ever suggested the obvious solution.
	While I cared for Little Eddie and the home, and did some seasonal work on the island, Ed worked five days each week at the storehouse.  His job was very routine.  Most of the time he just cleaned and organized the storehouse, but his primary duties were recording where the supplies were, and who had them, if they were not in storage.  The storehouse contained mostly tools and fishing equipment, but also some clothing, tents, fire extinguishers, flashlights, and many instruction books and manuals.  It was even the island's post office.  Caring for the storehouse required considerable diligence and energy, since every item had to be always in the proper place and in good working condition.  Ed had assumed the job eight years ago when we had first arrived and settled on the island.  Back then, the island's population was much smaller, and Ed could manage the supplies easily.  Since then, the population tripled, and the once peaceful job became hectic.
	Sometimes we blamed our personal problems on his work problems, since the two increased at the same time.  If we have a fight, we'd tell people that his job was the reason.
	I didn't quite know why Ed never just quit his job.  He didn't like it, and he felt no obligation to keep doing it.  Maybe he knew his job wasn't causing our problems;  in fact, by keeping us apart, it may have kept our marriage alive.
	I was sick of thinking about my sorry life, and letting boredom turn into discontent.  I left the seedlings to rot, and chose to finish my day in front of the TV.  Now, I could share my sympathies with the tragic lives in a mid-afternoon soap opera.  Mechanically, like eating popcorn in a movie theater, I went about my chores, while losing myself in the never-ending melodrama on television.  I watched other men treating other women like dirt.  I watched other women throw off their shackles, and change their lives, just to  fall for another man who was no good for them.  And then, every once and a while, she will find that she never should have left the first man to begin with. I felt like crying.
	Then, without warning, I heard the sound of a disturbance rising from within the storehouse, and I was drawn to its calling.

	"I said you could have it!  What the hell do you want!"
	I opened the door to the storehouse, and saw Ed shouting at Psyche, who was wide-eyed in horror and holding a shirt in her hands.
	"What's all the commotion 'bout?" I asked.
	"Get her out of here, Mair. Your friend's bugging the hell out of me."
	"Psyche, come 'long with me."
	She dropped the shirt that she was holding down on a pile of clothing.
	Ed shook his head in amazement and said, more quietly, as if shouting had exhausted him, "Take it with you, girl.  It's what you came in for, isn't it?"
	She nodded and again took the shirt.
	"Come 'long," I said.
	We left the storehouse and my husband in peace.
	"I just wanted a shirt," Psyche explained, as tears streaked down her cheeks.  "My other shirts got dirty, and so I came for another. And then he yelled at me."
	"God, Psyche! If ya gotta cry, then ya shoulda done it back theah, when ya tears woulda been useful," I consoled, while leading her into my cabin.  I handed her a tissue, but she didn't seem to know what to do with it.  "Ed doesn't like his privacy to be cut into by anyone—even me.  But if he saw he made ya cry, he'd be really 'shamed and nice late-ah, when ya next see 'im.  But crying now won't do a bitta good, now that he can't see ya."
	She relaxed and tried to smile for me. "Sorry."
	I shrugged, "No reason to be sorry."
	"I hate people yelling at me," she said. "And when he started yelling ..." she pressed her hands against her head and breathed deeply.
	"You 'kay?"
	She shook her head.
	"How 'bout us walking to the showah?  I could lose some of this dirt, and it could help you relax."
	Psyche nodded.
	I snatched the still sleeping Eddie from his crib, and he immediately opened his eyes at the motion.  I whispered some baby talk at him, and he shut his eyes again.
	"You are a good friend," Psyche said, as we started our circuit along the shoreline.
	"Yeah.  Thanks. Let's get outta heeah," I said.  "I'm sick to death of this cabin."

	After Charles, I was the first to meet Psyche.  Charles had brought her to the storehouse the morning after her appearance on the island.  I was minding the storehouse at the time.  Psyche was wearing one of Charles' sweaters, and nothing else.  She desperately needed something appropriate.  I gave her some underwear, socks and sneakers.  I didn't know where Ed kept the rest of the womens' clothes, so I sacrificed a few of my shirts, jeans and shorts from my bureau. These clothes hadn't fit me since I had become pregnant with Eddie, and I was glad that they fit Psyche perfectly.
	I was a little suspicious of Psyche at first.  I had been at the cooking house the night before, when Newton had told those rumors of Psyche and Charles.  When Charles brought her to me, she clung to Charles like a frightened child.  I didn't know what to think of her.  But I've had plenty of time to get to know her, and I know now that she hasn't got a deceptive bone in her body.  I already trust her as much as anyone else I know.
	She made several friends during her first few days on the island, both men and women, but she had a strong charm on the men.  I wasn't sure why she was so appealing, since she wasn't very pretty.  Her teeth were crooked, she never combed her hair, or took care of it, and she wasn't even graceful.  But she did have a brilliant smile and a great figure.  And I'm sure that most men knew that her great figure could occasionally be seen strolling around nude.  Yet that was only a small part of her appeal;  men seem to like her anyway.  Maybe they liked her simple seeming mind.  Maybe they liked her lack of inhibitions.  Or maybe they just liked that she was so mysterious.
	I was worried for her, because she didn't seem to understand the power of her charms.  She knew what sex was (in fact, she knew an amazing amount of the biology of sex), but she didn't understand any of the rules.  She knew that men liked to look at her body, so she let them look.  I told her that men wanted more, but she just replied that she'd be happy to give them more.  
	And then everything happened so quickly.  Psyche first sexual experience with Phil worked out very well.  They really seem to love each other, and I thought that all my worrying for Psyche was pointless.  I was more than a little envious, watching them kiss and stare into each other's eyes during the baseball game a several days ago.  I foolishly thought that now that she had her man, she would understand the need for clothes and the rules of monogamy.
	But I didn't understand her at all.  She had had a taste of sex and romance, and was anxious to taste it again.  In her mind, there was no reason that she couldn't have sex and romance with every guy on the island.
	Just a few hours after the baseball game, Psyche was a mess.  She ran screaming and nude into my cabin, and I couldn't calm her down.  Finally, she told me what had happened.  She thought that God was going to strike her down, and set her on fire.
	"Listen, to me Psyche!  Freddie is full of shit! If God is gonna burn anyone, it will be Freddie for doing this to you!"
	Both Charles and Phil were with us by then, and she eventually calmed down.  Phil was more understanding than I expected.  He didn't take her infidelity personally, or maybe he was comforted that she had perhaps learned a lesson.
	And Psyche did learn a lesson.  She was much less eager to meet new people, now, and she met strangers with very strong feelings of distrust.  She not only wouldn't have sex with strangers anymore; she also wouldn't smile for them or even look at them.  It was a pretty extreme change, but maybe it was what she needed for a while.
	I spent more time with Psyche, now.  I was her only close female friend, and we have been spending time walking along the shore together, as we were doing now, just talking and getting some exercise.  Actually, I did most of the talking;  I had lots on my mind, and she was a good listener.  I don't think she understood everything I was saying, but she was so sympathetic and non-judging that it didn't matter.   I had a knack of getting into arguments with people, but Psyche had so few opinions that I never seemed to hit a nerve.   I could be very rude and angry—just a real bitch on a roll, and Psyche would just hold my hand and wait for me to finish;  then she would find some beautiful plant or stone just laying on the ground that no one else would have noticed.  I always felt better after a walk with her, and I think her eye for beautiful things was rubbing off on me.  It was her influence that made me decide to decorate around my house.
	Psyche did do some strange, unnerving things, though.  For example, she had very passionate feelings towards Little Eddie.  Most people like babies, but Psyche adored Eddie. Whenever we walked around the island together, Psyche would ask to hold the baby for a bit, and Eddie would so completely hold her attention that I actually worried that  she might trip and drop him.  Whenever Eddie cried, she would panic, as though Eddie was in intense pain.  She would do anything to comfort him.  Just yesterday, Psyche had been holding him when he had begun to cry;  I'd left him with her for a moment, and when I returned, I was surprised to find Psyche holding my baby to her breast, pacifying him, mothering him.  I felt that she was being too intimate and had stepped out of bounds.  I thought that breast feeding was like a marriage ring, binding mother and child.  Of course I forgave Psyche, but I told her not to do it again.
	When we arrived at the showers, we had to take turns, since someone had to stay with Little Eddie.  Psyche went first, and when she came out again, her hair was soaking and her T-shirt did nothing to hide her bra-less breasts.
	"Ever hear of a towel?" I asked, a little amused.
	Psyche had come out the shower totally refreshed, and the smile on her face was so bright that I was eager to get into that shower.  I haven't smiled that brightly in many years.

	Well, the shower didn't quite do it for me, and  to make matters worse, the sun was getting ready to set, which meant that Psyche had to leave.  She worked at the cooking house with several other women, and she helped prepare the nightly meals and then helped cleaning up later.  I used to do that job myself before I had the baby to care for, and I wished I could go with her.
	Now, with Psyche gone from my side, I went home and was faced with a dilemma.  I stood before my cabin, and my arms were tired from holding Eddie, and my legs were tired from an active day.  And I looked through the cabin window at the interior.  Ed was sitting in a chair and watching our b/w TV spewing out lackluster, predigested ideas.  The bare incandescent 100 watt bulb hung from the ceiling, spewing out harsh light carelessly.  I didn't want to go in there, but I didn't know where else to go.  Despite everything the island offered, it felt so lifeless and barren, now.  God, I hated the serpent of boredom and emptiness that was slivering around in my chest!
	I turned around and looked east.  All I saw was the peak of the Reach, bathed in the deep blue of twilight.  When did the Reach stop looking beautiful to me?  When did the island start to seem so empty? There was nothing for me there.
	I turned around again, and I looked west.  I saw another great landmark, which seemed so much more appealing to me, now.  Victoria's house, which was now my object of admiration and desire, smiled at me.  It's porch light punctuated the entrance with an explanation mark.   I followed the paved path to the door, where I saw, sitting below it, the only "Welcome" mat on the island.  I haven't seen a "Welcome" mat in years, and I took the message personally.
	I rapped on the door, forgetting that she had a doorbell, and I was anxiously considering what to say when she appeared.  Victoria and I weren't friends, though we were hardly on unfriendly terms.
	The door opened.  "Mary ... uh, hello," she said, expecting no company.
	I glanced at Little Eddie, and an idea came to me.  "Hi, Victoria.  It just suddenly occuhd to me that ya haven't seen my baby, yet."
	"I have, but only for a minute at dinner time.  Come in! Come in!" she gestured grandly.
	I stepped inside and was amazed at her perfectly kept home.  There wasn't a speck of dust to be seen, nor an expired light bulb among the dozens that lit this one room.  Not a single item of furniture looked out of place.
	"May I?"  Victoria asked, holding her hands out to receive Eddie.
	"Oh, yes, thank you. Hee-ah ya go."  I handed him over, and my arms felt so stiff that I could barely straiten them out.
	Victoria smiled at the baby and tried to sweet talk to him, but he immediately started to cry.  I offered to take him back, but she waved me off and circled the room, cooing him while he shrieked.
	I easily ignored the piercing sounds, as I was distracted by the magnificence of Victoria's home.  I hadn't been in her house in years, and I'd forgotten how truly luxurious it was.  Just stepping into the house transported me into a king's palace or a presidential suite far, far, far away from the melancholy land of Hollo Island.  Rude though I may have seemed, I couldn't refrain from inspecting whatever was set upon the many shelves around me.   It seemed that she had everything, both old and new:  A giant projection television with a video tape recorder, a grandfather clock from nineteenth century England, countless paintings, carpets, and knickknacks.  Everything she had competed for my attention.
	Victoria tapped on my shoulder for my attention, and I was very embarrassed by my discourtesy.  She put the still screaming baby back in my arms and squinted against each wail.  Eddie's face was all blue, and his cries were now more strained than piercing.
	"Do whatever you need to do to sh-- . . . to quiet him!" Victoria shouted.
	I opened my blouse and gave him my breast.  Although Victoria didn't think well of public breast feeding, she sighed when Eddie quieted immediately.
	"Oh, Lord, what lungs!" She smiled a tense smile, and then she prepared herself some water and aspirin.
	"This place is incredible," I mentioned.
	Victoria sat down, very properly, on a very old couch. "Thank you," she said.
	"I mean, just standin' heah makes me feel like I'm in another woold or something," I continued, so much still awed by the place that I barely noticed that I was nursing my son.
	"You are," she said matter-of-factly, " in a way:  You could hardly compare this house to the cabins out there."
	"Hardly," I agreed.  "I wish theah was something—ya know—we could do to fix things up."
	Victoria brightened.  "Well, of course there are things you could do."
	"What?" I faltered.  "What do you mean?"
	"No one ever said you had to live in cabins like primitives.  This island's as much yours as anyone's;  and if people would just take some initiative and start selling what they work at, well, they'd be able to afford something better some day—something that they have worked for and deserve. But the way things are now, no one is going to accomplish anything."
	Something stirred within me—memories of my life in New Bedford—memories of a frustration that was far worse than boredom.  By coming in here, was I taking a political stand?  What would happen to Psyche if she had to compete for a living?  Would drugs and crime follow the money to the island?  I said, "That would change everythin'.  Everyone would staht workin' jus' for themselves."
	"What's wrong with that? The way things are now, it's like communism.  The way things are, you don't even have the freedom to grow.  Think about your husband, Ed.  Hasn't he been working at the same job for nearly ten years?  I'm sure things have been getting harder for him, but what has he got to show for it?  Have you benefited in any way?"
	Before I could even consider what she was saying to me, she turned on a stereo to a soft-rock station.  I hadn't heard such entrancing music in years, and I fell right into it.
	We missed our dinner at the cooking house, but the everyday fish and vegetables seemed less than food when compared to what Victoria had stored away.  We prepared and ate a meal fit for heaven—at least it seemed that good to me—and we washed it down with a bottle of real Champagne.
	We talked senselessly for several hours.  I found myself wondering how we could have remained neighbors for so long, but not friends.

	Nature

	In April and May, the buds on the trees had been growing into leaves, and the flowers had been blooming on some bushes and on some sprouts.  Back then, the island children quickly forgot their winter politeness towards parents and adults in general, as the mud and grass and trees and beaches once again became their playground.  The adults had enjoyed the welcoming outdoors, too, though they lacked the carefree attitudes of their kids.  Hollo Island had little protection from the harshness of winter, so spring had been a wonderful time of rainbows and warm breezes.
	But now it was the beginning of summer, and the warm breezes were becoming  too warm, and the rainbows were all gone.  Flowers attracted many bees, and humidity attracted the mosquitoes. Yet the sun's face was still cheerful, and the not so pleasant memories of winter still lingered to help the islanders endure the excesses of summer.
	Of course, the kids needed no reminder of the winter to enjoy themselves—their minds being forever in the future, if not in the present.  If the temperature got too hot, they would swim.  Bees were more interesting than flowers, anyway. And they moved too fast for the mosquitoes to catch up.  Summer was made for kids.

	Doug

	I was standing about a foot from the door that entered the storehouse, just sizing up the doorknob with my eyes for about an hour.  There wasn't anything else to do that I could think of—at least nothing more interesting—even on such a hot and sunny day.  My friends and fellow members of the Youth League were all out with their parents or eating or doing something else, and they couldn't meet with me.  The doorknob that I was eyeing looked like gold, and was made more interesting by all the dents and nicks that marred its surface.  My reflection in it was distorted, and I got to wondering how the knob had been made and what in its construction caused it to open the door when turned.  I got to wondering if I could dent it with a rock or something.  I got to wondering all these things because the one thing that I did know for certain was that I didn't want to turn it.  If I did turn it and open the door, I'd have to go in.  And if I went in, my father would start tutoring me about mathematics and some other number things.  Some of my friends usually would be tutored with me, but today I'd be alone.  The nicks and dents and other mysteries of the doorknob, many though they were, couldn't hold my fascination forever (like watching a sunfish squiggle when it was put on the sand could, or like any frog or toad doing just about anything could), and so I finally did turn that knob, listening very carefully for a clue as to how it worked.
	My father didn't notice when I came into the storehouse, so I wandered quietly about and handled and inspected things.  Dad was grumbling something below his breath, as he punched away at a calculator.  Still he didn't look up at me, and I didn't do anything to attract his attention.  The storehouse was always the most interesting place to be, and it was too bad my father was always there.  Everything I'd ever want was in there;  I handled clocks, radios, cooking junk, sleeping bags, a guitar, flashlights (I found a really small one, and I slipped it into my shirt), and anything else that caught my eye.  Then, before I moved to touch what really caused my mouth to water, I glanced at my father.  He was still grumbling and punching at that little box with his fingers.  I gumshoed toward the giant lawnmower that I'd seen Mr. McNeill driving the other day, and just as I began my investigation of the monstrous machine, dad looked up.
	"Oh, it's you," he sighed.
	"Hiyah, dad," I greeted.
	He squinted at the clock on the wall across the small building.  It read two-thirty.  I thought he was gonna scold me for being a half hour late, but he just asked, "Where's Meg and John?"
	"Ya mean Noodles?"  I asked.  Two of my friends were named John, so the Youth League named the smart one Noodles.
	"Yeah."
	"They're out shopping with their moms," I said, but dad never could understand me like ma could.  What I'd said sounded to him like, "De-ah oud shoppin' wid dah moms."
	"In English," he said, and I repeated more properly.  "Well, Doug, if they're not coming, then we'll forget the lesson for today."  He applied his attention once again to the calculator.
	I looked around for a while but didn't leave.  Not that I enjoyed being taught mathematics or anything, but I couldn't think of anything else to do.  Besides, I really wanted to check out that lawn mower.
	Dad peeked up again, a little more irritated, now, and commanded, "Hey, Doug! Get out!"
	"Wa's dis?"
	"It's a fertilizer spreader. Take that flashlight out from under your shirt, put it where you found it, then get out."
	"Wheh's ma?"
	"Oh, probably with Victoria—"
	Before he could repeat "Get out!" again, I asked, "Why don' she go 'wound wid dat dahk hayad lady, anymoah?"
	He shook his head.  "English."  He was getting dangerously angry.
	"Why don't . . . doesn't she go 'round with that other lady, anymore?"
	"I don't know . . . and I don't care!  I never understood what kind of spell that girl has on your mother and everyone else, anyway.  Now get—"
	Again, risking severe punishment, I said before he could finish, "Is she a witch, dad?"
	"No! Course not!" he muttered, and with clenched fists, he stared hatefully into my eyes.  I felt fear running down my spine, now, as I realized that I'd gone too far.  Dad wasn't nearly the patient guy that he used to be. But then a slyish smile creased at his lips, and he spoke in a completely different tone, "Well, then again, maybe that girl is a witch."  He began to whisper solemnly, "The other night, I passed by her cabin and saw her inside, stirring a bowl of soup. And there was a boy's head sticking out of the bowl!"  I gasped at the image, and I tried to think of who I knew who had disappeared recently.  Must have been Cecil, a little black kid whom, they told us, had been taken to the city last week, where he would live from now on.  Poor Cecil!  "Then I saw a black bird," Dad continued, "—or maybe it was a bat!  It  flew into her cabin, and then someone started screaming!"  Then he stopped whispering and looked down again at his calculator.  "I think you are right;  she's probably a witch. Now get out of here."
	Mouth wide open, I turned and walked through the door.  The only thing I could think of was a boy's head floating in a kettle of stew.  Were his eyes open?  Was the head screaming when she cooked it?
	After walking a few steps from the storehouse, I sped to a running pace.  I remembered that in all the comic books, when a boy discovered a witch, he'd be dead before he could tell anyone—at least I thought I remembered that.  I had always thought that woman was kinda pretty, but looking nice was just a trick that witches use as bait.  Now that I knew she was a witch, I could easily imagine grey in her hair and dozens of wrinkles.  And I could hear the heh-heh-heh-ing sound coming from her dry and colorless lips, as I ran as fast as I could.  She was speaking to me in my mind, telling me that it was hopeless to run.
	When I was about halfway down the long path, running and running as fast as I could, I saw Mr. Johnson and Mr. McNeill tarring the roof of a cabin.  As I was running by, they called out, "Hey, Doug!  What's the rush?"
	"Running from a witch!" I called back, out of breath.
	They laughed heartily.
	I ran until I got to the Reach and then climbed up a few steps.  There I sat, feeling secure that if a witch came close I'd see her.  Besides, no witch would dare come near the Reach:  If one was to, she'd certainly wither and die, because the Man On The Reach would protect his home from her kind. The Man On The Reach was the protector of the island, and as long as I stayed near, I'd be safe.
	I sat at my favorite spot at the base of the climb, which was beside a heavy rock.  I rolled the rock aside with my greatest effort, and I found what I expected to find, about twenty worms and several ball-bugs, as I called them; these were the bugs that, when touched in the belly, would cuddle into tiny balls.  I always had fun with them: I used to insert them into drinking straws and fire them at people, or I would take a few and drop them into Meg's shorts, which she hated; but when I was alone, the only use I found for them was as marbles. With a twig, I touched five of them and put their spherical bodies on a flat rock.  The object of the game was to bounce one ball-bug against another in a certain way so that they wouldn't start to open nor could they fall off the rock. I was pretty good at it, and it took about ten minutes before a bug finally opened.  (During that time, I had entertained about fifteen zillion amazed Ball-bug fans who were watching from just behind me, cheering in ecstasy.  Every move I made was filled with tension, for I didn't like to hear the occasional boos.)
	Then I saw some of my friends from the Youth League walking down the path towards me.  John was walking with Geoff, and Noodles and Meg were not far behind.
	Suddenly, I realized how glorious it would be to have killed a witch! Those hags were evil and frightening, and I was afraid of them, but against the Youth League, what could she do?  She was nothing!
	Smiling, I stepped on the ball-bugs.  They crunched with an awful sound.  But just being able to crush them so easily gave me a feeling of strength, which was very important now that I was soon to face such peril. I jumped down from my position on the Reach to the path below and dashed to meet with my friends.

	The Youth League included within it almost every kid about my age and some kids very much younger, too.  Our headquarters was beneath a huge grain storage container, which was really just the rear end of a big truck that had been renovated to serve another function, and we leaguers ate, slept and played there-under or nearby whenever parents and weather allowed.  We also read there: Stashed away under a ton of cornmeal, where it shouldn't have been, was our wealth of a thousand comic books.  We had Batman, Superman, Action, Spiderman, Conan and every other kind I knew of; but the most important were the Justice League comic books, because these were the inspiration for our own league.  We have sworn to protect those being treated unjustly.  Maybe, once every week, a big kid might hit a little kid, and we'd come to the rescue. But most often, not finding much injustice to combat and feeling kind of bored, we'd assign a few members of the League to play bad guys for a while.  We were well prepared for battle at all times, and evil wouldn't take us by surprise:  Every day, some one who claimed to know karate would teach the other kids how to fight;  we had swords that weren't very sharp but could cut, and some of them left wooden splinters in their victims.  The two girls in the league were the precious objects to be protected—keeping in the traditions of the comic books—and the penalty to a boy for striking a girl was death.
	Presently, about ten of the League members were gathered around myself (the leader), as we planned the final hour of the witch.  All such gatherings occurred at our headquarters, beneath the grain-filled trailer, where no spy could see. The ten of us formed a circle, and I had my arm around Meg, because she was my girlfriend.  I drew in the dirt with my finger a map which represented the area around the witch's cabin;  the map included all nearby bushes and trees, and it was accurate, we knew, because the entire area was clearly visible from just a few steps up the Reach's base.
	"How d'ya know she's a witch?" Geoff asked.  "I seen huh an' she seems real nice."
	"Yeah, bud dad saw huh boilin' Cecil's head in a stew," I said, and they had no trouble understanding my improper pronunciation, as adults always had.  Their eyes opened wide in horror.
	"Bud 'e moved ta Sprin'field," someone said.
	"Yeah, dats wud I thoughd, but she musta snatched 'em 'foah 'e could go," I said. "Witches ah always nice-like 'till midnighd, so they ain' rec'nize'ble."
	Noodles and I planned the attack out, and we got our walkie-talkies for our separating groups to communicate with.  We wouldn't use them until the very last moment, unless there was a change in plans.
	Meg and I were walking to the bush we would duck behind. She carried a small puppy in her arms, and she petted him as we walked along. I waved my sword around in battle with an invisible opponent.
	When we arrived at our place behind a bush, we were plenty far from the witch's cabin.  We didn't want to get too close, because we'd be too easy to see.  From where we were, none of the other leaguers were visible—but I knew they were out there.
	The witch was inside her cabin, and we would wait until she came out rather than go in after her;  we figured that she was more vulnerable this way, flushed out of her home.
	We were just about to relax, expecting a long wait, when she stepped through the door, which she shut behind her.  She took a few steps away and then just sat down on the grass, completely naked.   I wanted to wait a little longer, thinking that she might move even further from the cabin, but I heard someone giggling, breaking the silence, and I knew it was time.
	Meg didn't move. She just stared at the witch.
	I pressed a button on my walkie-talkie, and both mine and Noodles, which was somewhere nearby, screamed a siren sound.
	The witch, who'd been forewarned by the giggles, stood quickly but didn't move toward the cabin door.  In an instant, Geoff was standing there, cutting off her escape with an outstretched sword.  The witch suddenly realized the threat, but every possible escape was quickly cut off by league soldiers.
	As the walls of swordsmen enclosed, she glanced around in panic. With nothing left to do and nowhere she could run, she sat on the ground, pulled her knees to her chest and buried her face.  I could hear her weeping.
	I stepped into the center of the group beside her, and I touched the tip of my sword to her back.  She trembled.  She reminded me of a ball-bug, as she huddled herself to a similar shape. As I pretended to crush her beneath my foot, I shouted, "We've conquered the witch!"
	"Kill huh!" called out one of the soldiers.
	The lady looked up.  Her face was flooded with tears, not at all like a bug.  Her eyes were red as if she had been crying for a long time.
	Kill her? I thought, He's serious!  Yeah, that's what we said we were going to do, but it was all pretend.  Pretend swords; pretend witch.
	"Please, Doug," she whispered, "don't kill me."
	"Ah ya oh nod a wicked witch?" I asked, pretend threatening with the sword.  She really thought that I intended to kill her.
	She shook her head.
	"Ya gonna believe dat, Doug?" the serious soldier said.  "Huh name's Psyche;  id's godda be a witch's name."
	I didn't know what to do.  I never really wanted to kill her.  I really didn't believe in witches.
	As I stood there in confusion, Meg's pup twisted itself from her hands, wobbled on its short, basset hound legs through the circle of boys, and he settled down against Psyche.
	Noodles then spoke up, "She's no witch!  Pups don' like witches.  They know the smell of 'em, even."
	Among the League, there was a general nod of agreement. Everyone knew that dogs and witches were the worst of enemies, just like dogs hate black cats, and dogs could smell either from a mile away.
	I removed my sword from its threatening position and said, "Ya cahn go, lady."
	But she was still weeping, even as she pet and hugged the puppy.
	"Did I hurd ya, lady?"  I asked.  I had left a mark on her back where my sword touched her, but it wasn't even bleeding.
	She shook her head.  "Charles fell off of a cabin's roof a while ago," she whispered.  "He almost died."
	I was stunned.  I remembered seeing Mr. McNeill and Mr. Johnson just a few hours ago, when they'd been tarring a roof.  "He . . . Is he gonna die?"
	She shook her head.
	The whole league was quiet and listening.
	She was talking about real death, and I didn't like to hear such talk. She was talking about the one evil that I knew the Youth League couldn't do anything about.  "'Fees alive then theh's no problem, righd?"
	She didn't respond.
	Meg stepped into the circle of boys, now that Psyche was declared "not a witch," and I thought she meant to get her pup. But she said, "Could ya cayah for Pudgy?  E's a real nice pup an' mom says 'f'ee breaks one moah ding, she'll make 'em sleep a real long while.  Ee's no trouble, an' I'll come and feed 'im  evayday."
	Psyche nodded even while Meg was asking. She held the pup up against her chest, and Pudgy started to lap her tears away.
	Unlike some adults, I thought she could understand our improper speech.
	I said, "Sweyah t'die befoah ya led Pudgy be pud asleep!"
	She nodded with Youth League determination; she even swore with a Youth Leaguer's tongue.  I kind of liked her, and if she weren't an adult, I'd let her join the league.  She wasn't much taller than me, and she didn't act big or anything.  But her shape was definitely that of a woman (I knew what girls look like, because I'd secretly skinny-dipped with Meg in the pond up by the Reach, and though she was almost as tall as Psyche, she had a kid's shape, and she didn't have any hair between her legs.)
	"C'mon Meg," I said, wondering what adventure for justice was awaiting us.  We'd planned to threaten Meg's mother not to hurt Pudgy, but that wasn't necessary anymore.
	"I'm gonna stay heah wid Psyche a while," Meg said.
	The rest of us gathered and started back towards headquarters, discussing on the way what to do next.

	"Hiyah, ma!" was my greeting, as I trotted into her cabin on that new afternoon. She was moving a large box around.  From my angle, all I could see were a bunch of switches and knobs and a surface that seemed like some kind of wood. "Wha's dat?"
	"Color TV . . . Wanna see?"
	She switched it on, and I moved for a better view. It was a soap opera (yuck!), and it looked just as bad in color as in black & white.  "Looks OK.  God any cahnbread an' jelly?"
	"In the usual place.  Jam's in the frij'ratah," she said.  The new refrigerator, the television and other things were all gifts from Victoria—things that Ms Smith had stored away in her cellar.  Ma was going crazy over the stuff.
	I opened the door to the refrigerator, then I repeatedly shut and opened it again, fascinated by the light inside that flashed on and off.  I'd never seen such a machine before.
	"Don't steal the cold, Doug.  Take the jam and shut it."
	I grabbed the raspberry preserves and dumped half of the contents on a slice of cornbread.  As I began to devour it, ma pointed at the refrigerator, and I put the jar back inside.
	She looked critically at the television.  "How's it look theyah, Doug?"
	"I dunno."
	"Not so great, huh?"
	"I dunno."
	She moved it to a corner and again looked at it critically.
	Then a thump sound exploded from another room (it just occurred to me that there had been no room there just three days ago), and immediately the sound was followed by a cry from the awakened Eddie.
	"Damn!" cursed ma.  "Can't evah have a moment 'thout somethin' happenin'!"  She rushed into the other room, and in a moment there was silence again.
	The new television was big—much larger than the old black & white set—and if it weren't for that soap opera, I'd have been really interested. I grabbed the knob that changed the channel and turned it, then again, but there were nothing on except soap operas.
	"Don't touch that!" I heard the yell and immediately jumped away as if the TV hid some monster inside.  Then to my relief and irritation, mom said, "I don't want to miss any of my show."
	She turned the knob back to its original position.
	I didn't like her much at that moment.  She often had such moments, but they seemed to happen more often, lately.  Usually she got bad when dad got bad, but he hasn't been acting up lately.
	"Ahn't ya s'posed to be in class?" she asked, dividing her attention between the television and me.  I hate being only half attended to.
	"I din wanna go," I said.
	"What? It doesn't mattah that ya want ta go or not. Ya have to go!" she bellowed, meeting my eyes. Now that her attention was completely on me, I felt better . . . well, kind of.  "Besides," she continued, "ya said befoah that ya wah getting ta like it."
	I did say that several days ago, but only because I thought that dad had been near to killing me and would've if I hadn't said something good like that. And now that he was teaching goes-intos (which I've already given up trying to understand), class was the most abhorred place I could dream of.  I said to ma, "I changed my mind."
	"Well, change it back!"
	She again set her vision firmly on the television.
	I considered for a moment and took a few bites of the cornbread and jam.  Then I casually asked, "Ma, can Meg an' I go oud skinny dippin' in da pond."
	She was surprised, and again I had her full attention.  She finally replied with, "Ya know my answah ta that."
	After losing her strangely caring glare for a third time, I said, "Bud Psyche—da lady ya was goin'  'wound wid befoah—she was walkin' like dat aboud huh cabin jus' yestahday."
	She seemed confused for a moment about what I'd just said, but then I held her attention undivided.  She opened her eyes wide and started to breath more rapidly.  "Y-Ya saw huh?"
	"Yeah, we was standin' as neah as I'm ta ya now, talkin' an'—"
	Suddenly, ma commanded in perfect, proper language, "You stay away from her, Doug!  If I hear you've gone near her cabin again, you'll be sorry!"
	"Bud ma! Dat cabin's on da way ta—"
	"Stay away from her!"  she yelled without raising her voice, somehow.  "Now go to your class.  And no skinny dipping!"

	Both Noodles and Meg could figure math better than I could, which meant that dad thought that I wasn't trying.  I did try, but just when I thought I could figure something, he would always tell me that I was wrong.  If there are fifteen rows of chairs—dad might ask—and five in each row, and then someone sneaks off with a dozen, how many remain?  I couldn't even start to solve the problem, but Meg and Noodles would just glance down and touch their pencils to some scrap paper, and wholla! The correct answer.  Most often, while they were figuring, I entertained other thoughts.
	"Hey, Doug, you're not even trying," dad would say.
	But how could I try if I didn't even know how to start?
	And now, just as I was beginning to understand how to times numbers, he changed the problems to goes-intos, which were much tougher. To make matters worse, I couldn't even cheat because calculators didn't understand remainders.  What is a remainder, anyway?  Where do they come from, and what good are they?  I supposed that they were numbers that just didn't belong with the other, normal numbers but rather in some number twilight zone.
	With my pencil, instead of scratching digits and such down onto the paper, I doodled shapes and faces. I loved to doodle, especially when I wasn't supposed to.  When dad found out what I was doing, he grabbed me by the shirt and threw me to the floor.  Despite the pain and threats, I continued to doodle.
	When class was over, I found that I wasn't being released from the prison with the other inmates because of my attitude.  Dad made me sweep the entire storehouse while under his watchful eyes.  Then he found that there was a film of dust settled on the shelves, and after I finished sweeping the floor, he held a rag out to me.  I gritted my teeth but finished the job, while dad relaxed.  I finished just in time to start grammar lessons with Mr. Andle.
	There wasn't anything I disliked more than goes-intos, but verbs and adverbs and prepositions and direct objects and other names for better nameless things were nearly as zoney as remainders.  Mr. Fred Andle began to break up words in sentences and ask what their names were.  I looked out the cabin window, feeling depressed. With only myself and five other kids that he was tutoring, he must've known that I wasn't paying him any attention.  When he asked me a question, I gave him the wrong answer deliberately.  My gloom was too deep to rouse . . . except by the freedom of dirt and sun and ball-bugs.  But I had no freedom to look forward to in the near and eternal future; when the class ended, it would be dinner time, and then I'd have to return home to sleep (because ma dictated that I couldn't sleep with the league anymore.)
	I had to escape.
	It seemed like an hour before I thought of a plan.  Like most cabins on Hollo Island, Mr. Andle's opened outward.  When I noticed it, planning the escape was easy. Mr. Andle's concentration seemed glued to us, his few pupils, and I had to wait impatiently for my chance;  then, when he turned to face a portable blackboard, I grabbed my chair and burst out from the cabin door.  I positioned the chair in the sandy ground and leaned it against the door as a brake.
	I knew a zillion hiding places on the island.

	After the escape, I hung out inside the old lighthouse.  It wasn't very safe there, because that was where the fishermen's showers were, and many islanders would pass through there before heading off to dinner.  I waited inside and watched the storehouse from a window.
	I wasn't ever going to go back home—at least not for several days, anyway. Ma didn't care anymore for me, only for her soap operas and Victoria's daily gifts. If I went home, now, she'd probably continue to watch her programs and send me to dad, who'd just hit me or make me work off my badness in the storehouse.
	Instead, I hid away and waited for dad to leave the storehouse, so I could get a tent from within it.  I'd then set up my hideaway at the other side of the island and make it my home.  Every night, I'd sneak into the cooking house and take some food, so I wouldn't go hungry.  I had the whole thing figured out already, because I had done my thinking while still in class.
	As I waited in the lighthouse, Mr. Johnson showed up to take a shower. He smelled of fish and had white patches on his green shirt and black skin.
	"Hiyah, Mr. Phil."
	"Hey, Doug!" We smiled and slapped hands.  "Whatcha doing?"
	"Runnin' 'way," I told him, because he wouldn't tell.
	"Really?" he asked, surprised. "Can't go too far. Since ya won't be paying attention to the law, now, come by my cabin and we'll draw some stuff."
	"Maybe," I said. He was teaching me how to draw and paint pictures, though dad had strictly forbid my associating with him.  When he'd commanded me such, I was curious why, so I made friends with him.  I figured dad just wanted me to learn boring stuff like math and grammar, and not about really interesting stuff, like drawing.

	After a few raps on her door, Psyche appeared.  She looked at me in surprise, whispered my name, then shut the door with the words, "Wait a second."
	Night had descended about two hours ago, and I stood now with my back to her cabin, watching shadows that moved with the wind.  The one thing that I hadn't prepared for were the night's monsters. And sitting in that tent, alone, with no flashlight, the wind howling, and the bushes that surrounded the tent forming finger-like shadows on the tent's vinyl surface . . .
	I had kept listening real carefully for monster sounds. I kept thinking to myself, There's nothing to fear; they're only branches and twigs tapping against the tent; they aren't monsters' fingers. I tried to believe that rationalization but couldn't, because I knew there were monsters there, and I knew that I was alone. 
	Psyche opened the door again. She wasn't wearing anything before, but now she wore a sweater that went down to her knees.  I was a bit disappointed, because I knew that ma must have been talking to her.  Besides I liked looking at her naked body.  What was ma trying to hide from me, anyway?  It had to do with nudity, of course, but what was it?  It wasn't the swellings that women had on their chest, was it? I don't think so, because ma had nursed Little Eddie while I was watching, and she didn't seem to mind a bit. And ma's bathing suit hid next to nothing, except between the legs. That's where the secret was, I figured, between the legs and forbidden from the eyes of boys.  Was it the hair?  Or was there something else, beneath the hair?  For Psyche, it hadn't been a secret until now, after ma's likely complaints.
	"Hiyah, Psyche," I greeted.  Pudgy, now living with Psyche in her cabin, waddled up to the door.  I kneeled and pet him on the head.  "Hiyah pup!"
	"Your mom has been looking for you, Doug," she said.  She kneeled down beside me and also pet Pudgy, who was in ecstasy from all the attention.
	"I've run 'way."
	She didn't look surprised.
	I continued, "I've gud a tent sed up. Com'n an' see. Ih's well hid, an' no one will see us goin' theah 'cause ih's so dahk."
	"But your mom—she'll be worried."
	"Ah, she don' cayah.  Bud she will, an' she an' dad will tread me beddah when I come back."
	Psyche didn't seem angry or nothing, so I didn't expect that she'd tell on me.  "Won't it be lonely?"
	"Nah, I can always talk ta da Man On Da Reach.  Ya comin' or nod?"
	"Can we take Pudgy?"
	I thought about it for a moment, but he seemed too excited.  "Nah, 'e could stahd yippin' when we leas' 'spect 'em ta.  Ee'll be OK heah f'while."
	She nodded and kissed Pudgy on the nose (I don't know how she could do that!) and said, "Bye, Pudgy." Then she looked up at me and whispered, "I'd better tell Phil where I'm going," and she slipped back into the cabin.
	Phil was inside?  He didn't live here.  I peeked inside and saw him lying on her bed.  He must have been really tired and just fell asleep while visiting her.
	When she came outside, she was carrying a lit lantern.  "Phil says we should we take this?"
	I took the lantern and turned the flame down very low. "Good idea."
	As she shut the door behind her, Pudgy started yipping at being left behind and in the dark.  We felt sorry for him.
	I waved for Psyche to follow me, as we sneaked our way through the trees and by cabins with as little noise as a whisper and with the speed of kids escaping persecution.  I had never known an adult who could follow me into the woody areas of the island at that speed, so late at night, and I was amazed at how easily Psyche managed.  Dodging branches and twigs that aimed for unwary eyes seemed to be a talent possessed by kids, but adults had somehow outgrown it. Psyche hadn't; I think the only reason that she didn't run right past me was because she didn't know where we were going.
	When we stopped running, we were near the Reach and were surrounded by trees.  "Where is it?" she asked.
	"Shh . . ." I whispered, "in the bushes. C'meah."
	She stepped beside me and peered into the bushes.  The tent was well hidden, almost invisible beneath the dense bush.  I forced aside branches and disappeared from her view;  then she followed me in.
	Once inside, the wind caused twigs to tap, tap, tap against the tent's surface, and the shadows of the branches which were projected to us by the dim moonlight seemed like a web entrapping us within. I hadn't been ready to spend my first night alone, and that was why I brought Psyche with me—as if monsters only strike people when they are alone.
	I fingered the knob on the lantern, and the shadows disappeared from the conquering light. I sighed in relief.
	Psyche, who was sitting beside me, was, in that position, nearly exactly my height. I felt more like she was just a girl instead of my ma's friend.
	She opened the flap that was the tent's door and squinted through the bush branches at the Reach. "Where is he?" she asked.
	"Who?"
	"The Man On The Reach."
	"Oh, him.  Ya godda jus' keep lookin' a long, long time.  Sometimes 'e comes down ta talk wid me.  Dad says 'e ain' real, bud 'e is. 'E's my friend."
	Psyche looked down towards the ground for a while, and then she hesitantly got herself up into a kneeling position.. She took my hand in hers, put it to her lips (she didn't kiss my hand; she just held it there), and then she laid my hand on her shoulder.  She was still looking at the ground, not daring to look at me, as if she felt ashamed or something.  She looked like people look when they pray in church.
	"Can you get him?" she pleaded. "Please!  He won't talk to me, anymore."
	She's seen him! I thought in amazement and disbelief.  Most people didn't even believe that the Man On The Reach existed.
	I shook my head. "'E only comes ta talk when I'm by myself."
	She looked devastated, but I couldn't understand why. She let my hand drop from her shoulder.
	"I'm sorry," I said, putting my hand back.  I never apologize even when I know I've done something bad.  But she looked so sad, and I didn't like seeing her that way, and I had to say something.
	It seemed to help.  She nuzzled my hand, again, whispered something I couldn't hear, and then smiled and asked, "What does he tell you?"
	I smiled, too. "Oh, jus' stuff," I said. I reached into my pocket and removed the cap of an acorn. "Stuff like how ta whistle wid acawns."
	"How did you do that?" she asked, after I demonstrated.
	"Jus' hold 'tween ya dumbs an' blow," I said while handing it to her.  She tried but couldn't produce the sound.  "An' 'e taughd me ta do da same wid grass blades, an' 'e taughd me a game ta play wid ball-bugs.  'E's a real good friend."
	She smiled and yawned.
	"Ya look tiyahd," I said.
	She nodded.
	"Well, ya cahn sleep if ya wanna. I'll look oud case monstahs come by."
	Again she nodded, and she settled onto the blanket I had folded as a small mattress. I lowered the lantern's flame until the shadows threatened on the tent's surface.  Psyche was really tired, and soon she was asleep.
	I guess I liked her. She was weird, but I liked her.  She listened to me like neither ma nor dad would, and she didn't scream, or tell me to shut up, or tell me what to do. She was really nice.
	I remembered how mad ma got when I talked about Psyche and that woman-secret—that place where babies come from. She got more angry than when she found Meg and I undressing in the bushes last year, and even then she was red in the face.
	I very carefully moved the lantern into position and then slowly lifted the hem of Psyche's sweater to reveal the secret.
	I was really surprised to find the puff-ball spot of hair that was there only a few days ago was completely gone.  What happened? I know I saw hair there before—unless it was something else.  Maybe it was dirt, or something else that I didn't want to think about.  But then I saw that the hair on her legs was gone, too, and I understood.  Ma didn't have hair on her legs because she shaved them, so I guess women shave off all the hair on their bodies.  Why would they do that? Very strange.
	But without the hair in the way, I could see the spot more clearly, even in dim light.  I expected something more dramatic.  Without any hair, it didn't look much different than Meg's looked.  I expected that since Psyche's body was much rounder than Meg's, and her breasts were fuller, that her spot would look much different, but it didn't.  I also expected the hole to be much larger if babies really did come from there, like some people say.
	When I dropped the sweater back, her expression remained unchanged, but her legs shifted in response and, by pure luck, moved the sweater away again, showing me even more of the spot than I could see before.
	What was the big secret, ma?  I wondered.  Ma had me believing that there was something enigmatic or amazing down there,  like an old wind-up watch.
	I looked at the overrated exhibit for a while, and thought that the shape was kind of interesting.  It was kind of wrinkled and squished.  But soon I got bored and killed the lantern.
	The shadows returned with all other evidences of monsters, but I wasn't in the mood to be frightened.  I was in the mood to be courageous. I imagined that I was battling the monsters to protect the fair Psyche, and that the Man On The Reach was helping me achieve victory.  These happy thoughts and visions eventually carried into my dreams as I fell asleep.

Charles

	I have never liked thinking about hard, cold facts.  I preferred to think of things as I'd like them to be.  My parents spent all their time thinking of cold, hard facts, and because of that I never had to. I had money, health and friends, and the only thing I ever really worried about was living a worthwhile life.   I've had bad times, and I've lost people that I have loved, but I never had everything taken away from me.  That almost happened three weeks ago, when I received a cruel lesson in irony.
	I had climbed the Reach many times, risking my life, but I never slipped.  Most people think they will die from aging or a disease or an accident; I always envisioned that I would die climbing the Reach, as if it were my destiny, and I never gave death a serious thought except when I was climbing.  I controlled my fear by pretending that death was under my control.  
	I was such an idiot.  How did I imagine that I could cheat death of its greatest horrors?  The most frightening thing about dying is the unpredictability and the agonies.  These facts became cruelly clear to me in one brief moment, as I fell from the roof of the cabin.
	Now, every moment seems as tense as the moment when I reached for Phil's outstretched hand.  The shadow of death was sitting on the couch beside me, digging his claws into my injured skull, forcing me to reconsider everything I believed was true, and everything I valued, and everything I wanted to do with my life.
	So I sat, now, in my cabin, alone with the shadow.  I didn't want to be there, cultivating my fears and watching everything I valued slip into the shadow.  I wanted to be out fishing, as I have always done, but  the throbbing in my skull would be unbearable while sitting in a fishing boat with a hot sun penetrating the bandages.  I wanted to be with my friends, but I didn't want to drag them into my new, frightful mood.  So I just sat in my cabin, alone, looking forward to the doctor's regular visits to my cabin.
	"You have a bad concussion, and it will need regular care,"  the doctor had told me with a clinical manner, suggesting that I had something to worry about.  Every time he came to visit, I listened for a change in his tone, but it never did change.  Nothing he said comforted me in the slightest.  "You have some bleeding." "You have some swelling." "I have scheduled an appointment for you at Mass General."
	Of all my friends, I was most surprised to find that Victoria was the one who really came through for me.  She and Mary visited often, and I spent most of the first few days recuperating in her house.  I never really appreciated the comforts of a soft couch or air conditioning before, and I had barely remembered Victoria's gentle, nurturing side.  But now I remembered everything.  I remembered our romance long ago.  I remembered the life we had planned to live together, in sickness and in health.  Now, I was very sick, and she remembered the vows we had never taken.  Depression sank in when I thought of how I gave my entire life up to a few platitudes and dreams.  What did I have left that was real?
	Nothing, it seemed. Not even Victoria.  After about a week of supporting me and showing me the love she would have freely given me twenty years ago, I learned the price of her love.  She couldn't resist taking some advantage of my situation. She suggested that I needn't worry about island events in my weakened state, and she wanted to take that ordeal away from me.  I wasn't in any shape to argue, so I agreed.  But her couch didn't seem so comfortable anymore, and her air conditioning seemed a bit too cold.  So I went back to my cabin, where I now rest on an old couch, and savor every little breeze that comes through my cabin's windows.
	I was feeling more optimistic today, because the pain was turning into an itch, and I felt that I could walk more without feeling dizzy.   Tonight or tomorrow, I wanted to try to walk to the cooking house for dinner. Usually, Psyche and Phil would bring some food to my cabin and eat with me, and they were good company;  but I just couldn't feel like myself when my cabin seemed like a cage, and when the island was beyond my reach.
	And when damn mosquitoes were hovering around me like vultures!  I swiped at one, and splattered the stolen blood on my shirt.  I was brushing the bugs remains away, when I heard a knocking at my door.
	"Come in."
	Psyche did.
	She came in, closed the door, and then just stood there, with a rolled up magazine in her clenched fist, staring at me.
	Psyche had a hard time adjusting to my condition. She didn't know what to expect from me anymore, and she was afraid to touch me or smile for me.  I couldn't blame her, really. I didn't act much like a father or even a friend, as my fear kept me distracted.  Everything seemed to have a shadow, now, and as fear dimmed the light of love, I could barely concentrate on anything else.  Whenever I looked at Psyche, I couldn't see the lovely face of a girl who wanted to be my daughter.  Instead, I saw her scars, her broken finger, her strange accent, her wild ideas, and actions that would seem foreign to any culture I knew.
	Today I saw something new, as Psyche stood by the door.  The first thing that caught my eye was that she had combed her hair; I have noticed that from day to day, she has been trying to improve her appearance, and I wondered if she was doing it to please herself or to please Phil.
	I tried to smile. "You look very pretty, today.  Have you done something to your hair."
	Psyche just stood there and continued to stare. At first I thought she was just feeling uncomfortable seeing me in my condition, but now I saw the complexity of the expression on her face.   She looked angry, sad, desperate and distrustful all at the same time, like a cornered animal.  "Psyche? Is something wrong?"
	She nodded.
	"Well, what is it?  I can't help you unless you tell me what the problem is."
	"They are coming to get me, Daddy,"  she cried out, but she wouldn't come over to me.  She just leaned against the cabin door, with her hands behind her back.
	I stood up and went to her.  "What do you mean? Who's coming to get you?"
	I tried to hug her. She shrugged me off and wouldn't look at me.  I had been so blinded by my own problems that I just now noticed the depth of her feelings.  She looked as though her whole world was crashing around her.
	"A policeman," she said.  "He's trying to find me."
	I felt myself take a step back, and I felt my eyes look away. I felt ashamed for responding in that way.  "What does he want?"
	Psyche stamped her foot and yelled, "He wants to take me away!" She  stepped away from me and started looking frantically for a place to hide, or a place to escape.
	"No one's gonna take you away, Psyche," I said. The pain in my head couldn't compare now to the pain in my heart, knowing that Psyche felt that she couldn't rely on me.
	I grabbed the composite bow that I had hanging on my wall, and Psyche stopped panicking and watched me in wonder.
	I told her, "Look for an arrow. I know I have one around here somewhere.  Look near the window."
	She nodded and walked to the window. "What does an arrow look like?"
	She asked amazing questions like that every day, but I never ceased to be amazed, and I just paused and tried to think of how to explain it to her.
	Then someone knocked on the door.
	Psyche and I glanced at each other.
	Phil didn't wait for an answer, and he threw the door open and rushed in.  He was carrying a shotgun.
	"Phil!" I gasped in relief, "What is going on? Why are the police interested in Psyche?"
	He looked out the door, then he shut it.  "Don't worry," he said to Psyche, who stood anxiously by the window.  "Everything will be great."
	"Phil"
	"Yeah, Charles.  I . . . I don't really understand it all, but Psyche has a very unusual past."
	I nodded, "Yeah, I kinda expected that.  What else?"
	Phil tried to collect himself. "Some people think that she belongs with them, and they sent the police to get her."
	The information just wasn't coming fast enough for me. "What people? Her real parents?"
	Phil shook his head, "I don't really know. Just some people who think that Psyche belongs with them. Scientists, I think."
	I was stunned, and I suddenly had a million questions, but I didn't even want to ask them.
	Phil and I both looked at Psyche, who had retreated to the corner.   I walked over to her, but she wouldn't meet my gaze. She couldn't trust that the love we had for her would survive whatever was soon to come.  She leaned into me, anyway, grabbing what love I still had left to give.
	"Did they hurt you Psyche?" I whispered.
	She didn't respond.
	"Did they experiment on you."
	She said nothing, but she put her arms around me and held tight.
	Again, someone knocked on the door.  This time the knocks were exactly three and were hard and were drawn out.
	I patted Psyche on the back and said, "Phil is right, Psyche.  Everything is gonna be fine."
	Phil stepped away from the door, and raised his shot gun.
	"Who is it?" I asked.
	"State Police. Open up, please.  I have a court order to take Psyche McNeill to her rightful guardians. She will not be harmed."
	"Come in," I said.
	Psyche McNeill?  Why did he call her that?  He must have known what her real last name was, but he chose to use my name instead.  Did even the state recognize Psyche as my daughter?
	Officer Benjamin Penny opened the door, stepped inside, and looked right into the double barrel of a shot gun.  He wasn't expecting such extreme resistance, and he took a step back in surprise.  He said, "You people are really asking for trouble."
	"Well, officer, ask yourself how you would react to someone coming into your home to take your daughter away."
	"She is not your daughter," he replied.  "Antonio Sordino is her rightful guardian."
	"She is my daughter, now. I don't know who this Mr. Sordino is, but Psyche clearly doesn't care to be with him.  She has friends here, now, and she is old enough to do what she wishes."
	"Maybe she is old enough, and maybe she isn't, but she surely isn't competent enough to make decisions for herself," the officer said calmly. Then, much louder, to Phil, "You'd better lower that gun, son, while I'm still being understanding!"
	Phil looked at Psyche and me, and I nodded, "Don't worry Phil.  He's not prepared to take Psyche by force  at least not today."
	Phil lowered the gun, but stood straight as a soldier, ready for anything.
	Penny wouldn't allow himself to appear relaxed.  "I hope it never comes to using force.  I can overlook the resistance I've seen today, but if I have to come back, the law will be less blind.  The law does not look kindly on kidnappers."
	I shook my head, "OK, stop right there. No one kidnapped Psyche."
	Penny asked, "How did she get here, then?"
	I paused and looked at Psyche, who just leaned against me and stared at the ground.  I shook my head, "I don't really know.  I found her standing on the Reach  the high rock over there  on the first Friday of May.  She was naked and freezing, and I have no idea how she got here.  For all I knew, she parachuted in."
	Penny's glared at me in disbelief, and then he consulted the calendar in his wallet. He then shook his head and laughed, "That's strange:  We have evidence that she was in Florida only the night before.  She probably did parachute in! Are you sure it was the first Friday in May?"
	I nodded.  "Absolutely.  I remember that day perfectly.  You seem to know quite a lot about Psyche, officer."
	"Dr. Sordino is a friend of mine, and he's told me a lot about her. But many people know her.  She's quite famous in some circles.  You people are pretty out of touch here on this island.  You can read all about her in that magazine she's holding.  I tried to show it to Ms Smith, but Psyche grabbed it and ran off with it."
	I looked quickly at the rolled up magazine in Psyche's clenched fist, but she was trying to hide it from me.  I didn't want to upset her, so I said, "Maybe I'll look at it later."
	"Maybe you should look at it now," Penny pushed.  "In case you haven't noticed, we have a problem here."
	I stared him straight in the eye. "No, we don't have a problem here.  We don't have any confusion.  Maybe you'll be more persuasive in the future, but as for today, Psyche is staying right here.  So if you don't have any other business, you are free to walk around our pleasant little island, or you are free to leave.  But you'd best just forget about Psyche."
	Penny glared at me.  "You don't want to do this."
	I glared back. "I think I do.  Somehow I think that you don't want to come back.  I don't think you are following standard procedure, either. You wanted this to be quick and painless.  Why?  What are you afraid of? Bad press?"
	Penny looked too angry to answer. He just turned and walked out of the door.
	Phil smiled at me and said, "Wow!  Did you see his face!  I told you, Psyche!  Everything is gonna be just great!"
	I smiled slightly, but now that the tension was relaxed, I felt a sharp pain again stab my skull.  "Phil, could you keep track of him?  I just want to make sure he doesn't have any brilliant ideas."
	Phil nodded, and he slipped out the door.
	"I hope this doesn't sound racist," I whispered to Psyche, who still leaned against me, "but I don't think Phil likes the police much."
	Psyche shook her head. "Me, too."
	She still seemed  tense. I lightly massaged her shoulders and neck. Then I noticed that she was wearing a touch of cologne.  "You smell very good today.  And your hair looks nice.  I can't blame them for wanting such a beautiful and refined young lady."
	Psyche didn't reply, but I felt the muscles in her shoulders melt under my fingertips.
	"Do you think I could see that magazine, now?"
	She tensed again.
	"Don't be afraid Psyche.  You are my daughter, and nothing can change that, now.  But you have to trust me.  This Dr. Sordino wants to take you away from me, and I need to know why."
	Psyche wriggled away from me, tossed the magazine on the couch, and then stood at the window.  She bit her fingernails and stared out the window.  Her face went blank, like an autistic child, looking back on a black moment in time.
	I hesitated before picking up the magazine.  Why was I doing this, really?  Why couldn't I just leave the can of worms alone? Of course, I had to open the can, now that the police gave me no choice.  I also needed to for my own reasons.  My love for Psyche was strained by many questions that she could not answer.  Answers I just needed to know.
	I took the magazine, and sat down on the couch.  "Journal of Social Sciences" was the title.  Right underneath that were listed three articles:
 
Objectivity revisited, pg. 5
Agricultural Norms in Transition, pg. 35
Psyche, Wild Girl Is Wild  Again, pg. 59

	"Wild Girl?" I said in surprise.  "I guess I don't have a very good imagination, Psyche, because I never suspected anything so exotic! "    I opened to page 59, and I started reading out loud.  I knew I was invading her privacy, as though I was reading her diary.  I read out loud, so she could hear and so she could interject.  I wanted her to hear the tone in my voice, while I read.  I pretended that I had her permission . . .

Psyche, Wild Girl Is Wild Again

	Four years ago, the twentieth century produced its only true, undisputed feral child in the depths of the Florida Everglades.  This child, popularly known as Psyche, has stunned the scientific community by dispelling age old theories of human development and of human nature.  However, after blessing society for a time with her natural wisdom, Psyche has recently returned to the wild.

	Psyche had lived in complete isolation, in totally natural surroundings, since the age of two or younger.  The area was hilly, forest land about two miles from a tiny rural town and a highway in the southern Florida Everglades.  The plot on which she lived, and about two thousand more acres of land around it, was owned by farmers in the neighboring town. The land was never plowed or used in any way.  The farmers were strongly religious, and they left the land to God to "use as he wishes."  They wanted to "keep away the infection of man." What they did not know was that Psyche was living within that land, her development completely unaffected by mankind, until she was in her midteens.  She had no knowledge of language, no culture, no clothing, and was completely ignorant in all matters except in what she had learned on her own and in what her guardians might have taught her before she was orphaned.
	We know nothing of her parents, not even if they were the guardian or guardians that had cared for her in her primary years.  Even Psyche had no recollection of these guardians, and what little we know of them is based purely on speculation.  The only thing that we are certain of about her primary years is that she was born in that forested area, far from a hospital or even from decent shelter.  We know this because we found the remains of an afterbirth buried there, preserved in a plastic bag. This afterbirth belonged to a child of  Psyche's age  and  to a person with Psyche's unusual genetic   makeup.   We  found  the  genetic evidence alone to be conclusive.

	Now, as I read, Psyche paced around the room, looking lonely.
	I stopped reading for a moment and just looked at her, as if I had seen her for the first time.  I couldn't believe what I was reading; I couldn't reconcile the person to the words.  She had always been like a Christmas present, slipped under the Christmas tree mysteriously, and suddenly there the next morning.  Traditionally, people don't question where the gift came from or how much it costs.  It supposedly takes away from the meaning of the gift.
	"Psyche!" I said. She stopped and looked at me. "Please come here, Psyche.  Sit with me while I read."
	She just stared at me suspiciously.
	"I don't want to read about you as if you aren't here.  I want to know you are with me."
	She sat beside me, but she wouldn't face me.
	"Remember when we first met, Psyche?"
	She looked at me and nodded.
	"I remember, too," I said.
	She leaned into me, allowing herself some hope.  I stroked her hair, as I often do.  "Nothing is going to change.  I could only love you more, not less."
	I started reading again.

	Psyche's survival in this environment depended on lots of luck and several key factors.
	The most important factor was her exceptional health.  She had an excellent immune system, which protected her from a variety of diseases and infections. Since her introduction to society, her immune system gradually reverted to normal. We have not been able to identify the cause of this change, but we do know that people moving from one geography to another often undergo similar adjustments.  Still, our initial expectation was that she would be more susceptible to diseases, not less. Physical anthropologists have studied her diet and her lifestyle, and found nothing that would account for her improved immune system.
	Psyche had only one limiting physical defect.  She had an abnormal heart rhythm.  This defect was never lifethreatening, however, and the only restraint it forced on her was to not overwork her heart and to limit her exercise.
	Psyche's shelter was a closet sized recess in the ground that had been formed by an underground stream. The stream was convenient, as it gave her fresh, clean water to drink from or bath in.  The tiny cavern remained a constant, comfortable temperature even on the hottest days of summer and the coldest days of winter.
	She had an inexplicable knowledge of which plants were edible and which were not. Many of the nuts, berries, flowers and roots were far too poisonous for her to have eaten them experimentally. One theory suggests that she ate only what she saw the animals around her eating.  This theory doesn't explain, however, the wide variety of foods she enjoyed.  How she learned this knowledge of food is a mystery, but having it was essential to her survival.
	Within her small foraging area, Psyche did not need to worry about wild, carnivorous animals.  However, several threats lurked just beyond her normal range, including the endangered Florida cougar and a black bear.  She stayed away from the cougar, and he ignored her as well.  She had an unhealthy curiosity of the bear, and she often investigated perilously near to him.  Only by her swiftness and her presence of mind had she escaped the occasionally enraged predator.
	Many of us have speculated whether the mysterious scar that extends the length of her hip and leg resulted from a not entirely successful attempt to escape from the bear or some other predator.  But we have no way of knowing. Psyche had no memory of such an attack.  Some of us think that she has buried the terrible memory; but again, this is only speculation.
	Her only permanent injury was the middle finger on her right hand, broken and unusable.  We have reset the bone, but the repair was only cosmetic. Psyche couldn't remember what caused this injury, either, but we don't suspect that this memory gap was caused by trauma.  The damage had occurred when she was very young, and she might have just forgotten during the passage of time. We do suspect, however, that the injury accounts for her being left handed, now.
	We may never fully understand how Psyche survived alone all those years, but we do know that her survival has been a boon to scientific research.  Her unprecedented situation has helped support, debunk and introduce many theories about human nature, human development, and human cognition. Some scientists have tried to expand the research to include gender abstractions, even without a male to compare her with. Others have tried to attach significance to the fact that she is a mix of European, Mongoloid and Negroid races.  We have tried to avoid such provocative and purely political inquiry, and we maintain that any such speculation is foolhardy at best.
	Before we could learn anything else from Psyche, we needed to learn her unique perspective.  Studies of feral youths in the past coupled research with socialization, but we felt that socializing was premature with Psyche, who already had a well developed concept of the world around her. Wild children were expected to learn at a snail's pace, and to have a limited learning capacity; but we quickly found our expectations shattered, as Psyche grasped the rules of communication intuitively.  For the first time ever, civilization could see through the eyes of the uncivilized.
	Before we found Psyche, she had never wandered far from her shelter in the cave.  Civilization and the ocean were barely three miles away, but she had been content in her little Eden.  She was athletic and curious, but her curiosity did not draw her out of that small lot, until just before we found her.  Her weak heart kept her from running long distances, and we think that she may have encountered a certain kind of berry that grows wild around the lot but not within it.  This berry looked like a berry that was part of her regular diet, but it was not edible.  We think that the berry made her ill, and, not knowing the cause of her sickness, she concluded that the area where she found the berries was "unfriendly".
	Psyche attributed personalities to places.  She thought places, like animals, could be friendly or mean.  She avoided unfriendly places, and thus she never knew that a highway bordered her home, nor the farms, nor the Gulf, nor that any person but herself was alive.  Those few evidences of humanity (such as airplanes flying overhead and ancient litter found on the ground) were only mysteries to her that she accepted as natural.  She had a curious mind, but she didn't seek explanations.  Her curiosity was satisfied by sensuous rewards.  Unlike animals, who also seek sensuous rewards, Psyche thought that these sensuous rewards were gifts from friendly places.  Seeking out her favorite foods, or smelling her favorite flowers, did not just make her feel good;  it also made her feel cared for and in good company.
	Psyche sought the company of animals, which were her companions and friends.  Her cave was not home to Psyche alone, but also home to a dog and to a nest of todies.  She didn't consider herself dominant among the animals, either, or special in any way.  She learned much of what she knew from animals, and she shared her food with them.  She tried to befriend every animal that lived within the lot, even if that animal did not return the favor.  Yet many of the animals surprisingly did return the favor, including a raccoon, various wandering animals, and a pack of coyotes.  The coyotes could have easily driven her away or killed her, but according to Psyche, they accepted her presence, protected her from harm, and even accepted the dog with which she had lived into their pack.
	Perhaps because of her concordance with the animals, (or perhaps it was just a natural, human quality) Psyche was in many ways like an animal.  She had thought more visually than logically.  She could easily recognize visual patterns; she could easily differentiate between slightly different species of grass, reconstruct jigsaw puzzles, and find her way through mazes.  However, she was totally unable to contemplate strategy games, such as checkers or tictactoe. Even the concept of trading was beyond her ability to grasp.  We have had more success teaching these concepts to chimpanzees than we had teaching them to Psyche.  The chimpanzees had an advantage that Psyche didn't have;  they were raised in a complex social environment, where strategy is more important. Psyche's relationships with the animals were devoid of expectations and social structures, so we postulate that the conceptual development of logic is tied directly to the development of social concepts.
	Chimpanzees also were more overtly inventive with their physical environment than Psyche was.  Chimps use simple tools, and they like to play with things.  Psyche never used tools of any kind, and she rarely handled things except to look at them or smell them.
	What Psyche lacked as a tool maker, she excelled as a story maker and visionary.  To a casual observer, she would have seemed to act instinctually, like an animal.  However, Psyche chose her actions deliberately. The animals were her mentors, and she often imitated them, but she also had a well developed sense of self. She understood the world in a completely different way from the animals.
	Her world was a spiritual and magical place, where trees liked her and gave her their fruit, insects were afraid of her and bit her, and the sun was always smiling.  Her only physical creations were drawings in the dirt.  On cloudy days, she drew pictures of the sun. She drew pictures of the dog, after her dog had died.  She generally drew pictures of whatever was not available to her.

	"Are you OK, daddy?" Psyche asked, when I paused from reading and  reeled from a sharp pain in my head.
	"Yeah," I replied when the pain subsided. "I don't think that reading makes a good cure for headaches."
	"Are you disappointed in me?" she asked. But I knew she wasn't worried about that. In fact, she was nearly asleep.  She had curled up on the couch beside me, and she was using my leg as a pillow. She was preparing to take a nap.
	"Of course not!  I'm amazed, but not disappointed.  But I'm a little embarrassed about all those checkers games you beat me at."
	Psyche giggled.  "You let me win."
	I smiled and lied. "No, you won fair and square."
	I started reading again:

	Also, unlike her animal companions, and relevant to the study of humanity, she had developed a religion.  Her faith was essentially monotheistic, but, in the later days of her isolation, we suspect that she developed a few, less important deities.  The first deity was her most enduring and adored. Originally, this deity had no gender, since Psyche had no knowledge of sex, but he was male in characteristic.  He was active, and she was passive. He was dominant, she was submissive.  He also had a human form, because this deity had a special interest in her.  Other animals may have had similar deities, but this deity was for Psyche alone. She had no metaphysical understanding of this being, and he was governed by no rules. Her thinking had been too simple to require explanations or proof, and, like anyone who wants to believe in something, she found evidence where none existed.
	He was the reason that she was never bored or lonely, because she could always communicate with him.  Since she did not have a real language, he spoke to her instead through signs in nature, which she sought out eagerly. She spoke back to him through an elaborate body language, which was much like dancing, and he could see what she was telling him from his home in the sun.
	She did not need to see him to believe in him, because the sun was too bright for her to look into.  She felt certain that the sun had eyes, or perhaps was an eye itself.
	This deity had no wrath, unlike the gods in other monotheistic religions. Her world contained little that opposed her, and when the pains of sickness or injury afflicted her, she did not blame them on her deity.  She believed that he felt her pains and sympathized. With this hope, she searched out natural signs of consolation signs that he felt her pain  and she usually found them.
	This deity was by far Psyche's most complex creation.  Because of him, she was never lonely. Throughout the day, his brightness (the sunlight) revealed to her things in nature, which were his messages to her.  At nighttime, he came to her in her dreams.  Then, when the sun was watching, she showed her appreciation in body language.
	Perhaps what was most amazing about all this communication was that it never caused her to confuse her identity with his.  If the self and the other were somehow merged, her religion would have become a psychosis. Fortunately, though, she was as sane as any devoutly religious person.
	The issue of her sanity has led to open dispute among us, but we have come to a tentative agreement.  We agree that Psyche cannot be labeled insane simply because she is not normal; normal development demands normal conditions.  We agree that any judgment of her psychological state must account for her limited knowledge.  The only true test of her mental health that we could apply was to determine whether she logically connected her experiences with her thoughts and beliefs. She passed that test. The only sane response to the overwhelming array of mysteries that she experienced was to create a deity. The only sane response to overwhelming loneliness was to create a companion, who provided her life with meaning, and who helped her understand her place in her small world.
	What most convinced us of her sanity was that she abandoned her beliefs when evidence upon evidence proved her beliefs were wrong.  She could have easily ignored the evidence, or lied to herself. That would have indicated a psychosis, as she lost herself to her beliefs.  She instead grabbed the forbidden fruit and fled from her Eden.
	The evidences that had disturbed her so were the obvious ones:
	She had witnessed the nature of death for the first time. She had seen animals that had died before, but she had never thought about what death meant or what implications it may have had.  Then, her dog died.  She was fond of the dog, and his death was quite a shock. The horror of death was now clear to her, and soon it would obsess her.
	Then, shortly after her dog's death, she had begun her mentruous cycles.  Because of her unusual diet, she had arrived at puberty late, at about the age of fourteen.  Then, her body tried to make up for lost time, and she experienced the physical changes at an accelerated rate.  Of course, this was confusing to her, and her confusion had multiplied her fears.  She watched her body change, and she watched the corpse of her dog decay.  She thought there was a connection.  She watched her dog bleed before he died, and then she watched herself bleed every month.  Again, she thought there was a connection.
	Always looking for signs in nature, she quickly discovered that she bled whenever the moon was full.  She concluded that the moon was now her deity.
	These changes in her belief system were a sign of how upset she had become.  She created new deities to serve new roles.  Her feelings of wonder and caring had created the Sun God. Then her feelings of fear and doubt created the Moon God.
	So now, with her faith in turmoil, and her body changing, and her pet dead, Psyche's "Garden of Eden" did not seem friendly anymore. The Moon God, who she now believed ruled her life, haunted the land and chased her out. She ran from him, even beyond the small lot, until she arrived at the Gulf of Mexico, and she could run no farther. She remained there for a short time, and she lived off of the fruit of many grapefruit trees.
	She did not know that the grapefruit trees were orchard trees owned by the nearby town, and that the fruit was ready for harvesting.  She only knew that there was plenty there for her to eat, and that the orchard was friendly.  When the townsfolk went into the orchard, and when they found her there, they drove her away, yelling the word "psycho". After a few such incidents, the talk spread throughout the town of the strange, dirty and naked "psycho" who was raiding the orchard.  So whenever she was seen, she was called that term.  She naturally assumed that it distinctly applied to her, so she adopted it as her name.  When we finally approached her, we preferred the name "Psyche" to "psycho," for obvious reasons, and because the name "Psyche" suggested her value to science and mankind.

	I dropped the magazine, disgusted by what I had read. Psyche was sleeping, now, and that was a good thing. 
	What had she told me about her name? It was the Greek word for butterfly.  That made her name sound beautiful. Psyche was like a butterfly, dancing in the air.  This article tried to capture her, put her in a cage of words, and even rob her of the beauty of her name.  I didn't want to know that her nomenclators had thought she was crazy.  I wasn't sure that I wanted to read any more.
	She was my daughter, now.  She was a good friend, an eager worker, a freethinking nymphet, and an excellent base stealer.
	And she looked so vulnerable when she was asleep.
	I kept reminding myself who Psyche really was, then I continued reading:

	Psyche's first encounters with human beings had been profitless, but news of her presence had spread to neighboring towns.  She quickly became a local legend, not unlike the legends of Big Foot or Loch Ness monster.
	At that time, I (Antonio Sordino) had been hired to work with the towns in the area and prepare the way for a new highway already under constructed. The town folk thought I was an official who had come to deal with the wild girl. They complained about the psycho who was stealing from their orchard, and they peaked my curiosity.  I set out to look for her. I expected to find a destitute child, perhaps a runaway.  After viewing her for a few hours from about fifty yards away, I knew she was not just a patient for a social worker. But I didn't know until several days later just how special she was.
	Then I had to decide what to do with her. She did not belong in an orphanage, where no one could study her. And she did not belong in a laboratory, where she would never grow.  I decided that she belonged right where she was, in her element, where she could adjust as she grew, and where scientists could study her and the world she grew up in.
	I gathered together a team of scientists, including a child psychologist, a behavioral psychologist, a geographer and a cultural anthropologist.
	We were all anxious to study Psyche, but we agreed to act patiently.  We did not want to shock or confuse her, so we agreed that only one of us would make initial contact. At first we observed her from a distance, and occasionally I would walk out to where she was. She avoided me, but she was soon accustomed to my presence. Eventually she followed me back to our campsite, and she started living among us. We built two cabins, and set up a permanent residence.
	Here, we regarded her meticulously, and we taught her simple things, including a modest understanding of English, how to dress properly, and social manners.  She learned at an astounding rate, overcoming every prediction made for her that insisted her social and intellectual growth would be gradual; these projections had been based on the analysis of previous studies of feral youth in similar situations.  But these projections were too conservative, as they tried too hard to find historical precedents.  These projections ignored that this was the first case of its kind in 150 years, and that our capacity to understand and teach has been immensely increased.  We also ignored that her psychological development was far more intricate than was found in any previous case.
	While our predictions had been conservative, our studies were not.  Many scientists suggested that we try to replicate experiments that were done in the past, in order to test their findings. But feral children are such scarce resources that we felt that replicating past experiments was a waste of time. Science knew almost nothing about these special children. Psyche was already confounding our expectations, and we needed to generate ideas. We believed that no adequate methods had been already built, and we needed to start building from scratch.
	At first we decided to move slowly, afraid that rapid exposure to the civilized world would cause her to withdraw from it.  But soon we discovered that she was afraid of her old life, now that her Sun God was gone, and there was no place for her to go back to.  She was eager to learn, and she was eager to be introduced to society.  So we accelerated her exposure.
	At first, the only people invited to visit with her were scientists, but we agreed that we would not act like scientists.  We would try to communicate with her, and we would play games with her, but we would not overtly experiment on her. Ultimately, we did decide to do a few standard tests that are typically performed on children, but we decided that in general we would learn best in a sociable environment.  
	Psyche responded exceptionally to the social exposure. She was always trying to please us by mimicking our gestures, learning new words, and adapting her crude behavior to our behavior.
	Three years after we started the project, we invited the townsfolk who had discovered her to see "the psycho" that had once raided their orchard, and they were dumbfounded by the pretty, polite young lady that greeted them.
	The project had been an unqualified success, until the fourth year.
	At some point during our fourth year with Psyche, her attitude towards us changed.  The change did not happen in a day or in a week, and we do not know what caused it.  Psyche grew frustrated with us, and we had trouble teaching her anything new. She began to wander often, avoiding people, and resisting whatever plans we made for her. We were not worried at first, and we found her assertion of her independence interesting. We accepted it as a new stage in her development. But soon her quest for independence turned more aggressive. When we tried to tell her anything, she treated us with contempt. She was sinking into a depressed state.  She wandered about for days, and she even openly ran from us.
	We were losing control of her, and we didn't know why. We tried to refocus our attentions. First, we tried to just listen to what she had to say without interjection; when she stopped talking, we encouraged her to continue; we thought that she might need to assert her independence in words.
	But after only a short time of listening, the real problem became all too clear: Psyche was becoming psychotic.
	Psyche had reinvented the theology that she had chosen before to abandon. This theology had been created originally by a sane mind, putting a confusing world into some kind of order. Now, her theology had no meaning, and it defied logic, yet she insisted on its truth.
	Even Psyche could see that what she had once believed was foolish in the light of what she now knew. But her beliefs had evolved, raising them to a higher level that synthesized her new knowledge into her beliefs. Again, the Sun God was her primary deity.
	When she had lived alone in the woods, the Sun God had been a useful fantasy; he had been her explanation to all mysteries, and her companion in a solitary world. This fantasy had been a level above the imaginary companions dreamed up by many children, because Psyche had tied every truth and belief she had to him.
	But, painful as the loss must have been for her, her theology was an obsolete paradigm. Now that she knew about the real world, and how things really were, her continuing faith in her old beliefs could only hinder her when dealing with her new friends and with reality. She withdrew to a companion who was easier to deal with than people were, leaving no reason for her to socialize. Her deity was the answer to all questions, leaving her no need for curiosity. He was not a useful dream, anymore; he was a delusion.
	Strange as this may sound, the very nature of this psychosis was valuable to us. Examining how and why she resisted abandoning her deity sheds light on the development of religious beliefs. Her struggle lent new insight on the synthesis of knowledge and faith in the face of conflict.
	For example, when she had lived a solitary life, her coexistence with her deity was like a close marriage or a romance; they were in complete union. Now, she could not reconcile such a coexistence with her new knowledge of the world. But she knew that human biology and human relationships had analogous unions (sexual unions, and romantic or friendly unions), so she gave her deity a male sexuality. This gave him a distinctly human characteristic. Psyche did not even realize that her deity had evolved, because we had always referred to the Sun God as a "he", and because we had described his attributes as "male".
	Other changes were also unconscious or denied. The Sun God had communicated with her through signs in nature, which she, in her ignorance, had interpreted as having had some special significance. But she had learned while she was with us the true natures of these signs. She learned that a flower blooms to reproduce. Clouds are just water in the sky. And menstruation has nothing to do with the moon. She had believed all of these truths, and she had surrendered her beliefs.
	But eventually her memory clouded. Her early beliefs mixed with our later teachings. She now believed that her companion never spoke to her in just natural signs, but that he spoke to her in a complete language that she could no longer understand. This language was unlike English, and it did not use sounds, but Psyche could not explain it more clearly. She knew only that her companion, the Sun God, spoke this language, and she was determined to learn it, again. Of course, learning it again was impossible, because she never really knew it; it never existed in the first place. We could not disprove this desperate rationalization, so her resilient imagination achieved a hollow victory.
	Her understanding of the nature of death gave us yet another example of faith synthesizing with knowledge. We had the unfortunate duty to tell her about dying. We told her of its inevitability and its senselessness. Death was contrary to her theology. Her Sun God had always been her happiness, never her pain. So she blamed the fate of death on herself, instead of on her Sun God, because she had left him and his protection, and she had surrendered herself to the Moon Godthe cause of death.
	Psyche decided if she could reunite with the Sun God, somehow remember his language, then she wouldn't have to die. Nothing we could say would convince her otherwise.
	But we were hopeful. She was willing to reason with us, and we thought that the light of reason would prevail. We explained to her that she could not reunite with her deity, because her Sun God now had a human form. He could no longer dwell in the sun, because she now knew what the sun was. He had to be a man who she could seenot merely a ghost. He had to speak to her in some chimerical language that she did not know. And finally, he had to be everything she remembered him to be. Logically, these things could not happen, but Psyche insisted that they must.
	So she set out in search of him, hoping without chance that her companion, deity, and now lover, would return to her.
	She disappeared into the vast Everglades in April of this year. Evidence suggests that she had visited her former cave home, but she was there only briefly. A thorough manhunt is currently in effect, even as this article is going to print. But we have no leads.
	Maybe by this final desperate act, Psyche has demonstrated another human truth: people return desperately to the values of their youth, like salmon return to their spawning place.  People will fight all obstacles, even logic, just as salmon will die trying to swim up a waterfall, to reach their destination.
	Good luck, Psyche.  We hope your destination is all you hope it will be.

                                      A.S.

	I dropped the magazine on the table beside the couch.  The magazine knocked an empty beer can off the table, and it struck the floor with a loud clink. Psyche shifted, and then was just as peaceful as before.
	When she slept alone, Psyche awoke at the drop of a pin. But as Phil and I both knew, she could sleep through a gunfight when she was with someone. That was just one of many things I had taken for granted about Psycheone of many things that just didn't make sense in the light of what I had just read.
	I was grateful for my view into Psyche's past. She had been afraid that I wouldn't understand, or that I look at her with more curiosity than caring. But the only thing that has changed is that now I could respect her more. She had overcome unbelievable odds, and she had fought for what she believed in. I have to give credit to Drs Sordino and company for making Psyche's birth on Hollo Island possible, and I had give credit to them for explaining what Psyche could never explain herself.  But the rest of the credit goes to Psyche, for being the butterfly caught in a cage, for being the song that keeps on singing.
	Sordino was Psyche's father before me.  He had given her cold knowledge and showed her her place in a cold world. She was his prize and acheivement.
	But I was her father now, and I knew her better than Sordino ever did. She was not psychotic. She was like me; she was a dreamer. She needed a warm world, with caring friends. She needed a place to grow from the inside.
	And she needed someone like me, someone who needed a daughter.
	I shook her shoulder gently.
	She slowly sat up from her nap, and then she looked at me expectantly.
	I didn't know what to tell her. I just took her hand in mine.
	And then she smiled.
	"I want to eat with the island, today," I said, as I tried to stand up. My leg was numb from the weight of Psyche's sleeping head. "I'll need to organize something, just in case Officer Penny comes back better prepared."
	I felt a little dizzy, but I accepted Psyche's support, and we stepped out of the dark cabin, into the summer's sun.Joe

	While ambling down the long path, I hearkened to the music of the stillness. Silence sings and enchanting melody. The music reached a crescendo whenever the winds brushed against the treetops above and enveloped me, its receptive audience, as I walked along my path below. This was music in its primal form.
	I stood under the stars that peeked through the cloth of night, and the full moon that glared down upon the Reach. I stood within the acres of maize, which rustled in the wind, as if singing a hymn to my farmer's ears.
	I closed my eyes, and let the rhythm of Nature become the rhythm of my heart. I held the hand of Nature in my hand, in the form of an ear of corn. I was at peace . . .
	When, very unexpectedly, a sour note violated Nature's gentle symphony.
	First, I heard someone rustling and whispering from beyond the trees. A moment later, an ear peircing siren erased the silence. A dozen members of the Youth League leaped from their hiding places. They appeared, barely visible in the dim moonlight, from trees in front of me, from the corn stalks to my right, and from the bushes to my left. They surrounded me, their unwitting adversary.
	Now, don't get me wrong. I love kids. But these kids have been after me for a week, and I was begining to get annoyed.
	The attacks had begun when Freddy Andle introduced his pupils to the novel Tom Sawyer, and the kids learned about that novel's villian, Injun Joe. Everyone on the island knows that I am an American Indian, and, by coincidence, I had chosen Joe Bradley for my English name. It was only a matter of time before the Youth League came after me. I was suddenly a blood-thirsty savage to their young eyes.
	Tonight's attack was their third attack on me, and I've finally figured out what they expected and wanted me to do. I was amazed at their persistance, and their faith in me was almost as touching as it was frustrating. Until now, their attacks have caught me completely unprepared.  The first time, I tried to make a joke out of the situation, saying, "Oh my! I've been captured by the Little Rascals."  Many islanders compared the "Youth League" to Our Gang; the kids didn't know who Our Gang was, but they resented the comparison all the same. The second time they attacked, I just raised my hands in the air, and I let them capture me.  I didn't understand why at the time, but I had spoiled their fun.
	They wanted Injun Joe. They wanted a blood thirsty Indian who wouldn't  think twice about killing a kid. They wanted someone to be afraid of and to tell exciting stories about. Fortunately, they gave me one more chance. . .
	Doug stepped into the circle of warriors, aimed a flashlight directly into my face, thus blinding me. "Surrendah oh die, Injun Joe!" he exclaimed, with enthusiasm that died hard. "Deyah's no escape!"
	The other leaguers seemed less hopeful. I was just a big party pooper to them, and they were probably already thinking of 
who else to add to the League's hit list.
	But I caught their attention when I raised my hand over my head. In the darkness, the ear of corn must have looked like a weapon. Their hearts must've raced when I clapped my other hand over my mouth in a classic Injun war whoop.
	The leaguers were stunned, but when I took a step towards them, they took off through the trees, heading at full speed for the Reach, their haven.
	I figured I was safe from attack until at least tomorrow, when I would have to perform another act. Maybe I would employ an "ancient Indian curse", or a zombie act. I just hoped for their sake that they attacked at night, because I have a far less frightening face in the daylight.
	As the children ran screaming in excitement, I thought about how odd it was that they were up playing this late at night, nearly midnight. Normally, they'd be asleep at around nine or ten o'clock on a summer night, yet they were having tons of fun, unsupervised, running wild about the island. This was a very strange ending to a very strange day.
	Today was an island holiday--so declared by Chuck, and it was being capped by a party that would end tonight at nearly two in the morning at Victoria's home. Almost every adult was there right now, drinking a bit too much, while their children were partying in their own way. Tomorrow (Sunday), the excesses of today would take their toll on the islanders, as they would sleep until noon, and then gather together as one big hung-over crowd to watch the hung-over fishermen try to play the weekly game of baseball.
	As much as I disapproved of drinking to excess, I agreed that today warranted special reflection. Two centuries ago, a man climbed the Reach and stood on top of it (or so the legend goes). The exact day is not known, but the time of month is almost certain. Since this was the island's only important legend--the single person and event that all islanders felt akin to--we all felt it was worthy of a celebration.
	And this was no small celebration! The heartfelt preparation, the many hours of volunteer work, and the wealth removed from the island's collection, was the community's voice, saying: Yes, this is a great day! Few celebrations in the past could match it--not even Thanksgiving Day, which itself packs a good punch, but the same punch every year. Earlier tonight, at twilight, volleys of fireworks exploded over the ocean. At dinner time, exotic foods and wines and lagers were at every table. And Victoria's house and the docks were transformed into a wonderous place of amusement and dance and joy.
	When I saw all this and much more, I escaped as quickly as I could into my familiar, friendly gardens. I felt uncomfortable at parties--especially wild parties with lots of drinking, lots of passion, and very few rules. I liked order in my life. I lived a life of discipline, and I learned to rely on discipline for my happiness. Sometimes, people need to relax and loosen up, but whenever I saw people acting with abandon, I felt that they were inviting danger.
	Maybe I was too disciplined. I still awoke just after 
sunrise every summer morning; I still sought my meaning in life almost exclusively in my labors; I still went to sleep every night shortly after dinner time. Some people thought I was crazy to work so many hours, especially at my advanced age. They didn't understand how meaningful my work was for me, and how it comforted me to live this way.
	Farming was my life since I was child, and discipline was the farmer's master. Discipline was not our master's punishment; discipline was a reward. With bare fingers, I had planted corn, pressing the seed into the soil. Even today I planted in the same way, though I knew of more efficient ways. But my fingers wished to touch the earth, and to deny my fingers that pleasure would make my work meaningless. To embed a seed into the Earth improperly was the same as stealing her bounty--stealing what she'd most happily give. My disciplines remained even long after the tribe that taught them to me had disappeared into the dominant society. They remain because the Earth still remains, and the Spirit still lives despite civilization's attempts to put out its fire wherever it might be found, whether in the depths of a soul or in the connecting space between two souls, or in the whole of creation.
	And my disciplines found a new sacred ground Hollo Island. Discipline allowed me to hear the island's music, beat my heart to the island's own heart beat, and welcome the Spirit's peace within me.
	So why was it so hard to keep to my disciplines today? I should have been asleep several hours ago. I couldn't even relax here in my gardens, as my heart seemed to drift away from my body. There seemed to be something wrong with the air today, and I couldn't breathe easily. 
	As I walked, I was drifting, searching for something, and I came upon the intersection where the island's three roads met. The Circle to my right led to and revolved around the small, clear water pond near the Reach, and the Broken Road, also to my right and forking towards the west, led in a planless zig-zagging pattern to the sea. The Long Road led before me through the midst of the gardens to the Reach. Or it led to the celebration at Victoria's house.
	I took that path last mentioned. As I neared the point where the path terminated at the  jetty, the error in my wandering was made clear to me, yet I kept on walking. The symphony of silence became a clamor of random noises. I was affronted by excessively loud laughter, chairs being moved with a drunkard's care, and the steady beat of distorted music from an overtaxed amplifier. A floodlight poured down from a tree, spraying light off of the shiny table tops and the party decorations. Only my sense of smell was unoffended; overwhelming the smell of alcohol were the sea breezes and the pine and the prepared foods lending themselves to the air.
	As I walked about the site, I felt out-of-place, but I took some comfort in conceit, as everyday at twilight, I believed that I threw a feast superior to this very expensive one. The food cooked at the cooking house was island produce, adding something special to its flavor. When people ate the food, they felt a 
sense of pride and gratitude. And the Reach stood dependably before us, while this party was being held on the opposite side of the island (which, considering the occasion being celebrated, seemed to me most perverse.)
	I realized that I had no business here, except that for my own state of mind, I needed some company right now.
	Then, drawing me from my detached state, a hand fell on my shoulder, and I spun around to see the man it belonged to. He was a very drunk Ed Cheene. "Hello, fellow worker," he greeted. "It's great to have a break like this, now 'n then, huh? We really earned our beer. See these guys?" he gestured to his friends, teasingly. "They party every day, all day, and all night. What a bunch of lazy bums!"
	I was amazed that Ed was comparing himself to me. I guessed he saw me as just another hard worker, but we worked hard for entirely different reasons.
	Ed just wanted a steady beat in the chaos of his life. He planted his feet firmly in his place, allowing his feet to root there even though the sun never shone upon that ground.
	But I never felt that way. I felt that my work was like a lonely melody in the overall symphony that nature composed. My melody had its own special place, and the Spirit of the whole symphony spred itself before me and captured my full attention.
	I wanted to tell Ed about that, and maybe he could find his own lonely melody, but I knew I couldn't do anything for him. So I just patted him on the shoulder and baffled him by saying, "Yep! What miserable lives. I can only say, I'll be glad come monday."
	Ed stepped away from me, confused by what I'd said, and then he was lost with his friends again.
	Only three years ago, I had a lot of respect for Ed. He had divided his time evenly between work and family, and his only desire in his work was to serve the community.
	But now he had looked at the Reach for so long that he forgot its challenges. He pretended that he had climbed it, and now he was giving others advice on what steps to take. But he didn't even know what it meant to climb the Reach. He was neither for nor against what was being celebrated today.
	Maybe no one understood what the Reach stood for anymore, or was comforted by its presence. When I looked around me, I suddenly saw how anxious everyone was feeling as they celebrated. Maybe everyone felt the same disillusion that I was feeling today. Maybe they had been feeling it for much longer. They had lost their sense of beauty, and they felt that their hearts were beating alone, issolated from other hearts.
	This contagion of disquiet frightened me. I had sensed it before, many years ago on the reservation when feelings of disillusion tore my tribe from our disciplines. We fancied that society held something better for us, so we gave up everything we had. I felt the same kind of disquiet today, and this kind of disquiet sets things quickly in motion.
	What the island needed wasn't movement but patience, because the island has lost its center. Patience is the treatment for a soul that has lost its center, because if the soul moves, it can 
only wander further away from the center and become totally lost. Patience and hope always finds the center.
	The voice of the center was unmistakable to me, speaking the words of the mountain and the trees -- not of the winds that come from and lead to nowhere. But I knew that my friends would hear whichever words they wanted to hear.
	As I wandered near the house, the porch door opened, and out stepped the hostess herself. Victoria picked me out from the crowd and came up beside me.
	"Hello, Vicky," I said.
	"Welcome to my humble dwelling, Joe. I didn't really expect you to come by here at all, so happy as you are with the simple cabins and the trees. I just assumed that you think of my home as a slum or a tenement or something," she said, her words carefully calculated. We don't hate each other, but we often talk as if we do. We only seem to be able to enjoy each other's company when we argue, so we make sure we argue well.
	"I do," I replied, "but a walk through a slum helps me realize the good things I have."
	Suddenly, she spoke in a grave tone. "What do you really think of the party?"
	I almost replied again with sarcasm, but I noticed that this was not the usual Victoria, despite her pretense of nonchalance. Her eyes let on nothing, nor did her hard smile, but her voice had softened slightly, and she clasped her hands together when she'd normally be gesturing with them. So I reconsidered my reply. "Well, the party looks very well planned, but, as you know, it's not really my style."
	She was still clasping her hands, so I offered: "Besides, I could use a day off from work, now and then, and its nice to see someone else throw a party for a change."
	"How long will you be here?"
	"Just a few minutes. I'm dead tired and too old to miss my sleep."
	"You're not too old," she said kindly.
	"Thanks." I said, stunned by her good vein. "It's nice to see you getting what you want for a change."
	She nodded. "But you'd rather this was being held at the cooking house, wouldn't you?"
	"No," I lied. "It would be too much work."
	She flashed me a skeptical look but said nothing.
	"Is Chuck here?" I asked.
	"No. He came by but left in a hurry, " she said bitterly. "And Charlie has a way of taking people with him wherever he goes. He's trying to ruin this party."
	"Oh, I doubt it." I said, taken a bit off guard. I now understood her present, vulnerable sentiment: Charles had finally broken free of her control. During the past few months, after his injury, Charles had given up his will to hers, and Victoria never felt a qualm about taking advantage of his situation. That was one reason reason why this party was being held at her house tonight. I never really understood how Victoria could love Charles and want to control his life. Charles had only recently begun to pull himself back together. Yesterday, he had confessed 
to me that he was ashamed that he had let himself become so emotionally weak. I told him that being weak during an illness was understandable, but his real mistake was choosing for his company someone who could profit from his weakness.
	The porch door opened once again, and Mary Cheene joined Victoria and me.
	"Hello, Mary," I said, as I looked her over. I hadn't seen her in nearly a month, which is a long time on Hollo Island. It seems especially long, considering that we have worked together two or three hours every day for several years at the cooking house. She was dressed attractively in a tight yellow dress, and she sported a perfectly sculpted hairdo. Her blonde hair fell down perfectly strait, as is popular among oriental women, but it curled in at the ends, where her blonde hairs glowed red. I swear she looked ten years younger.
	"Hi, Joe," she said with a smile, as she caught me admiring her.
	But I wasn't the kind of person who compliments a woman on her appearance, even when I'm truly impressed. "New kid must be keepin' ya busy, stayin' away from ya old job as ya've been. Where are the little lungs?"
	"He's asleep right inside. Been great all day, hahdly even a whimpah. He's been so good, I've been gettin' worred, but I guess if he was gettin sick, he wouldn't be smiling all the time."
	"Well, come by sometimes. The kid oughtta know where he'll be eating some day. Don't want him to starve into skin an' bones just 'cause he don't know where to find some food."
	As I spoke, Mary's flashed a glance in Victoria's direction, and her open eyes closed up, as if to say, There's something you don't know, and I don't want to want to tell you.
	I pretended I didn't see her expression, and I continued, "You know, we've had some problems up there with the food, what with all the help takin' days off and your replacement, Psyche, not wanting to touch the meat and fish. But on the plus side, she's good with the salads and a real help in the garden. So things are in a little disorder, and we miss you down there, but everything will work out."
	"And speakin' of Psyche, have you seen her around? She's not at her cabin or at Phil's."
	Again, Mary flashed a glance at Victoria, then she informed me. "We aren't really friends any more."
	Suddenly, I wished that I was somewhere else. I never quite understood the female version of fighting. The gentle sex, as I know it, fights mostly cold wars. Instead of striking out or cursing, as men often do, women debase the treasures entrusted to them by the other, displaying the remains publicly. A woman's cold shoulder can hit as hard as a fist.
	Psyche wanted no part of this, I suspect. This kind of fighting was probably especially painful to her, because she lacked the emotional calluses that protects most people from this kind of aggression. She had only just learned how to be intimate, 
and she probably didn't even realize how dangerous trust can be.
	Suddenly, crashing through this tense moment, a very bright light bathed the area. I looked up to see the source, and I was shocked to see the old lighthouse shining brightly for the first time. My heart stopped for a moment. Two hundred years ago, the lighthouse shined dimly from a flame, but today the source was electricity, and it was blinding in its new, resurrected form.
	The beam of light, which was at first focused down upon the three of us, now was adjusted so that it panned back and forth over the ocean.
	"Well," Victoria broke the silence. "Freddy and Ed said they could do it for tonight. I must admit, I had given up hope."
	Mary replied, "They had it ready on Friday. Ya din' hahve ta worry."
	"Why did they wait until tonight?" I asked.
	"We thought that since we were celebrating the island's past, tonight, turning the lighthouse back on tonight would be a great way to celebrate." Victoria replied.
	I wondered which part of the past they were celebrating--the island had a complicated history. Were they celebrating the founding of the island by a wealthy slave dealer, or his servant who climbed the Reach? Were they celebrating every islanders' individual pasts on the mainland? Or were they celebrating the community's birth twenty years ago?
	No, if they wanted to celebrate the past, they would have lit a flame in the lighthouse. If they wanted to celebrate the community's ideals, they would have celebrated at the Reach. They were not seeking a renewal of the island's purpose, faith and unity. They wanted rapid change.
	I think they were trying to celebrate the future--a different future. They made this party extra flashy, extra expensive, to make the islanders dissatisfied with their simple lives.  Mary was dressed at her very best to make other women envious, and want what she has.
	I then left the party in a hurry. I had not found at the party what I was looking for. My need to find someone who still believed in something real and enduring was even stronger than before.
	My old legs ached as I pressed them to move me down the Long Road. I tried to focus my thoughts on something reassuring. I stared at a tree that reached its autumn early, and most of its leaves had already fallen. Through the cadre of the tree's branches, my eyes followed a single, bright star, as I walked below.
	Once again, I was back in the gardens. Again, I looked upon the moonlit acres of cornstalks and the star-crowned oaks and maple trees. I felt peace in my heart again, as I rediscovered truths that are alive and expressing themselves in Nature. Peace was lulling my very tired body to sleep, so I prepared to finally call it a night and walk home.
	I paused at the narrow stream that ran from the Reach to the pond at the center of the island, when I saw a small black stone shining brightly from the moonlight. I manouevred the stone between my fingers, and I thought about something that Chuck's daughter had told me a few weeks ago: "A little round rock can be so wonderful to touch or look at or to hold that its scary." I didn't know what she had meant, but now, looking at that stone, I understood completely. I felt that by looking at that stone, I was looking into my soul. And both seemed so empty.
	I sat by that stream for a long time, and my eyes gradually were adjusted to the darkness. I could now see shapes that were just blackness before in the shadowy night, if I just stared at one spot long enough. 
	The spot I chose to look at was about fifty paces away, where a mysterious object stood erect between myself and the Reach. It was triangular in shape, and it appeared like a small Reach eclipsing it's larger self.  I looked at it longer, trying to see more details. I expected that if I looked at it long enough, I'd learn that it was just a sheet wrapped over a bush, or maybe a large board placed at an odd angle. When waiting didn't tell me what the object was, my curiousity forced me to stand and explore. After taking just a few steps, I thought I recognized what I saw, but I just couldn't believe it. No, I told myself, you are just being too romantic! But as I stepped nearer, and I could see the object more clearly, I could no longer doubt the distinctive shape and markings of a plains Indian's tepee.
	Awed and inspired, I stopped and stood several paces away. Although my tribe had traditionally lived in longhouses and wigwams, our reservation also harbored some plains people, who had brought with them tepees just like the one now standing before me half a century later. I circled the tepee once and sighed at the flood of memories. I failed to notice that this apparition was much smaller than it should be. Instead, I was transported with a smile to special moments in my past--to a sundance that I participated in as a teenager, to a ceremony for the corn-maiden, and to my first and only ride on a horse.
	Reality came back to me in a hurry when I touched the fabric of the tepee. It was made from nylon cloth. I looked closer and saw that it was supported by metal tubes.  I found a tag on surface that read: MADE IN USA. I almost laughed out loud. I was a little disappointed, but I was very happy to relive those memories.
	The entrance to the tepee was a flap that could be conveniently shut tight with a zipper, but it hung loose. I turned the flap fully away to look inside. All I could see in the near absolute blackness was a single, sleeping form. I could smell a woman's perfume. It must be Psyche, I thought. I didn't think that Psyche ever wore perfume, but she was the only woman I could imagine in this peculiar setting.
	I stepped inside the tepee for a better look, and I was assured of her identity. Resting beside her on a sleeping bag were a flashlight, and lantern, and two walkie-talkies. They were like fingerprints, telling me that she had been with kids not very long ago. The kids probably abandoned her because they wanted to be at home in bed before their parents returned home from the party.
	Psyche did not stir when I sat in the tepee-like tent beside her. I thought that I was making a lot of noise, as I moved around with neither light nor space, yet she slept serenely on. I had heard that Psyche had been a very light sleeper in her wild childhood, and that she would snap awake at the sound of a pin dropping on a table -- or, more likely, an acorn dropping on the ground. I was amazed that she could be almost comatose, now. I brushed her hair away from her mouth. She stirred in her sleep, but did not wake up. I smiled and let her sleep on while I sat quietly beside her.
	To many Islanders, Psyche and I were exotic people of Nature. We had very different backgrounds: I came from a culture that lives according to Nature's principles, while Psyche was actually raised by Nature. But we have both seen our ways of living and beliefs turned upside down, and that common pain bonded us. We shared thoughts that we don't share with anyone else, and we talked about very spiritual things. Of course, and old man like me could not understand what being a young woman was like, and Psyche could not understand what a lifetime of working in fields was like, either. But we both knew the shock of being violently torn from the lives we knew as children. We both needed sympathy to control an anger and bitterness that other Islanders just didn't understand.
	I rarely talked to people about my past, because when people learned about the trajedy, they couldn't understand what I went through. They had a category for people like me; I was a victim. They didn't understand anything else.
	I was born and raised an Indian on a reservation harboring (or imprisoning, as some viewed it) two very different tribes. We were very poor and crowded, but we were alive and living our lives much as our ancestors lived theirs. Our land was worthless, but it was our land.
	Then we found out that our dry, nearly barren land was very valuable indeed. It was the perfect place to build a railroad. It was really the only good place to build a very particular railroad, and the company that wanted to build it was willing to pay handsomely for it. The two tribes that had struggled together to maintain their traditional lifestyles were suddenly at odds. The barren land was sacred to the Iroquois tribe, and they were content living as they were. They were rich in tradition. But the Plains tribe had no ties to the land, and they had already lost their traditional ways. They felt poverty on many levels. They desperately wanted to improve their lives, and money was the easiest way to do that.  I was very young and I didn't understand what was happening at the time, but I saw a seemingly happy community slowly turn violently on each other. Eventually, the government stepped in and took the land from us, because we couldn't peacefully resolve the issue. One tribe wanted money, the other wanted land, but in the end, both tribes lost everything.
	I never knew what happened to my friends. We were scattered to various towns and cities in the midwest, where we didn't know how to survive. My mother died in the first year from pneumonia, while we were working on a large farm in Illinois, and then my father left to find work in Chicago. I never saw him again, nor heard about his fate. I worked on that farm for twenty years, 
trying to educate myself in my new culture, but always feeling dead inside.  Finally, my self education brought me to the University of Massachusetts, where I hoped to study agriculture. Instead, I met a senior at Amherst College named Charles McNeill, and my life instantly turned around.
	When I told people this story, some called me a victim of society. That was a very popular label at UMASS. I didn't like being labeled like that, but if I had a choice of labels, I would have prefered survivor.
	I could understand why Psyche kept even from me her now famous story. Who could really understand what it meant to be a child of Nature, or a guinea pig of the social sciences? Now, Psyche was known by many such anecdotes. Charles destroyed the magazine article, as Psyche wished, but he couldn't destroy the thousands of magazines telling her story in every major library. Newton, ever eager to open the door on other peoples' lives, filled every breakfast and evening with tasty appetizers. Soon, Psyche was just a curiousity to many islanders, and was the butt of a new brand of joke. One islander actually followed her around to take pictures of her, hoping he could make money off of them, before a furious Chuck destroyed the camera. Very few people were interested enough in her to become her friend; they were more interested in facts about her than moments with her.
	Yet despite everything, she didn't change who she was. She was stronger than many people thought she was. While her history was once a closed book, she displayed her feelings almost recklessly, even after being hurt many times in the past month. For her close friends, she still had the courage for intimacy even after iconoclasts had torn her sacred places down. She trusted us to help her build them back up again, while she built bridges into our hearts.	
	Like all of her friends, I had a special role in her life. We looked to each other for understanding about Nature. I saw Nature through an Indian upbringing and through Western culture. She viewed Nature as its child, and her intense passion for Nature was stronger than mine, yet she looked to me to interpret Nature's language for her. She told me that she didn't trust her own feelings about Nature, and I don't think she felt comfortable with any knowledge that only she possessed. So she looked into my religion and rituals to fill the gaps in her own beliefs.
	She was a good teacher, too. When Psyche first started helping me in the gardens, I watched her curiously as she gave special attention to every tree, every bird, and even to the dirt. I inquired, and she replied, "I want to make friends with this place, so it will accept me." This sounded strange to me at first, but then I realized that I felt almost exactly the same way when I first came to the island and started to work on the new land. I felt like a stranger to the fields for a long time.
	Psyche was a good worker in the field--surprisingly good when you consider that she had never worked a day in her life before. She enjoyed working outside, even in the rain and mud, even getting down on her knees to pull weeds. I expected her passion to wear off. Many people find the simplicity of touching Mother Earth and her fruit refreshing for a while, then they tire 
of the blisters and the dirt. Psyche surprised me, because farming actually meant something to her. She worked hard most of the day, and now she was possibly the best farm hand I had.
	She had arrived on Hollo Island when I was planting the second crop of corn, and she was actively involved in the crop's growth every step of the way. She felt a kinship with the corn and the tomatoes and the beans, and now as we were harvesting the crops, she felt as if her own flesh was being harvested to nourish the island. She didn't want to eat the corn. She had worked so hard to raise it, she just wanted to let the corn grow. But I told her that the corn would die soon anyway, but if we ate it, it would live on as a part of us. She liked that idea very much, and in just a few days, she had turned the idea into a kind of gospel. While we harvested the corn, she talked constantly about how the island would feast on her body and suck out her juices. This incited a wave of jokes from the other farm hands, who rightly saw the eroticism in her gospel, but none of us understood how edifying her new belief was for her. Harvest time changed from a trajedy to an ecstasy. She finally overcame her awkward feelings towards the fishermen and the butcher; they were not killers; they were preparing the sacrificed flesh for a new life. The ugliness of death changed into beauty and passion.
	So while other farm hands tired of the hard work, and complained of monotony, Psyche was increasing devoted to it. For her, the farm was a drama of love, in which life reached up to the sun, and the heavens returned gifts of light, warmth and rain.
	As I saw quietly in the nylon tepee, I watched a glow creep, as the sun began to rise. It was dawn, when I usually awake, but now my eyelids were very heavy. I would greet the sun before I went to bed. I would wait until the sun surmounted the Reach, then I would succumb to my exhaustion. Today was one of those few days that comes every late spring and early autumn when the sun climbs the Reach from behind in the east and emerges in glory from the peak. These were special days, and were it not for the late night party at Victoria's house, most of the island would rise early just to look out their windows and watch. It was a crime that last night's feast wasn't held this morning, in anticipation of this wonder--the legend told that that the ascension occured at sunrise!
	I had stop getting angry over this, but I just couldn't ignore the incongruity of it all!
	Just then, I felt a hand touch my leg. I hadn't noticed Psyche waking up. She blinked away the sleep and smiled at me. "Hello, Joe," she said, having fun with the words.
	"Good morning, pretty lady. I see you've slept well."
	She glanced around. "Where's the league?"
	"Cackled off, I guess. Their heads will roll, I assure you! What a crew of cowards, abandoning a sleeping maiden to the monsters of Hollo Island. Fortunately, that's when I came along."
	Psyche laughed beautifully, and I felt that with her smile blessing me, casting away the demons in my heart, I might finally find sleep, soon.
	She rolled over and sat up. She shook the over-sized green sweater she wore, to smooth the wrinkles. Her hair was in her eyes, so she tossed it back over her shoulders without a fuss. I wondered it I would recognize her if she ever set those waves and tamed the stray hairs.
	Finally, satisfied with her appearance, which was becoming more important to her, she smiled at me and looked me in the eyes. Her smile wavered a bit, as she noticed through the twilight the rings around my eyes. "What is wrong?"
	I shook my head. "Nothing, really. I'm tired, couldn't sleep last night."
	Her persistent gaze perceived the truth. "Because of the party," she said, and I nodded. "Daddy didn't like that, too.  He was talking about another party here in the morning. He said we could have a breakfast party. But then he said no, because he thought Victoria would be angry."
	I nodded. "She would."
	"So he did the right thing?"
	"Maybe," I shrugged. "I don't know."
	We sat uncomfortably for a moment, both knowing that everything about last night was wrong, but neither of us wanted to talk about it.
	Psyche abruptly changed the subject by glancing outside and asking, "Have you seen Pudgy?"
	"Your pup wasn't here when I came."
	She stuck her head through the tepee's entrance, and she yelled out a loud ululation that sounded like a harsh bird call, then she sat down again. Catching my shocked expression, she explained, "Pudgy always comes when I do that. I didn't even teach him."
	"Really? How did you find out? It's not a sound you hear every day."
	Psyche blushed under her blush proof skin (you had to know her to see the glow underneath). She didn't answer my question, and instead changed the subject again. "I've got a present for you," she said while searching the tepee, and then under the blanket.
	"You expected for me to come here?" I asked.
	"Yep," she replied, still searching, "but not so early. You always come to the gardens in the morning."
	When she finally found what she was looking for, she sat down again. She was holding a small cloth pouch, which was pulled shut with a draw string. She opened the pouch and withdrew a corncob pipe, which she had apparently made by herself. The pouch was also filled with cornmeal, and she indelicately jounced the pipe in the air to free it from the powder. Then she presented the pipe to me with a wide grin of satisfaction.
	I touched it gently, though it seemed solid enough. She had carved on the stem the english letters rendering my tribal name, which approximately means Laughing Stream.
	"I made sure no one saw the name on it," she reassured me with a hopeful smile. Psyche was the only person I had trusted with my Indian name; even Chuck knew me only as Joe Bradley. She was the only person I knew who fully appreciated the magical force inherent in the spoken word--especially in a name, which 
affects our whole being.
	"It's beautiful," I struggled for words. "Thank you. . . But why? It's not my birthday."
	She shook her head, amazed that I could ask such a stupid question. She kissed my cheek, "Because I love you."	
	I felt like such an old fool. I could count everything meaningful given to me in my adult life on one hand. Every other gift I ever received was a payment or at best an expression of thanks, so I felt obliged to give her something more than my happiness in return.
	While I tried to decide what I had that a young women might want, a blur suddenly burst through the tent's  entrance without warning and leaped onto Psyche's lap. When the blur stopped moving, it took the form of a dog named Pudgy, which happily painted Psyche's face with saliva.
	After a minute of calming her pet, Psyche spoke to me again. "Why don't you try the pipe? Maybe when the spirits come to you, you can fall asleep." She was only half serious. She handed me a package of tobacco and prompted me with a child-like playfulness, "I'd like to try it, too, just once."
	I accepted the second gift with a smile and pretended to read from the package. "Warning. The Surgeon General had determined that unity with the spirits and the mysterious can be dangerous to your health."
	Psyche looked baffled, and I had to tell her that I was joking. But I shouldn't have been making jokes, because this was serious.
	We were about to perform a sacred act in a very strange setting. A department store had provided the undersized temple; the unifying principle that we were about to ignite was known as apple tobacco; and the loud panting of a contented basset hound filled my ears. But I felt that the serious desire of this young lady to be a part of this sacred ritual made it real. She understood and sought to renew her own faith by finding me in mine.  She was not merely curious; she wanted to make my rituals her own.
	Where did she learn to do this? How could she learn by herself to seek her faith in the communion of others? Every day, this child of Nature was growing wiser.
	I found a lighter on the gas latern left behind by the kids. Psyche and I sat opposite each other in the center of the tepee. I said a few solemn words, then I filled the pipe's bowl with tobacco and consumed the leafy medium in flame, evoking the ethereal vapor which would join our souls with the greater soul--the Spirit of Creation. I filled my mouth with the smoke, then my lungs, and I handed the pipe to Psyche. As I exhaled, the smoke formed a cloud that rose and left the tepee through its apex.
	Psyche coughed loudly, as she tried to draw a full breath of smoke into her healthy lungs. After she recovered, I advised that she try again, but only fill her mouth and then inhale slowly whatever amount felt comfortable. When she succeeded to do so without coughing or pain, I smiled and affirmed the meaning of the act: "We are all related."
	She exhaled a small cloud of smoke, and together we watched it rise to meet one of my clouds, and to meet the clouds in the sky.
	When the tobacco had turned to ash, I emptied the pipe and put it into my shirt pocket.
	Psyche was happy. Her face was flushed with color, expressing her deep sense of peace. Her eyes were clouded with moisture, as she was seeing a vision only she could see. She didn't move or talk for several minutes, when at last she smiled and embraced herself, moving as if to include me and all of creation in her embrace. She enounced jubilantly, "I think he heard me."
	I knew what she was talking about. She believed that the Great Mysterious was a personality who could be reached and perhaps known. She had told me about her beliefs many times, and while I respected them, I did not share them.
	"How do you know?" I asked.
	She shrugged. "I feel a good feeling. I think he heard me."
	I doubted that this feeling she spoke about meant a direct contact with the Ultimate, but I did not doubt that she was in harmony with the Ultimate. In any case, her joy permeated the air, as did the smoke. I breathed in both, and I exhaled the chaos that had disturbed me throughout the night.
	Psyche said, "When the sun climbs the Reach, I'm going to step into the light, and maybe he will watch me dance this time."
	She believed that the sun was the eye of the Creator.
	"Have you been doing this every morning?" I asked.
	"Every morning that the sun climbs," she replied, while we both watched a halo forming above the Reach, spraying gossimer rays of light above the treetops. "I dance right here where he can see."
	I smiled wearily, very near sleep, now, and I said. "I would like to watch you dance before I drift off."
	The glow of wonder and freedom dimmed on her face. She confessed in a low tone, "I don't dance behind clothes. I want the sun to shine on me, not my shirt. I want him to see *me* dance."
	Her voice was grave, because she knew I had a fundementally different opinion about clothes and modesty. For Psyche, clothing was shameful and deceitful, while nudity was honest and clean. She has learned about the sensual power of nudity, but she also feels that her body is her best instrument for communication, and when she is forced to hide it, she feels like other women would feel if they were forced to hide their faces and mouths behind a veil.
	But I think clothes protect men and women from becoming too intimate. In my tribe, we believed that if a man even accidentally saw a naked women, the two must be married, because seeing a nude women would attach the man to her.
	Hollo Island did not have any laws requiring clothing, but everyone expected Psyche to follow the social norm. Psyche accepted the island's expectations, and she usually donned clothing when she was outside her cabin. She did this in deference to our needs.
	But now, she was with just one friend, trying to express something very important to her in a way that she deemed venerable. I didn't want to be a bad guy. She wanted to share her dance with me, and I didn't want to spit on her gift. I would save my opinions for another time.
	I told Psyche, who's face was dim with dejection, that I would love to see her dance as she saw fit. I was an old man; what could a young flower reach through my ancient eyes, anyway?
	Psyche was delighted. She grabbed the pouch of cornmeal, and we moved outside.
	I felt dizzy and weak, so I reclined against the surface of the tepee. "I don't think I can stay awake much longer."
	Psyche urged Pudgy to lay against my legs. "Keep Pudgy here, leaning against you. When he falls asleep, he gets contagious, and you'll fall asleep, too."
	"If I'm asleep when you finish your dance, please remember to cover my head," I asked. "My skin is already a little burnt, and I don't want it to be well-done when I wake up."
	Psyche smiled and nodded.
	I was jolted fully awake when Psyche unexpectedly lifted her sweater over her head. While I knew she was going to remove her clothes, I didn't know what effect it would have on me. Her strong feminine scent, heightened by perfume, escaped the trap of her sweater and carried her essence to me. She had shaved most of the hair from her body, so her skin was a pure tan. Her tan was pure even on her breasts. Her tan was pure even where the sun never shines on most women.
	I've been such a fool, I scolded myself. I had aqcuired my disciplines over a lifetime, and I've haphazardly abandoned them during the past 24 hours. I should have known that a young flower makes old eyes young again.
	Then I scolded myself again for feeling guilty. What is wrong with feeling young again? If only this young flower could make the rest of me young again, too!
	Psyche covered my legs with her strongly scented sweater, then she stood and kissed me on the forehead, exciting me yet again when her hair stroked my cheek. I wondered if I would ever see her the same way again.
	But when she walked about twenty yards away from me, my heart settled down, and her naked form was much less (disturbing?).  I stopped noticing the scent on her sweater. I only noticed its softness and warmth. 
	Psyche stood between myself and the Reach, at the perimeter of the gardens where the vegetation did not grow, and the ground was very sandy. She found a corn stalk laying there, beside a narrow stream that originated in the Reach. The stalk was nearly eight feet tall, healthy and beautiful, and I figured that she must have put the stalk there earlier in anticipation of this moment.
	She then layed down between the stalk and the stream, and she placed the pouch of corn meal on her chest. Motionless, she waited, like a seed just planted, waiting for food from heaven to grow.
	The sun had very nearly finished its climb by now. Its halo crowned the summit, already spraying beams of light over much of the island. In less than a minute, it would shine gloriously upon us.
	While we waited, Pudgy and I looked at each other, and we yawned together at exactly the same moment.  Then we turned our attention back to his owner and watched with restful expectation, as the dance was about to begin.
	Moving only her left arm, Psyche cupped a handful of cornmeal. She held it over her body (the seed), and sprinkled the powder over as much of herself as she could 
	Psyche inched her right arm from her side until her hand dipped into the stream of water. She sprinkled a handful of water over her body, and again layed still.
	Finally, an explosion of light! The sun blazed down on me, embracing me with a serene warmth.
	Psyche was in the shadow, still, but for only a moment longer, as the sun hurried the shadow away, and then glistened on her wet skin. She was a seed, carefully prepared and watered, and now, with her fingers and toes penetrating the soil, she was taking root.
	She was becoming a dance--the same dance that the corn performed every year. She took the stalk in both hands, and as raised it so it stood upright. While still lying flat on the ground, she expertly fitted the base of the stalk into a hole in the ground, so it stood alone. Then, with patience and grace, she climbed the plant in pantomime, never actually touching it, and always facing skywards. She took all of five minutes to dance from hands and knees to a standing position. Her slow and seemless movements recalled the growth of the corn. Her trim and firm body resembled the smooth, firm stalk. She opened her arms wide with her palms facing the sky, just as the corn raises its leaves to the sun. When a breeze caught the corn's leaves, and the plant swayed, Psyche also swayed. She danced this prayer of thankgiving until  I had long forgotten her nudity, and I could see just how well her body could speak.
	The smoothy eurythmy was broken when Psyche stepped away from the plant for a moment and removed another handful of cornmeal from her pouch. Suddenly, her dance of thankgiving became a dance of hope. She clasped her hands together, as in prayer, trapping the cornmeal between them, and she raised her hands high over her head. (Before a corn plant grows to its full height, the tassel emerges high atop the plant). She opened her hands slowly from her wrists, so that her fingers rayed out in a circle, like a tassel or like the rays of the sun.  (When a breeze passes through a cornstalk's tassel, pollen is loosed and falls to be caught by the cornsilk below; from there, the pollen enters the ear and fertilizes the female kernels within.) Psyche arched her back and positioned her body. The cornmeal fell from her hands onto her chest, and it skittered down past her abdomin to collect in the short hairs of her sexuality. Psyche fixed her eyes on the sun, and her expression was both deferent and imploring.
	I was already half asleep, and I could barely keep my eyes opened, but I resisted the call of sleep for a little longer. I knew that Psyche was revealing something very important to her, now.
	Still dancing and staring into the sun, she pressed her hands down against her belly, as though she was pushing something out.  She tore an ear of corn from the stalk and placed it stem first high between her legs; there, touching where she might one day give birth, she carefully pushed aside the spike's husk and the silk, bringing forth the fruit within into the light and the air.  She held the new yellow form to her breast and continued to dance and celebrate, expressing the delight in growing a new crop, but also dreaming that the fruit at her breast was her own fruit.
	As Psyche danced on in unwavering intensity, sleep finally claimed possession of my senses, and I could no longer discern reality from my imagination.
	The sun rested on top of the Reach, and it was clothed by clouds on all sides. The clouds were like ghosts or angels with the dominant Grandfather Sun, smiling down at the young woman worshiping them.
	From beyond the Reach, a light blue pigeon emerged as if from  the sun and the clouds. When Psyche saw the bird, she stopped dancing and watched it in wonder.
	At first, the scene was beautiful, whether real or a dream, as the bird was like a messenger from heaven about to perch on Psyche's finger.
	But then I felt a cold breeze, and storm clouds eclipsed the sunlight. The pigeon turned black, like a crow.
	We were not in the field by the Reach anymore. We were in a desert, and it was night time. I could not see Psyche, but I could hear her weeping. I stood outside my body, looking at myself sleeping peacefully. Rattlesnakes emerged from the sand, and wrapped around my limbs, and climbed my body, while I slept.
	This was an omen. I had known all night that an omen was coming. I could see it in the winds, and in the moon, and in the faces of my friends. My disciplines revealed it to me, so I abandoned my disciplines to not hear the message. I had tried to stay awake, because I knew that I could not avoid the omen in my dreams. But at last the messanger found me...

to be continued
by Tooshoes (E.R.Gundel)