them might resemble. “If I came to live with you, and if I had a room
of my own, you wouldn’t make me hang a lot of your paintings on my
walls, would you?” The “your” was emphasized in such a way as to imply
that she still preferred a dead cat even if velvet was not involved.
“Not a one,” Lindsey assured her.
“Good.”
“Do you think you might like living with us?” Lindsey asked, and Hatch
wondered whether that prospect excited or terrified her.
Abruptly the girl struggled up from the chair, wobbling as she reached
her feet, as if she might topple headfirst into the coffee table.
Hatch rose, ready to grab her, even though he suspected it was all part
of the act.
When she regained her balance, she put down her glass, from which she’d
drunk all the Pepsi, and she said, “I’ve got to go pee, I’ve got a weak
bladder. Part of my mutant genes. I can never hold myself. Half the
time I feel like I’m going to burst in the most embarrassing places,
like right here in Mr. Gujilio’s office, which is another thing you
should probably consider before taking me into your home. You probably
have a lot of nice things, being in the antiques and art business, nice
things you wouldn’t want messed up, and here I am lurching into
everything and breaking it or, worse, I get a bursting bladder attack
all over something priceless.
Then you’d ship me back to the orphanage, and I’d be so emotional about
it, I’d clump up to the roof and throw myself off, a most tragic
suicide, which none of us really would want to see happen. Nice meeting
you.”
She turned and wrenched herself across the Persian carpet and out of the
room in that most unlikely gaitsccccuuuurrrr… THUD!-which no doubt
sprang from the same well of talent out of which she had drawn her
goldfish ventriloquism. Her deep-auburn hair swayed and glinted like
fire.
They all stood in silence, listening to the girls slowly fading
footsteps.
At one point, she bumped against the wall with a solid thunk! that must
have hurt, then bravely scrape-thudded onward.
“She does not have a weak bladder,” Father Jiminez said, taking a
swallow from a glassful of amber liquid. He seemed to be drinking
bourbon now. “That is not part of her disability.”
“She’s not really like that,” Father Duran said, blinking his owlish
eyes
as if smoke had gotten in them. “She’s a delightful child. I know
that’s hard for you to believe right now”
“And she can walk much better than that, immeasurably better,” said The
Nun with No Name. “I don’t know what’s gotten into her.”
“I do,” Sister Immaculata said. She wiped one hand wearily down her
face. Her eyes were sad. “Two years ago, when she was eight, we
managed to place her with adoptive parents. A couple in their thirties
who were told they could never have children of their own. They
convinced themselves that a disabled child would be a special blessing.
Then, two weeks after Regina went to live with them, while they were in
the pre-adoption trial phase, the woman became pregnant. Suddenly they
were going to have their own child, after all, and the adoption didn’t
seem so wise.”
“And they just brought Regina back?” Lindsey asked. “Just dumped her at
the orphanage? How terrible.”
“I can’t judge them,” Sister Immaculata said. “They may have felt they
didn’t have enough love for a child of their own and poor Regina, too,
in which case they did the right thing. Regina doesn’t deserve to be
raised in a home where every minute of every day she knows she’s second
best, second in love, something of an outsider. Anyway, she was broken
up by the rejection. She took a long time to get her selfconfidence
back. And now I think she doesn’t want to take another risk.”
They stood in silence.
The sun was very bright beyond the windows. The palm trees swayed lacy.
Between the trees lay glimpses of Fashion Island, the Newport Beach
shopping center and business complex at the perimeter of which Gujilio’s