mouse, decapitated the rodent, and put the corpse in Martin's shoe. Then Martin... well, you get the idea. "Martin Bartell's office," Mamie Sands said. Her raspy voice was all business. "Mrs. Sands, this is Aurora. I need to speak to Martin." It had taken me weeks to stop apologizing for disturbing him.
"I'm sorry," Mrs. Sands said, her voice several degrees warmer than it had been when I first married Martin, "but Mr. Bartell's out in the plant. Want me to page him?"
I thought of trying to tell Martin that his niece was here with an unexplained baby, over a telephone where he stood surrounded by employees. "No, that's okay," I told the secretary. "Please ask him to call me before he starts for home."
I hung up the phone. I made a face, the kind of face my mother always warned me would make my features stick in permanent disgust. I strolled back across the hall to Regina. She was putting some bottles of formula in the refrigerator.
"I just made myself at home," she said brightly. She'd gotten out a pan and boiled some water, and an empty can of formula powder was on the counter by the sink. "It always helps to have plenty made up and ready to heat. Now, when I heat them up ..." and she described the procedure at tedious length. Hayden stared at me with the big round-eyed goggle some babies have. He was a cute little guy, with a pink mouth and rosy cheeks. In fact, he was strikingly fairer than Regina, who was pretty enough, but endowed with the dark complexion and wide hips her own mother'd bequeathed her. Hayden waved his arms and made a sudden gurgling sound, and Regina looked at him adoringly. "Isn't he wonderful?" she asked.
"He's so cute," I said, and tried not to sound yearning. "Too bad Uncle Martin's too old to have another kid," Regina said, actually giggling at the idea.
I could feel my back stiffen and I was sure my face had followed suit. "We talked about it," I said in a voice of pure ice. "But unfortunately, I am not able." Martin, who was staring fifty in the face, hadn't been able to work up any enthusiasm for starting another family, though at my just-turned birthday of thirty-six, I could still hear my biological clock ticking. Loudly. However, it was ticking in a malformed womb, which let Martin off the hook as far as making a decision.
I began to empty the dishwasher, all the time telling myself I'd sounded hostile and I had to calm down. Regina, who really seemed to be remarkably tactless, had stuck a sharp stick into my tenderest grievance, my inability to conceive. She was staring at me now, trying to look properly cowed, but I detected a certain - what? Satisfaction? Her eyes had the same look I saw in Madeleine's when she'd left those footprints all over Martin's windshield. I had a sudden inspiration.
"Would it suit you if we put you and Hayden over in the garage apartment?" I asked, trying to make my voice light and friendly. "That would be super. I wondered when I drove up if that was a separate apartment," Regina said. Maybe she sounded a tad disappointed that I'd changed the subject. "Hayden still gets up at night, and we'd be less likely to bother you."
"Let's just take your things over there," I suggested. Taking the keys from a hook by the back door, I grabbed the big diaper bag and Regina's purse and trotted across the covered walkway and up the stairs that ran up the side of the garage, the side toward our house. The heavy bag looped over my shoulder banged ponderously against my thigh. Though the air was colder and wetter, it wasn't actually raining at the moment.
The apartment smelled only slightly stale. Our friends Shelby and Angel had moved out about eight weeks ago. I had been keeping the heat on so nothing would freeze or mildew, and I turned it up and glanced around as I heard Regina open her car trunk below.
The garage apartment is one very big room, with a corner walled in for a bathroom and adjacent closet. There's a queen-sized bed, a chair and love seat and attendant tables, a television, and a small table for two in the kitchen area. It's as pleasant as basic apartment living gets. Regina seemed pleased.
"Oh, Aunt Roe, this is so nice," she said, throwing a suitcase on