His hand moved to where Sascha might be.

"Listen. Say something. Don't scare us, Sascha. We don't want to be scared or scare you. We need each other. We three against the world. Sascha?"

Silence.

"Well?" whispered Douglas.

Maggie breathed in and out.

They waited.

"Yes?"

There was a soft flutter, the merest exhalation on the night air.

"Yes."

"You're back!" both cried.

Another silence.

"Welcome?" asked Sascha.

"Welcome!" both said.

And that night pa.s.sed and the next day and the night and day after that, until there were many days, but especially midnights when he dared to declare himself, pipe opinions, grow stronger and firmer and longer in half-heard declarations, as they lay in antic.i.p.atory awareness, now she moving her lips, now he taking over, both open as warm, live ventriloquists' mouthpieces. The small voice shifted from one tongue to the other, with soft bouts of laughter at how ridiculous but loving it all seemed, never knowing what Sascha might say next, but letting him speak on until dawn and a smiling sleep.

"What's this about Halloween?" he asked, somewhere in the sixth month.

"Halloween?" both wondered.

"Isn't that a death holiday?" Sascha murmured.

"Well, yes . .

"I'm not sure I want to be born on a night like that."

"Well, what night would you like to be born on?"

Silence as Sascha floated a while.

"Guy Fawkes," he finally whispered.

"Guy Fawkes??!!"

"That's mainly fireworks, gunpowder plots, Houses of Parliament, yes? Please to remember the fifth of November?"

"Do you think you could wait until then?"

"I could try. I don't think I want to start out with skulls and bones. Gunpowder's more like it. I could write about that."

"Will you be a writer, then?"

"Get me a typewriter and a ream of paper."

"And keep us awake with the typing?"

"Pen, pencil, and pad, then?"

"Done!"

So it was agreed and the nights pa.s.sed into weeks and the weeks leaned from summer into the first days of autumn and his voice grew stronger, as did the sound of his heart and the small commotions of his limbs. Sometimes as Maggie slept, his voice would stir her awake and she would reach up to touch her mouth, where the surprise of his dreaming came forth.

"There, there, Sascha. Rest now. Sleep."

"Sleep," he whispered drowsily, "sleep." And faded away.

"Pork chops, please, for supper."

"No pickles with ice cream?" both said, almost at once.

"Pork chops," he said, and more days pa.s.sed and more dawns arose and he said: "Hamburgers!"

"For breakfast?"

"With onions," he said.

October stood still for one day and then...

Halloween departed.

"Thanks," said Sascha, "for helping me past that. What's up ahead in five nights?"

"Guy Fawkes!"

"Ah, yes!" he cried.

And at one minute after midnight five days later, Maggie got up, wandered to the bathroom, and wandered back, stunned.

"Dear," she said, sitting on the edge of the bed.

Douglas Spaulding turned over, half awake. "Yes?"

"What day is it?" whispered Sascha.

"Guy Fawkes, at last. So?"

"I don't feel well," said Sascha. "Or, no, I feel fine. Full of pep. Ready to go. It's time to say good-bye. Or is it h.e.l.lo? What do I mean?"

"Spit it out."

"Are there neighbors who said, no matter when, they'd take us to the hospital?"

"Yes."

"Call the neighbors," said Sascha.

They called the neighbors.

At the hospital, Douglas kissed her and listened.

"It's been nice," said Sascha.

"Only the best."

"We won't talk again. Good-bye," said Sascha.

"Good-bye," both said.

At dawn there was a small clear cry somewhere. Not long after, Douglas entered his wife's hospital room. She looked at him and said "Sascha's gone."

"I know," he said quietly.

"But he left word and someone else is here.

Look."

He approached the bed as she pulled back a coverlet.

"Well, I'll be d.a.m.ned."

He looked down at a small pink face and eyes that for a brief moment flickered bright blue and then shut.

"Who's that?" he asked.

"Your daughter. Meet Alexandra."

"h.e.l.lo, Alexandra," he said.

"And do you know what the nickname for Alexandra is?" she said.

"What?"

"Sascha," she said.

He touched the small cheek very gently.

"h.e.l.lo, Sascha," he said.

ANOTHER FINE MESS.

The sounds began in the middle of summer in the middle of the night.

Bella Winters sat up in bed about three a.m. and listened and then lay back down. Ten minutes later she heard the sounds again, out in the night, down the hill.

Bella Winters lived in a first-floor apartment on top of Vendome Heights, near Effie Street in Los Angeles, and had lived there now for only a few days, so it was all new to her, this old house on an old street with an old staircase, made of concrete, climbing steeply straight up from the low-lands below, one hundred and twenty steps, count them. And right now ...

"Someone's on the steps," said Bella to herself.

"What?" said her husband, Sam, in his sleep.

"There are some men out on the steps," said Bella. "Talking, yelling, not fighting, but almost. I heard them last night, too, and the night before, but . .

"What?" Sam muttered.

"Shh, go to sleep. I'll look."

She got out of bed in the dark and went to the window, and yes, two men were indeed talking out there, grunting, groaning, now loud, now soft. And there was another noise, a kind of b.u.mping, sliding, thumping, like a huge object being carted up the hill.

"No one could be moving in at this hour of the night, could they?" asked Bella of the darkness, the window, and herself.

"No," murmured Sam.

"It sounds like ...

"Like what?" asked Sam, fully awake now.

"Like two men moving-"

"Moving what, for G.o.d's sake?"

"Moving a piano. Up those steps."

"At three in the morning!?"

"A piano and two men. Just listen."

The husband sat up, blinking, alert.

Far off, in the middle of the hill, there was a kind harping strum, the noise a piano makes when suddenly thumped and its harp strings hum.

"There, did you hear?"