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Mae’s tangled hair. “What about you? Oh God. Look what he did to you!”
    Anna Mae appeared puzzled.
    Sarah touched the bruises on the little arms. “I’m so sorry he hurt you.”
    “Uncle Walter didn’t hurt me! Only Susie.”
    Sarah pushed back the intense guilt of leaving this baby alone with her drunk and enraged husband.
    “Why Auntie sad?”
    Sarah was confused. Didn’t the child remember?
    “Auntie Sarah?”
    “What, Baby?”
    “Uncle made a booboo on your face.”
    Sarah had all but forgotten Walter’s blow that had sent her hurtling into the banister. She touched the side of her face. It was sore. But why was her little niece so concerned? Wasn’t she upset about her own injuries? “Don’t worry, Sweetie,” Sarah said. “It was an accident.” 
    Anna Mae, clutching Susie to her chest, lay back down. Sad as it was, the child would be okay. Sarah pulled the blankets up and around her little niece. She leaned over and kissed her. “Go back to sleep.”
     
    Later, in the kitchen, Sarah’s hand trembled as she measured coffee into the percolator basket. Why? For what reason? Why would Anna Mae deny anything had happened? It was obvious that Walter had hit her. Yet Anna Mae insisted he hadn’t. How could that little girl be so unaware of her injuries?
    Sarah sat up all night nursing one cup of coffee after another. The red mark around her left eye gradually became black and blue as the window above the sink grew lighter. At five-thirty she called the mill and told the foreman that Walter wouldn’t be at work because his sister had died. She replaced the receiver and dropped her head in her hands. “God help us
     

CHAPTER SEVEN
    Seven years later
    She was sitting in the pew near the votive candles—the little girl with the long blond hair. With her head hardly reaching the top of the pew, she sat motionless, schoolbooks beside her. She was ten years old, too young to sit alone in an empty church. She should have been outside playing with other children.
    Anna Mae moved forward, putting one foot on the kneeler. She frowned and put her hands up to her face. There it was again: that same strange, confused feeling. She became aware of the rise and fall of her chest, the labored rhythm of her own breathing. In the dim lights she saw the tall wooden cross, the pulpit, the red carpet, and the candles.
    She took her foot off the kneeler, turned around, and looked behind her. Empty. She ran her fingers across her schoolbooks then picked one up. The last thing she remembered was sitting at her desk, watching her third grade teacher writing a long division problem on the blackboard. Then suddenly the air had exploded with a deafening siren. Her teacher dropped the chalk and turned to the class. “Oh God! There’s been an accident at the mill!”
    Anna Mae vaguely remembered her classmates running to the windows, trying to see the half a mile to the mill. During the chaos, Anna Mae was bumped and pushed until she fell between the desks. She remembered feeling dizzy, her hands tingling. That’s all she remembered.
    Anna Mae put the book down and slid forward to kneel. She placed the palms of her small hands together. “Dear God,” she whispered. “Please help me to understand why I don’t remember. It makes me scared, God. Please! Help me!”
    She heard footsteps at the back of the church. Moments later a figure genuflected at the end of the pew. Her heart skipped as her uncle sidestepped his way over to where she was kneeling.
    “You little bitch!” He grabbed the back of her coat. “What the hell’ re you doin’ here? We’ve been looking for you everywhere.”
    Anna Mae scooped up her books as her Uncle Walter dragged her out of the pew. Her steps faltered as he pushed her toward the door. With her feet barely touching the ground, he dragged her down the church steps then shoved her into the car.
     
    Sarah was waiting at the front door with her coat on. She snapped at Anna Mae. “I was ready