OCEAN
weakly, his face contracting with pain. "I don't ever want to die
again."
Clara lifted Stephen up and set him down on the sturdy,
unpolished, marble-topped table. Now Stephen was on a level with
Clarry's compassionate eyes, and he could feel her warm breath
against
his
cheek. "Course not, sugar. And you don't have to.
You don't have to. Not whiles Clarry's around. You don't have
to worry, sugar," she said, drawing Stephen'S head to her shoulder,
nestling her soft cheek against his forehead and stroking his
hair.
"Clarry'll look after you."
Though he could no longer see her eyes, Stephen heard the
catch in Clarry's throat, he felt her bosom heave, her strong arms
hug him tightly, and he knew that she was crying. "What's the
matter, Clar?"
"Nothin,' sugar. Nothin'. Clarry'lliook after you."
"Is Rosie dead?"
"Rosie! What's the matter with you, sugar? You know Rosie's
in Chicago. I've told you that a hundred times: my baby's in
Chicago."
"But if you never see her, isn't that like being dead?"
"Course it ain't. It seem like that sometime," Clarry said,
staring straight ahead of her, looking right through Stephen just
as
if
he wasn't there, "like Rosie gone forever, but it ain't.
It
ain't
like that. I dassen't let it
be.
Come on, now," she continued in
her normal tone of voice, returning Stephen to the floor. "You
better put that emerald away 'fore
it
time for dinner." ,
Stephen ran upstairs. For a moment he stopped to listen out–
side of Mommy' and Daddy'S door, but there wasn't a sound.
Realizing that their fight was over, he hurried along to the radiator
box in his own room where, much to Mommy's chagrin, Stephen had
succeeded in recreating the seashore's smell and sound and texture.
Scarcely an inch of the cream-colored radiator lid was left ex–
posed by his multifarious marine collection. Among its many treasures
were a dessicated starfish, a perfect pear whelk, the feather of a
tern, a piece of driftwood the color of smoke, two withered skate
egg cases, the spoored carapace of a calico crab, a blue crab claw, a
silver-streaked horse mussel embossed with several barnacles, a kidney–
shaped piece of coral, fourteen periwinkles, five ashtray-size
clam
