Madeline had always been able to counterweigh any damage Anne did to the child. Madeline had simply swept blindingly clean, thin, tidy Tessa up into her plump, energetic arms and hustled her off into her studio where she clad the child in one of her own smocks and let her loose with finger paints. And how many nights had Madeline sat with Tessa in the barn, watching cats or dogs give birth? Madeline had read to Tessa, had sung to and danced with Tessa, had taught Tessa to ride bareback, had taken Tessa skinny-dipping in the stream behind the house. Had taught Tessa to make jams from berries they picked, and cookies and pies and cakes, and Tessa had been so caught up in the sheer exuberance of Madeline’s pleasure in life that she’d eaten heartily without a thought.

  Now Madeline was gone, and much of the lust of living had disappeared from all their lives. Mont could never hope to do for Tessa what Madeline did, but Madeline would expect Mont to do, at the least, what he could to keep the child safe and happy.

  So for Madeline’s sake—and for Tessa’s—Mont finished his cereal, then climbed to his bedroom to dress and begin his day.

  Anne was pleased that the psychiatrist was male. Often females reacted to their first meeting with Anne with a subdued, instinctive hostility. There were many reasons. Anne understood them all. She was thin, in a culture where thinness was admired above all other qualities, the kind of thinness that few females could achieve without deprivation and grueling discipline.

  She was also wealthy, and her ancestors had been wealthy and their ancestors had been wealthy, and so much inherited wealth shone from her like an aura. She could not dim it. It was as much a part of her as the way she moved across the room. She left her jewelry at home, she wore the plainest white shirt and gray skirt, and she still looked exactly like what she was: an American aristocrat.

  Still, because he was male, he would tend to like her. Most men did, especially if she went to the trouble to smile and put them at ease. Later, when both men and women got to know her, they came to admire her. Perhaps not to enjoy her company, or to want to share secrets, or to light up when they saw her. Seldom that. But to respect her, yes. They always came to respect her.

  Anne had just seated herself on the green leather sofa when the secretary peered over her eyeglasses, produced a professional smile, and announced, “Mrs. Madison? Dr. Lawrence will see you now.”

  Anne knew how to enter a room, and she’d given a great deal of thought to the way she should approach this meeting. She must be calm and firm and sympathetic, but resolute. She’d thought of appearing nervous—letting the psychiatrist feel his power—but decided against it. She wasn’t nervous. She was angry, really. Indignant. But prepared to be polite.

  It was not, she saw at once, the office of a wealthy man. The furniture, desk and chairs, were traditional inexpensive “executive” pieces one could buy at any office-supply store. A bookcase along one wall held books, framed family photos, toys and games.

  The psychiatrist came out from behind his desk to shake her hand. With surprise she saw that he was rather attractive, not what she’d expected. No eyeglasses, no bushy brows, no hair in his ears. Instead, he was tanned and fit. In gray summer flannels and a long-sleeved black cotton (perhaps silk!) T-shirt, his dark hair clipped close to his skull, he looked youthful, urban, and contemporary.

  “Mrs. Madison? I’m Dr. Lawrence. Thank you for coming in.” He gestured to a chair.

  “Please call me Anne,” she requested, sitting, smoothing her skirt over her knees, crossing her legs at the ankles and slipping them to one side. She hung her purse by its strap over the back of the chair.

  “Anne.” He settled behind the desk. “Would you like some coffee, Anne? Or tea?”

  She hesitated.

  “How about some iced tea,” he suggested. “I’ll have some, too.”

  “That would be lovely.”

  He tapped his intercom. “Carrie? Would you be kind enough to bring in some iced tea for the two of us?”

  He rummaged around on a desk piled with folders and notebooks. It needed, Anne thought, a good dusting. She let her hands lie at ease in her lap as she waited. He opened a folder, glanced at it, opened a desk drawer, brought out a pen, laid it next to the folder, and finally looked up at Anne.

  “All right, now. I see we’re here about your daughter, Tessa.”

  She nodded.

  “You and Mr. Madison, um, Dr. Madison—he’s a physician, right?”

  She nodded again.

  “You’re divorcing, and you both want to have full custody of your daughter.” He looked at Anne expectantly.

  “That’s correct.”

  “You understand that I, as court-appointed guardian ad litem, will be talking with you and Tessa and her father.”

  “I understand that.”

  He looked at his notes. “In fact, over the next month, I’ll be seeing quite a lot of you and your daughter. The appointments are scheduled very close together. Is there a reason for the rush?”

  “Is there a reason not to rush?” she countered coolly. “Tessa starts school in September. She’ll be busy all day, and she’ll have extracurricular activities. In my opinion, it would be best for everyone to get this settled. Tessa needs to know where she’s going to be living for the school year.”

  He cleared his throat. “Often the expense of so many sessions close together is too difficult for people to deal with all at once.”

  “That’s not a problem. For either of us. Randall and I have no issues about money. I have—and always will have—a comfortable living from a trust fund from my grandparents.”

  “All right, then. Well, first, why don’t you tell me something about your marriage and the reasons for your divorce?”

  She cleared her throat. It was, after all, harder than she’d thought it would be. A welling of emotion conflicted with her need to control this meeting.

  “Randall and I have been married for fourteen years. We met fifteen years ago, when he was a resident at Brigham and Women’s and I was a nurse. We were both idealistic. We both intended, in all naiveté, to save the world. And I suppose, in our own ways, we’re still working toward that.”

  Dr. Lawrence smiled. “A difficult task, saving the world.”

  “True. And, of course, we both know we can’t really do that. But we have to try. Someone, after all, has to try.”

  “An admirable thought.” He paused a beat and, when she did not continue, said, “And so you married.”

  “And so we married. We wanted children—” She dropped her eyes. It’s all right, she assured herself, anyone would expect her to find this difficult. Anyone would feel sympathy. She raised her head and looked right at him. “During our first year of marriage, I became pregnant twice. And both times—” She clasped her hands together. “Both times I had an ectopic pregnancy. Do you know what that is?”

  “I’d be grateful if you’d refresh my memory.”

  “An ectopic pregnancy takes place when the egg is fertilized somewhere other than in the uterus. In my case, in the ovary. As the embryo grows, it quickly becomes too large for the ovary and the ovary bursts. The result is that the woman no longer has ovaries or eggs.”

  “How very sad.”

  “Yes. Very sad. And painful. Very painful. I mean physically, not just emotionally.” She looked away.

  A tap came at the door, and the secretary entered carrying a tray with two glasses of iced tea, the ice tinkling musically.

  “Just put them here.” Dr. Lawrence nodded to the corner of his desk. “Thanks, Carrie.”

  “Is that your sailboat?” Anne asked, looking at a photograph on the wall behind him.

  “Yes. It is. Sugar in your tea?”

  “No, thank you.” She picked up her glass and took a small sip. She heard the door close behind her, shutting Carrie out, and felt her shoulders relax.

  “So it was a tough time for you then, the first year of your marriage.”

  “Indeed.” She felt anger flush through her. “I believed, and I always shall believe, that it was Randall’s fault.”

  Dr. Lawrence looked slightly startled. “Oh?”

  “Randall is sexually rapacious. I’m sure that if he had not insisted on having sex so often, I wouldn’t have had the physical problems that I had.”

  “Is there any statistical evidence to back up this theory?”

  “I wouldn’t know. I don’t read medical journals. Besides, it might be purely psychological, I mean the cause and effect. I don’t care about statistics, anyway. They wouldn’t change things for me. They wouldn’t make me capable of bearing children.”

  Dr. Lawrence stirred a packet of Sweet’N Low into his tea. Sweet’N Low was a woman’s thing, Anne thought, watching. Still the action of his stirring, the domesticity of it, soothed her.

  “And so we decided to adopt,” Anne continued. “But we both knew, from working at the hospital, how crucial those first few hours, days, and weeks are for an infant. Things can happen then that can impact a child’s character forever. You must, as a psychiatrist, be aware of that.”

  He nodded.

  “In addition, I also felt strongly that I would like to have a child who looked rather more like us than less. Not just to prevent awkward explanations with other people. I thought I would relate more strongly to a child who looked like us.”

  “Perfectly understandable.”

  “So we decided to use a surrogate mother, a woman with my coloring and so on, who would be artificially inseminated with Randall’s semen.” She cleared her throat. She was a nurse, yet saying those words—semen, inseminate—brought a flush to her face.

  “We arranged it through a friend of Randall’s. He found a willing surrogate mother for us, a blond woman, young, healthy, and—perhaps we should not have cared about this, but we did—of high intelligence. So Tessa was born—”

  “Were you there for the birth?”

  Anne flinched. “Heavens, no. We never met the woman. We insisted on retaining our anonymity.” She waited for him to respond. He only nodded. “So—Tessa was born. A hired nurse brought her to us within hours of her birth.” Anne smiled at the memory. “She was a lovely baby. A lovely little girl. I’d been secretly hoping for a girl. She has one flaw, a birthmark on her neck, rather ugly, but otherwise she’s beautiful, and she looks like us. People are always saying to us that they can’t decide who she looks like more, Randall or me.”

  “A fortunate little girl.”

  Anne smiled at the compliment. “I stopped working when Tessa was born. I thought it best if I stayed home with the baby. I have nothing against mothers who work—I want to make that clear. I think children can be just as happy and well adjusted if they spend part of their early years with caregivers. That just wasn’t what I wanted for our daughter.” She stopped to sip some tea.

  Dr. Lawrence waited calmly for her to resume her narrative.

  “I did find, after the first blush wore off, that I was a bit bored, just staying home, and after a while I got into the habit of volunteer work. The more I volunteered, the more I wanted to work. My parents had raised me to be altruistic. As the years passed and Tessa was in school, I became more involved. I initiated a hands-on educational program for teaching high school students about contraception, AIDS, STDs, and drugs. I’ve sat on, and sit still, on several boards. As you might know, I’m campaigning for the Democratic slot for state representative from the Arlington district. I believe I have a fairly good chance of winning the election. I have quite a few supporters—”

  “Is it a problem with your husband? Your social commitments?”

  The interruption annoyed Anne, threw her off track. She sipped tea once more, trying to regain her poise. She considered his question.

  “No. No, that’s no problem for Randall. He has always supported me in my work.”

  Dr. Lawrence continued to look at her.

  “Oh, I see.” Anne threw him a smile. “You want me to focus on why Randall and I are divorcing.”

  “I’d like to know about that, yes.”

  How to put it in the most flattering light? She knew if she were vitriolic about Randall (which certainly she deserved to be), it would somehow reflect badly on her.

  “Randall and I—have grown apart over the years. I suppose many people say that, but in our case it’s true. He works perhaps sixty hours a week, and in addition sits on boards, and with my schedule—well, I’m sure you know how it is.”

  “You’ve discussed the possibility of his cutting back?”

  Anne flicked a piece of lint off her skirt. “No, because that’s not really the problem.” She saw a stain on her skirt, just slightly darker than the rest of the linen, and rubbed at it. Lifting her head, she forced herself to say it. “Randall is promiscuous. He has been for years. I find it insulting, degrading, and disgusting.”

  “You’ve talked about this with him?”

  “Of course I’ve confronted him! It does no good. You have to understand, Dr. Lawrence, the physical side of marriage has never been important to me. Randall knew that when we married. I thought he had accepted it and would adjust himself accordingly. His life is full, after all. He has his work, Tessa, me, his parents and their farm. He’s not an adolescent any longer.” She leaned forward, impassioned. “This is why it’s crucial that I have custody of Tessa. Tessa’s at a delicate age now. She’s twelve. She hasn’t started to menstruate yet, but when she does, it’s her mother she’ll need to turn to, not her father. Randall’s attitude toward sexual matters is so … so reckless that it can only harm her.”

  “Do you mean he might behave sexually toward her?”

  “What?” Anne blinked and then flushed deeply. “Good God, of course I don’t mean that. Randall would never—” She shuddered. “I would never accuse Randall of anything so abhorrent.”

  “That’s good, then. We’ve got that out in the air and out of the way.”

  “Randall is a good man, for the most part. But just because he’s basically good doesn’t mean that Tessa should live with him. He works too many hours, and he spends too much time with his father on that filthy farm, and he takes far too many different women into his bed … that would have to have a deleterious effect on Tessa. If we had a boy, I’d agree the child should live with Randall. But Tessa’s a girl. She needs her mother.”

  “Tell me about Tessa.”

  “Gladly.” Anne leaned back in her chair and gathered her thoughts. “She’s beautiful. Really beautiful. Slender, with long blond hair. I work hard, encouraging her to remain slender—children eat so much junk these days—but I believe her hair will stay blond as she gets older. I think her birth mother must have been Scandinavian. She’s got that look about her. I have a picture in my purse. Would you like to see it?”

  “I’ll be meeting with her soon. I’d rather hear you talk about her.”

  “All right. Well—she was a good baby. A happy baby. Indeed, I think she’s a naturally happy child. She’s extremely bright. She might be gifted, but I’ve never wanted to have her tested. It’s not necessary. She’s receiving an excellent education at a private school.”

  “What about friends?”

  “What about them?” Anne realized her tone had been hostile. She made herself smile. “Tessa has friends. She sees children her age at school, of course, and this summer she’s attending a day camp. There is one point of contention between Randall and me. I might as well go ahead and mention it. He’s certain to bring it up: I don’t allow Tessa to visit other girls’ homes very often.”

  “Oh? Why is that?”

  “I feel very strongly about the negative aspects of computers, television, and music. There’s simply too much sex, too much violence. I see this as an insidious evil in our culture.”

  “I’m afraid you’re right.”

  “Well, then, you’ll understand. How can I allow Tessa to go to someone else’s house? I can’t control what they see or do there. Other parents aren’t as vigilant as I. Even the things they’re exposed to on HBO …” Again she rubbed at the stain on her skirt.

  “And yet children need to be with friends.”

  “Tessa is with friends. At school. That’s most of the day, five days a week. Or, as now, at camp. She sometimes attends birthday parties or goes to the movies with a friend.”

  “What about boys?”

  “Boys?”

  “Does she have a boyfriend?”

  “Absolutely not! She’s twelve years old.”

  Dr. Lawrence nodded. “Okay. Let’s talk about something else. Tell me what you and Tessa like to do together.”

  Anne reflected a moment. “I have to think about that,” she admitted. “If you’d asked me this a year ago, or two years … we were closer then. You must realize that as girls grow up, they want to spend less time with their parents. And I’ve had to spend so much time lately, campaigning. Well, for one thing, Tessa and I used to go shopping together all the time. I loved buying her clothes, and even when she was five or six, she was capable of helping me select my clothing.” She smiled. “ ‘Mom,’ she’d say, ‘no ruffles.’ ” Tessa has never liked ruffles.

  “But now—she’s almost a teenager. She’s swayed by the opinions of the girls in her class, who in turn are brainwashed by ridiculous television ads. Everyone looks so sloppy these days. Baggy jeans. Oversized shirts. Children wearing slacks so low on their hips they walk on the hems, intentionally.”

  Anne picked up her glass and found it empty.

  “Would you like more tea?”

  “No, I’m fine. I just—” She threw him one of her most charming smiles. “I suppose I was just trying to give myself time to think. I feel I’m taking a test. I want to get the answers right.”