Us and Uncle Fraud Read Free

was down-and-out, as usual."
    "He didn't say that to Claude, did he?" Father's hearty rudeness was notorious, and usually I was delighted by it. But I liked Uncle Claude; I didn't want him to be shamed by Father.
    "No," Marcus said sleepily. "He said it to Mother. He asked Mother what Claude was doing
here, and Mother said that he's just passing through, and Father said"—here Marcus assumed Father's gruff, deep voice—"'Just passing through looking for a handout again. He's down-and-out, as usual.'"
    I snuggled deep into the bed with my arms around the pillow. "Well, so what?" I said. "He still has secret stuff in the box, and he said it's priceless and fragile. Probably he's been carrying it around for a long time, waiting to bring it to us, and even if he's down-and-out, he wouldn't sell it because it was for us."
    Marcus didn't answer.
    "Right?" I asked, after a moment's silence.
    But he still didn't answer.
    "Marcus?" I whispered. I lifted my head to peer through the darkness at him. He was asleep, his mouth open, his breathing soft and deep.
    I heard footsteps on the stairs. Mother and Father were coming up to bed; I could hear them talking quietly to each other. The door to Marcus's room opened and a stream of light from the hall cut a strip across the rug. I closed my eyes and forced my breathing into a regular, slow rhythm.
    Mother pulled the blankets up around our shoulders and tucked them in. I heard her move away and check the window—open a bit to the cool early April air—and then the door closed quietly again.
    I heard her go to Stephie's room, and I could imagine the same ritual, the rearranging of the blanket over my sister in her crib, the adjustment of the window, the tiptoeing away.
    She didn't check on Tom. After a certain age, Mother said, people didn't like to be looked at while they slept. I still did. It was reassuring, pretending to be asleep and hearing her slippered feet pad through the room for a final check on my comfort.
    I heard Mother and Father's door close, and after a few minutes, I heard the snap of their light switch and knew that now, too, their room was dark.
    I listened. I wanted to hear Uncle Claude come upstairs. My room shared a wall with Marcus's, and I knew that through the wall I would hear him find the Life Savers on his pillow. Maybe I would hear him unfasten the strap on the small box and check its priceless, fragile contents.
    But he didn't come. I could hear footsteps downstairs; I heard the refrigerator door open; I heard ice cubes being shaken from their tray and emptied into a glass. A faucet ran briefly. The footsteps came from the kitchen and went back into the living room. I heard the creak as Uncle Claude settled into Father's leather chair.
    Marcus turned and sighed in his sleep. I stared at the ceiling, not at all tired, and wondered what Claude was doing downstairs.
    Finally I turned the covers back and climbed out of bed. Marcus didn't stir. Barefoot, I crossed the room and went out into the dark hall. In the bathroom, a small nightlight glowed. I shivered in my flannel nightgown, blinked in the dim light, and tiptoed down the stairs.
    At the foot of the stairs, I made my footsteps
heavier on purpose, so that I wouldn't startle Uncle Claude. I didn't want him to think that I was a sneak.
    But he wasn't startled at all. He glanced over, lifting his eyes from a magazine in his lap, and smiled.
    "Louise Amanda," he said. "You're a night owl, just like me. I could tell that the minute I met you."
    "How?"
    "Large pupils in your eyes," he explained gravely. "And those are a sign that you can travel in dim light. I have the same characteristic."
    I peered into his eyes, and he was right. His eyes were brown, like mine, with large black pupils.
    "Nocturnal beasts we are," he said.
    "How did you know my middle name?" I asked him. "I never tell it to anybody."
    "Louise Amanda," he repeated. "It could almost be one word : Louisamanda. The Louisamanda