"Sure it did. And for a while I thought they were still there. I mean I kept trying to wiggle my toes even though I knew I didn't have any toes. It was like having an itch you can't scratch."

"I feel sorry for you," I said.

"Thank you," he said.

I brought him his brownie with ice cream on top.

"That looks good," he said. "Why don't you bring the things over here.

Then if we want more we can help ourselves."

"I'm not going to have more," I said. "I don't wish to get fat. Now I suppose you're going to tell me I shouldn't run away.

Well, it won't do you any good because I've made up my mind."

"Hey," he said, "I wasn't going to try to persuade you not to. It's an important decision, and obviously you've given it a lot of thought."

"I have," I said. "And once I make up my mind, I do it."

"Sure," Uncle Chas said. "You're very determined, I can see that. But we may have a problem. Now look here…"

He pulled out his wallet and spread five twenty dollar bills on the desk.

"That's a hundred dollars, Tania," he said.

"I know," I told him. "I can add."

"Of course, you can. But the problem is, what are you going to do with it until you actually leave home? I suppose you could give it to Chet to keep, but then he might run away and not take you with him."

"He wouldn't do that."

"He might. It's possible, isn't it? Don't bite your fingernails, honey. And if you hide it in your room, or someplace else around the house, your mother or father might find it and want to know where you got it and what it's for."

"I can hide it good."

"Maybe you can, but there's always the chance they may find it. Now, I'll put this hundred dollars aside for you. When you and Chet are ready to leave, you take a cab out here. Tell the driver to wait, and I'll pay him for the trip. Then I'll hand over the hundred dollars, and you and Chet can go wherever you like. How does that sound?"

I thought about it. "You promise to give us the money, Uncle Chas?

When we leave home and come out here? "

"Of course. Here it is. I'll put it in a special envelope marked with your name. I won't touch it.

It's yours when you come for it."

"Well, all right," I said. "I'll tell Chet about it, and then he'll have to let me go with him."

"Sure he will. If he's as smart as you say he is."

"He kissed me," I said suddenly.

"He did?" Uncle Chas said. "Did you get mad at him? "

"No," I said.

"I liked it."

He laughed, wheeled his chair over, and hugged me.

"What's not to like?" he said.

Mother came for me like she promised and we went home. I went looking for Chet and finally found him at the swimming pool.

This was a pool for all the people who live in our development.

I don't go in very much because the stuff they put in the water turns my hair green. Chet was sitting by himself on the grass, and he was wearing clothes so I knew he hadn't been swimming with the other kids.

I sat down beside him. He was eating a Butterfinger and gave me a piece.

"Listen," I said, "I've got something to tell you." And I told him all about how my uncle promised to lend me a hundred dollars. It was put aside for me in a special envelope, and when we decided to leave home, we could take a cab to his place and he would pay the driver, and then he would give me my money.

"Wow," Chet said. "That's keen. We can go anywhere on a hundred dollars. I've been studying the map, and you know where I'd like to go?"

"Where?

"Alaska. It's a nice place, and also it's so far away that our parents would never think of looking for us there." Aren't there bears in Alaska?" I asked him.

"I guess so," he said. "But they wouldn't bother us. There are alligators in Florida, but look how many people live here and never get bitten."

"And wolves," I said. "In Alaska."

"Okay, okay, " he said angrily. "Where do you want to go?"

"Wherever you say," I told him. "Alaska is fine."

But I really wanted to go to Paris, France. That's where Sylvia Gottbaum was going with her mother and father.

DR. CHERRYNOBLE e called me on Saturday right after his niece Hleft, but I had just come from the beach and had to shower and dress. I stopped on the way to pick up a chilled bottle of Frascati and arrived at his studio about five o'clock.

We sipped the wine from his ridiculous jelly jars and nibbled on brownies that had apparently been baked by his sister-in-law.

They were quite good. Chewy, with walnuts.

Chas told me about his lunch with Tania and how he had promised to hold the hundred dollars for her until she actually left home.

"Do you think that was wise?" I asked him.

"Can you suggest an alternative?" he said. "What I was really trying to do was stall for time. Look, Cherry, the kids might change their minds and forget all about running away. If they do go through with it and show up here someday asking for their money, then I'll just have to play it by ear. I "You know, Chas," I said, "aiding and abetting runaway children may be against the law, I don't know. But even if it isn't, you're going to make enemies out of the children's parents and possibly leave yourself open to a civil suit."

"I know that," he said, "but I didn't have much choice, did I? Unless I want to snitch on the kids, which I don't."

"You said the boy's name is Chet?"

"It's actually Chester, but Tania calls him Chet, Chester Barrow."

I put down my wine and stared at him. "Barrow?" I said.

"Is his mother Mabel Barrow?"

"I wouldn't know. They live next door to my brother's place.

Herman has eyes for her. He calls her a dumpling so I guess she's plump. And one of the reasons Chet wants to leave home is that she watches TV all the time."

I drew a deep breath. "I shouldn't be telling you this, Chas, but I trust your discretion. Mabel Barrow is a patient of mine."

"Oh, lordy."

"And I can understand her son's desire to run away. It's obviously not a happy home."

He looked at me. "What do we do now, doc?"

"There's not a great deal we can do. Getting Mabel straightened around is going to take time-if I can do it. She's talking about divorce."

"Oh, shit," he said. "And, of course, the boy senses what's going on."

"Of course. Children are much more aware than their parents suspect."

"Poor kids," he said.

"Poor ever I yone," I said. , "What's that supposed to mean?"

I poured us more wine. "An occupational hazard," I told him.

"I'm sure dermatologists get to thinking that everyone in the world has skin problems, and psychiatrists get to thinking that everyone in the world is screwed up."

He laughed. "Maybe we are," he said. "We're all nuts."

"Then what's the norm? " I asked him, but he didn't answer.

He hadn't turned on the lights, and the studio was filling with the mellow luster of the setting sun. It had a purplish tint, almost mauve.

The air seemed perfumed with that glow. It had a soothing effect, warm and intimate.

"He kissed her," Chas said in a low voice.

"Who kissed whom?"

"Chet kissed Tania. She said she liked it. Is that the norm?"

"It's a good start," I said.

Again we sat in silence, both of us seemingly content. It was a rare moment, a good time to say what I had to say. And if I lost, my life would go on. Changed, but it would go on.

"I love you, Chas," I said quietly.

I thought he wasn't going to reply, but finally he did.

"I don't deserve it," he said.

That infuriated me. "Stop it!" I said angrily. "Now just stop it.

Let me be the judge of whether or not you deserve it.

I'm the one doing the loving."

His laugh was rueful. "Yes, doctor," he said.

I waited patiently, knowing that eventually he would try to explain himself. He was an honest man, he really was.