"b. rh positive."

"thought you told me that once. gail is in the hospital. they have to replace every drop of blood in her body. she may die anyhow."

i thought of the little fluff and squeak that was gail. i eat de crus' of de toas'.

"what's the matter with her?" i asked fearfully.

"that damn hiserean child is poison. gail had a little cut inside her mouth from where she fell off the slide at school."

"i'll be at the hospital in ten minutes," i said, and hung up shakily. "dinner is set for seven-thirty," i told clay and billy, and rushed out.

the first person i saw at the hospital was not regina. it was mrs. his-tara.

"how did you know?" i asked. her integument was dull now and there were patches of scales rubbed off. her eyes were almost not visible.

"mrs. crowley called me," she said. "in any case i would have been here. there is in hi-nin also of poison. there remains for him only the return home. we must rejoice for him."

the smile she brought forth was more than i could bear.

"gail's germs were poison to him?"

"oh, no. he poisons himself. it is an ancient hormone, from the early days of our race when we had what your mrs. baden so wisely calls aggression. it is dormant in us since before the accounting of our history. an adult hiserean, perhaps, could fight his emotions and cure himself. hi-nin has no weapons—so your physicians have explained it to me, from our scientific books. how can i doubt that they are right?"

how could i doubt it, either? it would be, i thought, rather like a massive overdose of adrenalin. psychogenic, of course, but what help was it to know that? would there be some organ in hi-nin a surgeon could remove? like the adrenals in humans, perhaps?

of course not. if they could have, they would have.

i hurried on to find the room where gail was. she was not pale, as i had expected, but pink-cheeked and bright-eyed. they were probably putting in more blood than they were taking out. there were two of the other mamas from our car pool, waiting their turns.

regina was sitting by the bed, her face ugly and swollen from crying.

"she looks just fine!" i exclaimed.

"only in the last fifteen minutes," she said. "when i called you, she was like ice. her eyes didn't move."

"we're lucky with gail. did you know about hi-nin?"

"the little animal!" she said. "he's the one that did it."

"he didn't do anything, regina, and you know it."

"he shouldn't have been in the car pool. he shouldn't be with human children at all."

"he's going to die," i said quickly, before she had time to say things she'd have nightmares about later on.

"sorry," regina said, because we were all looking at her and because her child was pink and beautiful and healthy while hi-nin....

"regina," i said, "what did you do after it happened?"

"do! it scared the hell out of me—that creature shaking all over and gail screaming. at first i didn't know what had happened. then i saw that thing flopping around on the front seat and i screamed and threw it out of the window. and then i noticed hi-nin's wrist, or whatever you call it. i said, 'oh, god, i knew you'd get us in trouble!' but the creature didn't say anything. he just sat there. and i let the other children off and brought hi-nin to you because i didn't want to get involved with that mrs. baden."

"and gail?"

"she seemed all right. she just climbed in the back with the other children and pretty soon they were all laughing."

"and all that time little hi-nin.... regina, didn't you even pat him or hold him or kiss it for him or anything?"

"kiss it!"

at that moment mrs. his-tara came in, with mrs. baden and a doctor behind her. i should have known. mrs. baden didn't leave people to fight battles alone.

mrs. his-tara looked at mrs. baden, but mrs. baden only nodded and smiled encouragingly at her.

the doctor was gently pulling the needle out of gail's vein. the room was silent. even gail sat large-eyed and solemn.

"mrs. crowley," mrs. his-tara began, obviously dragging each word up with great effort, "would it be accurate to tell my son that gail has received no hurt from him? we must, you see, prepare him for the return home."

regina looked around at us and at gail. she hadn't dared let herself look at mrs. his-tara yet.

"doctor!" regina called suddenly. "look at gail's mouth!"

even from where i was, i could see it. a scaly growth along both lips.

"that's a temporary effect of the serum," the doctor said. "we tried an antitoxin before we decided to change the blood. it is nothing to worry about."

"oh."

"mrs. crowley," mrs. his-tara began again, "it is much to ask, but at such a moment, much is required. if you could come yourself, and if gail could endure to be carried...."

but gail did, indeed, look queer, and she stretched out her arms not to her mother but to mrs. his-tara.

"the tides," mrs. his-tara said, "have cast us up a miracle."

she gathered gail into the boneless cradle of her curved arms.

regina took her sunglasses out of her purse and hid her eyes. "mind your own damned business," she told mrs. baden and me.

"it is our damned business," i whispered to mrs. baden, and she held my arm as we followed regina down the hall.

mrs. his-tara threaded her way through a cordon of other hisereans who must have been flown in for the occasion. i couldn't see the children, but i could hear them.

"him cold!" said gail. "him scared!"

"he's scared of you," regina said. "we're sorry, gail. tell him we're sorry. we didn't understand."

gail laughed. a loud and healthy laugh.

"gail sorry," she said. "me thought you was to eat."

there was a small sound. i thought it was from hi-nin and i held mrs. baden's hand as though it were my only link to a sane world.

"dat a joke," gail said. "hi-nin 'posed to laugh!"

then there was a silence and regina started to say something but mrs. his-tara whispered, "please! it is a thought between the children."

then there was a small, quiet laugh from hi-nin. "in truth," he said with that oh, so familiar lisp, "it is funny."

"me don't do it again," gail said, solemn now.

when i got home it was so late that the stars were sliding down the sky and i just knew clay wouldn't have thought to turn the parking lights on. but he had.

furthermore, he was still up.

"were you worried?" i asked delightedly.

"no. regina called a couple of hours ago."

"regina?"

"she said she was concerned about the expression on your face."

clay handed me a present, all wrapped in gold stickum with an electronic butterfly bouncing airily around on it.

i peeled the paper off carefully, to save it for billy, and set the butterfly on the sticky side.

inside the box was a gorgeous blue fluffy affair of no apparent utility.

"oh, clay!" i gasped. "i can't wear anything like this!" i slipped out of my paper clothes and the gown slithered around me.

hastily, i pulled the pins out of my hair, brushed it back and smeared on some lipstick.

"i look silly," i said. "i'm all the wrong type." my little crayola note was still stuck in the mirror. phooey to me. "you're laughing at me."

"i'm not. you don't really look respectable at all, verne."

i ran into the dining area. "regina told you about the boudoir slip!"

i heard clay stumble over a chair in the dark.

"obscenity!" he said. "all right, she did. so what? i think you look like a call girl."

i ran into the living room and hid behind the sofa. "do you really, truly think so?"

"absolutely!" another chair clattered and clay toed the living room lights. "ah!" he said. "i've got you cornered. you look like a chorus girl. you look like an easy pickup. you look like a dirty little—"

"stop," i cried, "while you're still winning!"