From the Corner of His Eye

for the first time, she seemed to know where she was.
        She tried to raise her right hand, but it flopped uselessly and would not respond, so she reached across her body with her left hand, which Celestina gripped tightly.
        The girl spoke, but her words were badly slurred, her speech incoherent.
        She twisted her sweat-drenched face in what might have been frustration, closed her eyes, and tried again, getting out a single but intelligible word: "Baby."
        "She's suffering only expressive aphasia," the doctor said. "She can't get much out, but she understands you perfectly."
        With the infant in her arms, the heavyset nurse pressed in beside Celestina, who almost recoiled in disgust. She held the newborn so that its mother could look into its face.
        Phimie gazed upon the child briefly, then sought her sister's eyes again. Another word, slurred but made intelligible with much effort: "Angel."
        This was no angel.
        Unless it was the angel of death.
        All right, yes, it had tiny hands and tiny feet, rather than hooked talons and cloven hooves. This was no demon child. Its father's evil was'nt visibly reflected in its small face.
        Celestina wanted nothing to do with it, was offended by the very sight of it, and she couldn't understand why Phimie would so insistently call it an angel.
        "Angel," Phimie said thickly, searching her sister's eyes for a sign of understanding. of understanding. "Don't strain yourself, honey."
        "Don't strain yourself, honey."
        "Angel," Phimie said urgently, and then, with an effort that made a blood vessel swell in her left temple, "name.
        "You want to name the baby Angel?"
        The girl tried to say yes, but all that issued from her was "Yunh, yunh," so she nodded as vigorously as she was able to do, and tightened her grip on Celestina's hand.
        Perhaps she was afflicted with only expressive aphasia, but she must be confused to some degree. The baby, which would be placed for adoption, was not hers to name.
        "Angel," she repeated, close to desperation.
        Angel. A less exotic synonym for her own name. Seraphim's angel. The angel of an angel.
        "All right," Celestina said, "yes, of course." She could see no harm in humoring Phimie. "Angel. Angel White. Now, you calm down, you relax, don't stress yourself."
        "Angel.
        "Yes."
        As the heavyset nurse retreated with the baby, Phimie's grip on her sister's hand relaxed, but then grew firm once more as her gaze also became more intense. "Love… you."
        "I love you, too, honey," Celestina said shakily. "So much."
        Phimie's eyes widened, her hand tightened painfully on her sister's hand, her entire body convulsed, thrashed, and she cried, "Unnn, unnn, unnn!"
        When her hand went limp in Celestina's, her body sagged, too, and her eyes were no longer either focused or rolling wildly. They shimmered into stillness, darkled with death, as the cardiac monitor sang the one long note that signified flatline.
        Celestina was maneuvered aside as the surgical team began resuscitation procedures. Stunned, she backed away from the table until she encountered a wall. In southern California, as dawn of this new momentous day looms nearer, Agnes Lampion still dreams of her newborn: Bartholomew in an incubator, watched over by a host of little angels hovering on white wings, seraphim and cherubim.
        In Oregon, standing at Junior Cain's bedside, turning a quarter across the knuckles of his left hand, Thomas Vanadium asks about the name that his suspect had spoken in the grip of a nightmare.
        In San Francisco, Seraphim Aethionema White lies beyond all hope of resuscitation. So beautiful and only sixteen.
        With a tenderness that surprises and moves Celestina, the tall nurse closes the dead girl's eyes. She opens a fresh, clean sheet and places it over the body, from the feet up, covering the precious face last of all.
        And now the stilled world starts turning again…
        Lowering his surgical mask, Dr. Lipscomb approached Celestina, where she stood with her back pressed to the wall.
        His homely face was long and narrow, as though pulled into that shape by the weight of his responsibilities. In other circumstances, however, his generous mouth might have shaped an appealing smile; and his green eyes had in them the compassion of someone who