“I took time alone with Sweetheart in the kitchen, helping her dry her tears on her apron and assuring her that I was not insane.

“The moment is deeply inscribed in my memory because Sweetheart, who was always pure kindness, said softly to me that ‘things went terribly wrong with Patsy’ and she didn’t want for things to go badly for me.

“ ‘My daughter could have had a Sweet Sixteen Party in New Orleans,’ Sweetheart said. ‘She could have made her debut. She could have been a maid in the Mardi Gras krewes. She could have had all that—Ruthie and I could have managed everything—and instead she chose to be what she is.’

“ ‘Nothing’s going wrong with me, Sweetheart,’ I said. ‘Don’t misjudge Lynelle or me either.’ I kissed her and kissed her. I lapped her tears and kissed her.

“I might have pointed out to her that she herself had abandoned all the refinements of New Orleans for the spell of Blackwood Manor, that she had spent her whole life in the kitchen, only leaving it for paid guests. But that would have been mean of me. And so I left it with assurances to her that Lynelle was teaching me more than anybody ever had.

“Lynelle and I gave up on the question of insight or commiseration with others as to Goblin—except for Aunt Queen—and Lynelle believed me when I complained of how difficult it was sometimes to stop Goblin’s assaults.

“For instance, if I wanted to read for any length of time, I had to read aloud to Goblin. And that, I think, is why I am a slow reader to this day. I never learned how to speed through a text. I pronounce every word aloud or in my head. And in those times I shied away from what I couldn’t pronounce.

“I got through Shakespeare thanks to Lynelle bringing the films of the plays for me to see—I particularly loved the films with the actor and director Kenneth Branagh—and she took me through a little Chaucer in the original Middle English, but I found it extremely hard all around and insisted we give it up.

“There are gaps in my education which no one could ever get me to fill. But they don’t matter to me. I don’t need to know science or algebra or geometry. Literature and music, painting and history—these are my passions. These are the things that still, somehow, in hours of quiet and lonesomeness, keep me alive.

“But let me close out the history of my love of Lynelle.

“A great high point came right before the end.

“Aunt Queen called from New York on one of her rare visits to the States and asked if Lynelle could bring me there, and both of us—along with Goblin—were delirious with joy. Sweetheart and Pops were glad for us and had no desire themselves to be away from the farm. They understood Aunt Queen’s wishes not to come home just now, but they wanted her to know that they were having her room entirely redone, as she had requested, in Lynelle’s favorite color blue.