All the way there, she sat quiet, numb with fear, while the men and women in the car talked of a “good Christian environment” where Rose would learn the Bible, and learn how to be “a good girl” and come back to her aunts “an obedient Christian child.”

The “home” exceeded Rose’s worst fears.

She was met by the minister Dr. Hays and his wife, Mrs. Hays, both of whom were well dressed and smiling and gracious.

But as soon as the police were gone and they were alone with Rose, they told her that she must admit all the bad things she’d done or Amazing Grace wasn’t going to be able to help her. “You know the things you’ve done with boys,” Mrs. Hays said. “You know what drugs you’ve used, the kind of music you’ve been listening to.”

Rose was frantic. She’d never done anything bad with boys, and her favorite music was classical. Sure she did listen to rock music but—. Mrs. Hays shook her head. Denying who and what she had done was bad, said Mrs. Hays. She did not want to see Rose again until Rose had had a change of attitude.

Rose was given ugly shapeless clothes to wear, and escorted everywhere around the grim sterile buildings by two older students who stood guard over her even when she had to use the bathroom. They would not give her a minute of privacy. They watched her when she performed the most delicate of bodily functions.

The food was unbearable, and lessons were reading and copying Bible verses. Rose was slapped for making eye contact with other girls, or with teachers, or for trying to “talk,” or for asking questions, and made to scrub the dining room on her hands and knees for failing to show a “good attitude.”

When Rose demanded to call home, to talk to her aunts about where she was, she was taken to “a time-out room,” a small closet with one high window, and there she was beaten with a leather belt by an older woman who told her that she had better show a change of attitude now, and that if she didn’t she’d never be allowed a phone call to her “family.”

“Do you want to be a bad girl?” asked the woman sorrowfully. “Don’t you understand what your parents are trying to do for you here? Your parents don’t want you now. You rebelled, you disappointed them.”