“If you ever touch my child again, I'll call the police and have you arrested.”

“And if I ever see you doing that to her again, I'm going to testify against you in court, and well see who gets arrested.” There were no thanks for what she had done, but she knew enough about situations like these not to expect that. Gabriella was just grateful that she'd been able to help the little girl and stop her from hurting. But the little girl was halfway out the door with her coat on now, and crying for the gingerbread house she'd been promised, and which her mother hadn't purchased.

“But Mommy, you said I could have one!”

“Not now, Allison. Not after what you've just done, we're going straight home and I'm going to tell Daddy what a bad little girl you were today and he's going to spank you! You embarrassed Mommy in front of all these people.” She was concentrating on the child and didn't see the horrified expression on the faces of all the other people. She was truly a monster, but nothing about what she was seeing was new to Gabriella.

“But you hurt my arm!” the child was saying imploringly, looking back over her shoulder at Gabriella, wanting to stay, wanting to seek protection from the only kind lady she'd ever met. It reminded Gabbie instantly of Marianne Marks, the woman who had let her try on her tiara, and how she had wished that she had been her daughter. There were always people like that crossing the paths of children in distress, and they never knew or saw the longing they spawned in these terrified children.

Gabriella watched Allison fly out the door, pulled sharply along by her mother. She got no gingerbread house that afternoon. She got nothing. And she was being told how terrible she was as they left, how it was all her fault, how her mother would never have to spank her if she weren't so naughty. It made Gabriella feel physically ill as she watched them, and she turned toward the Baums with a glazed expression. But what she saw there startled her even more than what she had seen happen to the child called Allison at the hands of her mother. They were furious with her. They had never been part of a scene like that before, and they were outraged that she had put them in an awkward spot, challenged a customer, no matter how wrong she was, and cost them the sale of one of their gingerbread houses. In fact, Mrs. Baum had decided, watching her, that Gabriella was probably crazy. And she had been for a minute. With very little additional provocation she would have gladly slapped the woman in the mink coat so she could understand what it felt like. Gabriella's memories were extremely clear on the subject. She could still remember the piercing sound when her mother had hit her so hard she ruptured her eardrum.

“Take your apron off,” Mr. Baum said quietly, as both customers and other employees watched them. “You're fired!” he said, holding out a hand for the white apron, while his wife nodded her approval.

“I'm sorry, Mr. Baum,” Gabriella said quietly, not arguing for her job, but only for the salvation of one small child, who had no one else in the world to defend her. “I had to do that.”

“You had no right to interfere. It's her child, she has a right to do anything with her she wants to.” It echoed the voices of an entire world, which believed that parents had a right to do anything they wanted to their children, no matter how cruel, or dangerous, or inhumane, or violent. But if no one were to stop them? What then? Who would ever defend those children? Only the strong, and the brave. Not the cowards like the Baums, or her father, who had let it all happen to her. No one had ever stepped in for her either.

“And if she kills her? What then? What if she stood here in your store and killed her? What if she goes home and does it now, Mr. Baum? What then? What will you say tomorrow when you read about it in the paper? That you're sorry, that you wish you'd helped… that you never knew? You knew. We all know. We see it, and most of the time people walk right by it, because they don't want to know, because it scares the hell out of them, and it's embarrassing, and it's just too damn painful. What about the child, Mr. Baum? It's painful for her too. It was her arm that was hanging out of the socket, not her mother's.”

“Get out of my restaurant, Gabriella,” he said clearly, “and don't ever come back here. You're dangerous, and you're crazy.” And with that he turned to wait on his customers, who despite what they had seen and heard, just wanted to forget about it.

“I hope I am dangerous to people like that,” she said calmly, laying her apron on the counter. “I hope I always will be. It's people like you, who turn away from it, who are the real danger,” she said, looking at the crowd as well as her employers, who were too embarrassed to look at her. And with that, she picked up her coat from a hook at the door, and saw for the first time that Professor Thomas was watching. He had just walked in when the child began to cry and he had seen everything that had happened. He had seen it all with utter and complete amazement. He helped her put her coat on without a word, and walked out of the restaurant with his arm around her, and he could feel how violently she was shaking, but she stood tall and proud and she was crying when she finally faced him.

“Did you see what happened?” she whispered. Now that it was over she could hardly speak, and in spite of the warm coat she couldn't stop shaking. He walked her away from the restaurant and thought he had never admired anyone so much in his entire life, and he wanted to say so, but for a moment, he was almost too moved to say it.

“You're a remarkable woman, Gabriella. And I'm proud to know you. What you did in there was beautiful. Most people just don't understand it.”

“They're too afraid to,” she said sadly, as they walked away, with his arm still around her shoulders. He wanted more than anything to protect her, from the past as much as the future. “It's so much easier to pretend you don't see it. That's what my father always did. He just let her do it.” It was the first time she had talked about her childhood to him, and he knew there was more there, much more, and he had a feeling she was going to tell him about it when she was ready.

“Was it like that for you?” he asked sadly. He had never had children, but he couldn't imagine anyone treating them that way. It was beyond his realm of comprehension.

“It was much worse,” Gabriella said honestly. “My mother beat me senseless, and my father let her. The only thing that saved me finally is that she left me. I'm almost deaf in one ear now, I've had most of my ribs broken, I have scars, I had stitches, I had bruises, I had concussions. She left me bleeding on the floor, and then beat me harder because I stained the carpet. She never stopped until she left me.”

“Oh my God.” Tears sprang to his eyes as he listened to her, and he felt suddenly very old. He couldn't imagine the nightmare that had been her childhood, but he believed her. It explained a lot of things to him, why she was so careful about people, and so shy, why she had wanted to stay in the refuge of the convent. But what he saw in her now was why people told her she was strong. She was more than strong. She had the power of a soul that had defied the devil, she had lived through worse nightmares than anyone could ever dream of. And with all her scars and the things she described to him now, she had survived intact. She was a whole person, and a very strong one. Despite all her efforts to destroy her, her mother had never been able to kill her spirit. And he said as much to Gabriella as they walked home to Mrs. Boslicki's.

“That's why she hated me so much,” Gabriella said, walking tall next to him. She was proud of what she had done for the child in Baum's Restaurant. It had cost her her job, but to Gabriella, it was worth it. “I always knew she wanted to kill me.”

“That's a terrible thing to say about one's mother, but I believe you.” And then, with a worried frown, “Where is she now?”

“I have no idea. I suppose San Francisco. I never heard from her again after she left me.”

“That's just as well. You should never contact her again. She's caused you enough pain for one lifetime.” And he could understand even less the father who had never stopped it. They sounded like animals, worse than that, to Professor Thomas.

They walked into the boardinghouse together, hand in hand, and Mrs. Rosenstein saw them as soon as they walked in. She knew it was too early for Gabriella to come home, and she looked instantly worried. She thought maybe something had happened to him, and Gabriella had brought him home, but it was Gabriella who had had the problem.

“Are you all right?” she asked both of them with anxious eyes, and they both nodded.

“I just got fired,” Gabriella said calmly. She wasn't shaking anymore. She was strangely calm, and Professor Thomas went to his room to pour both of them a brandy.

“How did that happen?” Mrs. Rosenstein asked, as he returned with a small glass for her too, but she declined it, and he volunteered to drink it for her. “I thought everything was going so well for you there.”

“It was.” Gabriella smiled, feeling suddenly very free and very powerful, as she took a sip of the brandy. It burned her tongue and her eyes and her nose, but after it had burned her throat as well she decided that she liked it. “Everything was going fine, until I shot my mouth off, and threatened to slap one of their customers tonight.” Gabriella suddenly smiled, it almost sounded funny to her, except she and the professor knew that it wasn't.

“Did someone get fresh with you?” She imagined it was a man, and she was outraged that someone would do that to Gabriella.