Michael Malone - Weebly

ehind which to preserve human beauty. No shield was
strong enough. Keats ran in the teacher's mind still.
"And Joy, whose hand is ever at his lips / Bidding adieu;
And aching pleasure nigh, / Turning to poison while the
bee-mouth sips."
Cecil Hedgerow kissed his sleeping daughter; she
brushed her hand across her face and turned to the
side. Alone downstairs he opened the violin case that
sat atop Pauline's old upright piano, but before he could
begin his evening practice, someone knocked at the
kitchen door.
Jack Strummer wanted to know if Joy was upstairs
with Polly.
She had sneaked out of her room apparently, after
her mother had forbidden her to get out of bed. "Jesus,
Peggy's mad as a hornet. But I say, what the hell, let the
kid have some fun. Just starting her vacation and all.
You know Peggy. Not here, right? Bet you anything a
bunch of them went up to the lake and all just like we
used to."
Hedgerow was walking his neighbor across the