Free Safe Passage by Ellyn Bache

not see him. A cry, faint and far away, as if he'd been caught in the drainage culvert that ran underneath the driveway. Mag bent to examine the culvert, but of course he wasn't in it, and still the cry came: her son, tortured, trapped.
         She expected to faint but understood she wouldn't until she found him. She became surprisingly strong. Holding Gideon's hand, she followed the sound toward the Durrells ' house. Realizing that he was inside—inside!—she did not knock on the door but opened the screen, which was not locked, and pulled Gideon in with her. The crying was louder now, and the sound of a woman's harsh voice led them through the hall and into the kitchen. By the sink stood her neighbor, Susan Durrell , dressed in fashionable slacks and a sweater, holding Percival by the arm, preparing to bring a long-handled metal spoon down on the back of his jeans.
         "What the hell are you doing?" Mag screamed. She started to lunge for Susan but Gideon held her back, clinging to her leg like a ball and chain. Her heart knocked unevenly and a black rage grew in her chest. Susan Durrell , startled, let go of Percival. He ran to Mag and grabbed her other leg. She couldn't move at all.
         "If you can't discipline him," Susan said through her teeth, ''someone has to."
         Mag's rage grew until the room was black with it, but the boys held onto her slacks and whimpered. "You stupid bitch," she said. "I could have you arrested for assault."
         "On what evidence? The word of a three-year-old street urchin? Your word?" Susan smiled, more like an animal baring its teeth. "Obviously you don't care what things look like, but we have a nice home here and we're trying to grow grass .
         "Grass," Mag said. "You were going to beat my child because he put a dent in your grass ?"
         "We don't have any children here, and we don't want any. Susan's face was a maniacal white.
         "You really are out of your mind," Mag said.
         "Do you understand what I'm saying? We do not want your six or eight little maniacs putting ruts in our yard and tearing up our bushes and picking our flowers. If you can't keep track of them, someone has to. I think now this one at least"—she pointed to Percival—"will stay the hell away."
         "I think," Mag told her, moving the children toward the door, "that if you want so much privacy and no kids on your lawn, you better start building your moat and drawbridge."
         "Just keep them off our property," Susan said.
         "If you ever lay a hand on one of them again—if you ever so much as talk to them—you can kiss your sweet suburban life good-bye. I mean that literally."
         Susan Durrell blanched, though Mag would not have thought that possible on top of her previous pallor. Percival stopped crying.
         "If she ever says anything else to you, I'm going to beat her up," she told him as they wheeled his tricycle back up the hill in the rain. "Don't tell Daddy."
         Percival clapped. She believed he was undamaged. She'd swatted him many times herself, on a bare butt, with a hand and not a spoon. But still.
         She never mentioned the incident to Patrick. The next day she bought a complete herbicide at the garden center. Early the following morning, before the sun or the twins were up, she walked down to the childless Durrells ' yard, and sprayed and sprayed. A week later, the lawn began to die—first in patches and then all over, where she had sprayed. Susan Durrell , knowing full well who'd done it but with no hard proof, left the children alone—even Alfred and Izzy , who sensed what had happened and began to make a path across the Durrells ' lawn every day on their way home from school. The next spring the Durrells sold their house. Mag understood that she was in control absolutely—of protecting her children, caring for them, defending them, nurturing them. Until then she had been a child herself, not wanting