They came cowardly to the gate and stopped. The boy asked, 'Yu certain yu ready for this?' The girl nodded, and they pushed the gate and came cowardly to the door and knocked.

'Who's there?' a female voice said from inside.

'Is me, Mummy,' the schoolgirl answered.

'School over a'ready? How yu reach home so early?' Miss Elsie started the question from inside the house and by the time she had finished it she had unlocked the door and was on the verandah. 'Is who this, Susan?'

'Is mi school friend, Mummy. Him come to tell yu something.'

'Yes, little man, yu have something to tell me?'

'Yes, ma'am,' the boy stuttered. He swallowed hard. 'I have something to tell yu, ma'am.'

But the boy stood there as if he were dazed and the girl set her eyes firmly on the mango tree.

'Well!' The woman demanded, 'Yu have something to say or not, boy?'

'Yes, Miss Elsie, ma'am, I have something to say, ma'am.'

But his mouth moved and no words came and his feet made little jerky movements. When Susan saw it, she said, 'Mummy, Anthony want to marry me.'

Miss Elsie was angry. 'What kind of foolishness yu coming with, Susan? Susan, how old yu is?'

Susan's voice broke as she spoke. 'Fifteen, mummy, mi is fifteen.'

Miss Elsie stood with her hands akimbo. Then she stepped off the verandah and went down under the mango tree. She came back up and said, 'Susie, is pregnant yu pregnant?'

But Susan was too scared to answer.

The boy called Anthony said, 'I will take care of the baby, Miss Elsie, a' swear it, ma'am. A' going to be a good father.'

'How old are you, boy?'

'Seventeen, ma'am.'

'Yu know the age of mi daughter, boy?'

'A' think she is fifteen, ma'am.'

'Let mi fill yu in, boy, my daughter is fourteen until November. But let me ask yu something else. Yu know what the age of consent is?'

Anthony didn't answer.

'Let mi ask yu again, boy, what the age of consent is!'

Anthony didn't answer.

'So yu get dumb all of a sudden. Let mi ask yu then if yu know what prison feel like!'

Now Anthony answered. 'Miss Elsie, a' going to stand up to mi responsibility, ma'am, a going to mind the baby.'

'Young man, you will stand up to your responsibility, yu say, and so will I. Come, Susan, wi going out the station.'

'No, mummy, please, a' beg yu, don't!'

'Gal, don't get mi miserable in here. Yu is the next one. Don't get mi miserable, a' say!' Miss Elsie was steaming. 'And you, bwoy, if yu press yu luck a' bawl rape, yu hear mi? Yu hear mi, bwoy?' She was loud and the people in the tenement yard had started to drift towards them. But Miss Elsie shouted at them, 'Unno don't have any dirty clothes fi wash? Mind unno own business, man!' She pushed the gate and came out on to the road. There she turned and went back into the yard and in a low voice asked: 'What is your surname, boy?'

'Hussey, ma'am.'

'And yu mother, what is her name?'

' Mavis from Gem Street, Miss Elsie.'

She was walking fast with those huge strides of hers and Susan was literally running behind her. And the people on the road saw and knew that something was wrong. They passed Miss Clarice's house that had been firebombed in the gang war. They hurried past the wholesale at the corner of Fleet and Elgin streets, they cut across the short cut through the uninhabited house on Beal Street, and they were there. But instead of going into the police station Miss Elsie stood there for a while, then said: 'Come, Susan, wi going home.'

The girl was surprised but said nothing.

Back home Miss Elsie gave a sigh. 'Of all the people on earth, why should such a thing happen to me?' she said resignedly.

Susan was silent.

'Susan,' Miss Elsie called, 'wi going to the doctor tomorrow. Yu going to have to wash it out.'

Susan's face was firm, determined. 'Mummy, I won't do any abortion if is that yu talking bout.'

'Wait, is what this a' hearing in the house a' can hardly pay rent for? Pickney, yu do as I say or come out!' Miss Elsie's expression was as hard as flint. Susan ran out to the verandah saying, 'A' wont do it, a' wont do it!'

Miss Elsie went into her dresser drawer and searched and when she found the picture she called, 'Come here, Susie,' and when Susan came, she said, 'Look on this. What yu see?'

'A man?' the girl said quizzically.

Miss Elsie's tone was harsh, painful. 'Susie, this is the sperm donor who is yu father. Now look on the picture and tell mi what yu see!'

Susan was perplexed.

Miss Elsie said, 'Yu don't see the striking resemblance to the boy yu carry here? Look on the nose and the two ears, look how the ears them look like fi spaceman ears. Is John Hussey pickney that! Is yu father son, Susie.'

The girl's mouth opened, but all that came out was, 'Mummy.'

Miss Elsie said, 'Is my name yu get; that is why yu name Smith. From the wutliss man hear that mi pregnant him disappear into thin air. Is that bwoy him get with beggy-beggy Mavis from Gem Street.' She paused and gave Susan a look of great concern, maybe even of love, then added: 'Yu see

why yu must flush it out, Susie?'

The doctor's office seemed especially dark. There was a slew of medical certificates and degrees framed on the wall; a few religious paintings; one large poster telling people to get tested for HIV and to call the AIDS helpline soon; and there was a poster of a pregnant woman, which Susan stared at for quite a while.

The doctor seemed almost too young to be a doctor. Susan asked him, 'How old are you?' and the doctor smiled and said, 'Old enough to be a doctor.'

Miss Elsie fidgeted in her chair. 'A' want yu tell her what yu tell mi, doctor.'

'O, yes,' the doctor said, as if he had forgotten the whole thing. He cleared his throat and in a low voice said: 'Yes, little one, you find that when people of close kin copulateÉ' He stopped and to Susan seemed to become serious. Then he relaxed his face again. 'All that big word means is to make love. So when people that are closely related have sex there is a very, very good chance that the baby born will be deformed.'

The doctor saw the shocked look on the girl's face. 'Yes,' he went on. 'Sometimes it's as mild as a leg being deformed, sometimes it's worse: two legs; both hands; both hands and a leg. Sometimes it is the brain. So you see, it is serious business we are dealing with here.'

'So is that yu want, Susan? Deform pickney?' Miss Elsie asked her.

Susan looked frightened. She said nothing for a while as her mother and the doctor looked at her. Then she said firmly: 'Abortion is wrong. I am going to carry the baby.'

The doctor shrugged. He had done what he could.

The drive home in the robot taxi was eternal. They said nothing to each other.

The next morning, when Susan was putting her clothes on for school, Miss Elsie asked her: 'Is where yu going? Big woman don't go to school. Is my hard earn money mi work out miself pon night shift yu going to spend, Miss Big Woman?'

'Mummy, I intend to go to school until a' start to show, with or without your help.'

The girl dressed herself and went out through the gate. As the old board and zinc gate slammed behind her, Miss Elsie rushed out and said, 'Aright, take this,' and gave her lunch money.

Susan was getting stout. Since she had stopped going to school she had not seen Anthony, whom her mother had told, 'Don't put yu foot round here.' She was by now used to the crude remarks of the people in the tenement yard. Comments like, 'That is all inna them head, man,' and: 'A' long time she a dweet, she never know she woulda get catch.'

But Miss Elsie was gradually coming around, accepting the fact that her only child would be having a child at fifteen. What she found harder to accept was who the father was. She brought up the issue many times to begin with, but less these days. Still, in her eyes Susan saw the worry that the child might be born deformed.

It was not until the eighth month of her pregnancy that Miss Elsie finally asked 'What yu going to call the baby, Susie?'

'Well, if it is a girl, I'll call her Elizabeth.'

'And if it is a boy?'

'If it is a boy I will call him Matthew.'

'No. No.' Miss Elsie said. 'If it is a boy call him Michael, That is what I would have called you if you was a boy.'

They smiled. And Miss Elsie said, 'Please, Susie, never mention the relation of that boy to anybody, especially the people in the yard.'

'Yes, mummy.'

Michael was born with Miss Elsie at Susan's side. He seemed perfectly okay until about the time he started walking. To Miss Elsie, the child seemed to be leaning toward the left as he walked. Miss Elsie was paranoid now; Susan had been warned, she said.

But as the child grew older there was no sign of that weakness and the doctor dismissed it as the child not developing enough strength at the time.

So the child grew and made his mother and grandmother proud. And Susan, after having him, went back to school.

- Clarence Chance