Dangers of Mental Illness

Cecil Lockhart's condition starts out as depression after the loss of her child. However, it goes untreated and eventually Cecil loses control of her sanity and her morals. She becomes out of touch with reality. A strange hint of this is when someone at the reunion comments that she looks like Gloria Swanson, that her hair is purposely white now. Although she has had a fairly notable career, Cecil cannot maintain her sanity when the only thing she really wants is the baby who could not survive more than a week. To take someone else's child is an act of insanity which, in Cecil's case, gradually becomes worse. Cecil even dyes Ben's hair brown so that no one will recognize him and, according to Sam, is a good mother, so, although she is able to function for a while under these circumstances, her twisted and...