''It cometh and it goeth, it cometh and it goeth, '' Mrs. Geisel says, singsong and wry, ''and that was my father, too.''

When Mrs. Geisel is 5, her mother decides to live in a nurses' dormitory to save money. She sends her daughter to live with a friend in New Rochelle, N.Y., for five years, visiting on weekends. Later she studies nursing at Indiana University. She knows, looking at the application form, that she is supposed to say she wants to be a nurse ''to serve humanity,'' but she writes what she really wants: to be in the center of the action.

AT 25, she marries Grey Dimond, a fellow student who becomes a cardiologist. After the Dimonds move to La Jolla, they became friends of the Geisels. In October 1967, says Judith and Neil Morgan's biography ''Dr. Seuss & Mr. Geisel'' (Random House, 1995), Helen Geisel, in frail health, takes an overdose of barbiturates. She leaves a note to her husband.

''I am too old and enmeshed in everything you do and are that I cannot conceive of life without you,'' it reads in part. ''My going will leave quite a rumor, but you can say I was overworked and overwrought. Your reputation with your friends will not be harmed.''

The following summer, Audrey Dimond marries Ted Geisel. Her daughters are sent away.

Audrey Geisel did the same thing to her daughters that her mother did to her, she is told.

''Not entirely,'' she says, with unsparing self-appraisal. ''I think she did it out of absolute necessity, you know, as the wife of one who cometh and goeth. She's a better person than I am, Gunga Din.''

Mrs. Geisel is proud of her contributions to Ted Geisel's work. She doesn't want to sound self-centered, she says, but his editors at Random House told her ''his juices were getting diluted and he needed something to start him again.'' She also says she improved his appearance.