“I don’t know,” Hannah admitted as she followed her mother and Lisa into the kitchen. “I’ll throw it out, I guess. It’s too far gone for anyone to use.”

“Don’t do that!” Delores objected. “Are you getting your new ladder from Dad’s old store?”

“Of course I am. It’s the only hardware store in town, and I like Cliff Schumann and his dad.”

“Then why don’t you ask Cliff to deliver your new ladder and bring the old one to my house?”

“But it’s in pieces! Really, Mother . . . I don’t think anyone could fix it.”

“I won’t even try to have it fixed. I just want to keep it around for sentimental reasons.”

Hannah stared at her mother in confusion. Delores wasn’t usually this sentimental. But if Delores wanted the ladder, Hannah was perfectly willing to give it to her. “Okay. Whatever you want, Mother. I’ll call Cliff right now.”

“Thank you, dear.” Delores took her usual stool at the stainless-steel workstation while Lisa poured coffee and filled a platter with Red Velvet Whippersnapper Cookies from one of the two baker’s racks at the side of the kitchen.

Hannah headed for the wall phone in the kitchen, and less than a minute later, she’d ordered the new aluminum ladder for The Cookie Jar and given Cliff instructions to bag up the old wooden ladder and deliver it to her mother’s house.

“Okay,” she said, sitting down at the workstation and addressing her mother. “Now tell us about your emergency, or whatever it is.”

“Just because it may have been downgraded a bit doesn’t mean it’s not important,” Delores maintained.

“Agreed. Tell us, Mother.”

Delores sighed. “All right. The emergency, or situation, or whatever it is, is Ricky-Ticky.”

“Mayor Bascomb,” Lisa said, knowing that Hannah’s mother often used the nickname she’d given Mayor Bascomb when he was a small boy and she was his babysitter. “What else has he done?”

“What else?” Delores asked, and it was clear that she wasn’t sure what Lisa meant.

“Yes, what else has he done? Whatever it is, it couldn’t be worse than hiring Phyllis Bates and moving her here just because . . . well, you know why he did it. And then, when his wife, Stephanie, got wind of what was going on between the two of them, re-assigning Phyllis as Herb’s assistant in the town marshal’s office!”

Neither Hannah nor Delores knew quite what to say. They’d never seen Lisa quite so angry before. But there was no need to respond because Lisa didn’t bother to wait for a reply.

“At least Stephanie Bascomb got her revenge! I saw that diamond ring she made the mayor buy for her and it’s as big as a boulder!”