“Of course, Jack Mickelson thought he was too good for anyone in this town,” Mrs. Fryt went on. “He always was the most supercilious boy. I’ll never forget when he hit a baseball right through my dining room window. I was in my kitchen stirring up a rhubarb cake and I heard an awful crash in the dining room. I ran in there and wouldn’t you know it, there was his baseball. The window was gone, and I saw children in the Mickelson yard, up there on the hill, giggling and catcalling.

“I recognized Jack with the bat in his hand, and I was not surprised. I suppose he was about nine years old then. Well, I snatched up that ball and marched right out there. And did those children run! Except for Jack. He didn’t even look worried.”

“That sounds like Jack Mickelson,” said Corinne.

“He was just as cheerful as could be! ‘Thanks for bringing my ball back, Mrs. Fryt!’ he said. ‘Sorry I hit it through your window.’”

Dolly laughed in spite of herself, thinking, I’d like to meet Jack Mickelson.

“‘You ought to be ashamed of yourself!’ I told him. But he just plucked that ball from me like he was picking a blueberry, and he said, ‘I’m sorry, Mrs. Fryt. Send my dad the bill; he’ll pay you for the window.’”

“Those Mickelsons and their money,” Judy sniffed, with a little sneer of her bright pink lips.

“Yes,” Mrs. Fryt said. “I wasn’t about to let him get away with that. I asked to see his mother. So he called for Wilma, and when she appeared, wouldn’t you know, she was wiping her hands on an apron. Trying to keep up appearances! Even though everyone knew she didn’t do a lick of work around that house—she had two maids and a cook!—and spent all day playing that piano. If only I could have had the luxury. You ladies remember, she had that haughty nose, and the corners of her mouth turned down even when she didn’t intend to frown!

“Well, she came down the steps, holding her head high that way she did. You should have seen the dress she was wearing that afternoon: a high-necked sky-blue thing that looked like it wanted to go to tea with the Vanderbilts. You ladies remember the clothes she wore. Never a thing not custom made for her down at the Style Shoppe. Not until the thirties, anyway; maybe she started shopping at Birnbaum’s and Penney’s then.”

“I’m sure she did,” said Thelma.

“Well, do you know what she said, when I told her what had happened? She just looked at me and said, ‘Jack is getting awfully good at baseball!’”

Dolly laughed with the others.

But Mrs. Fryt frowned. “It was Wilma that did the family in, I’m convinced of it. Almost before it even began.”