One afternoon, they had arranged to meet for a matinee at the Loews Poli movie theater in downtown New Haven, and Lu arrived there first. That had happened before. Ricky often stayed at the beach in his brothers’ cottage, and he had to take the trolley or ride his motorcycle into town. Since there was no telephone at the cottage, he had no way of calling if he was late. So Lu wasn't worried—at first. Then the minutes stretched into an hour. Then two hours. Then four. Lu waited through three showings of the movie. Finally, unable to bear the pitying looks from the ticket taker, she left.

It occurred to Lu that maybe she had been stood up—or even dropped. Maybe the long, frustrating afternoons had gotten to be too much for Ricky. But then she rejected the idea. If Ricky had wanted to stop seeing her, he would have told her. He wouldn't have made a plan to meet her and then let her cool her heels at a movie theater until she got the hint. Besides, Ricky didn't want to stop seeing her, she was sure of that. But still… he hadn't shown up. By the time she reached her house, she was getting scared. There were so many things that could have happened to him. He could be sick. He could have had an accident on the motorcycle … he drove it way too fast… She was desperate to know what had happened to him, but she couldn't call his house. No one in his family knew about her.

She helped her mother set the table and took her place for dinner, wondering if she should call Mrs. Benedetto. But what would she say? She couldn't very well tell her former teacher who had loved and believed in her that she'd been sneaking around seeing Ricky for months.

Paulie's voice broke into her thoughts. “Tommy Gaspari is missing in action,” he announced.

“Madonna!” Mama dropped her knife and fork on her plate with a clatter. War talk upset her.

“Are you sure? How do you know?” Lu demanded.

“I heard it today at the ballpark.”

“How long has he been missing?” Lu fired the question, even though Mama's face was dead white. Normally she would have changed the subject, but this was about Ricky's brother. No wonder he hadn't shown up at the movie theater!

“The guys at the park didn't know for sure,” Paulie said. “Tommy's Seventh Army. That's Patton. And Tommy's a paratrooper—so everyone's saying he could have been in the invasion of Sicily.” Paulie threw a quick look at Mama. “They say the Gas-paris just heard about it today and the old man is trying to pull strings in Washington to find out what's going on—”