While she wicked canned milk on a twisted piece of muslin so Ruth could suckle, she sent Jake to the nearest neighbor for a bottle and then to the sheriff. After thirty days, when no one came forward to claim the baby, Jake and Edna decided enough was enough and declared they were keeping the child. Since no one had a better idea, no fuss was made, and the baby, named Ruth after Jake’s mother, became a Wheeler.

Mama brushed imaginary dust from her starched blue linen dress and adjusted the red silk scarf, reserved for opening day, and moistened red lips made brighter by a peaches-and-cream complexion. Mama didn’t wear makeup as a general rule but made an exception the first day of the season.

Mama turned to Ruth and slipped an unruly dark strand behind a cinnamon ear already tanning in the sun.

“I’m not a baby,” Ruth complained. “And why can’t I wear lipstick?”

Mama licked her thumb and dragged the damp edge over a smudge of charcoal above Ruth’s right eyebrow. “You’re not a baby,” she said with some regret. “But still too young for lipstick.”

“Just a little?”

“No.”

“When will I be old enough?”

A half smile tweaked her lips, as if she were recalling a conversation she’d had with her own mother once. “Not this year.”

“I bet the other girls will be wearing it.”

Ruth was referring to Dora, Jessie, and Bonnie, three girls who had been vacationing at the Seaside Resort since the war had ended. The girls and Ruth had all been about seven years old when they’d first met, but Mama had been careful to keep distance between her daughter and the other girls.

“Remember what I said about the line separating guests and staff. They’re on one side, and Daddy, you, and I are on the other.”

“Do you think they’ve forgotten me?” Ruth asked.

“You’re a hard one to forget,” Mama said. “Now go and find Talley and see if she needs help around the pool. Check-in time isn’t for another hour.”

“Okay.”

Talley Jones was a cousin Ruth had learned about weeks ago, when Mama announced she’d be working here for the summer. Talley had arrived yesterday on the Greyhound bus that stopped in Great Bridge. Ruth and her father had driven the hour and a half to pick her up, and when Talley stepped off the bus, her brown suitcase clutched in her right hand, her expression was a mixture of fear and excitement. Ruth pegged her as Mama’s kin, given her fair skin and light hair. When Talley saw Ruth coming toward her, calling out her name, the tension eased from her shoulders.

Talley was bunking in Ruth’s room, sleeping in the twin bed across from hers. When Talley had climbed to the top floor of the cottage, she’d stared out at the ocean dumbstruck for a good ten minutes. So far, she was still afraid of the waves and hadn’t let the water roll up to her bare toes.