“Yeah,” Verna said again. “I hope so, too. But the right thing for some folks is sometimes the wrong thing for others.” She let that hang in the air for a moment, then said, “Don’t forget. We’re talking to Bessie Bloodworth right after the meeting tomorrow. About Miss Jamison.” She grinned. “Also known as Lorelei LaMotte.”
“I won’t forget,” Lizzy said. “Good night, Verna.” She turned and began to walk down the street.
Verna turned to go the other way, took a few steps, then stopped and flung out her arms. “Don’t take it serious,” she called. She did a little soft-shoe shuffle. “Life’s too mysterious.”
Lizzy laughed and waved, then headed home, feeling a little lighter. Life might not be a bowl of cherries, but you could always find something that would cheer you up—as long as you lived in Darling, anyway.
FIVE
The Roof Falls In
Lizzy��s ample mother couldn’t fit comfortably into the narrow dining nook and Lizzy’s small house didn’t boast a dining room, so they would be eating at the kitchen table. Lizzy dressed it up for their Sunday dinner, spreading an embroidered tablecloth and setting it with her favorite yellow china plates, rimmed in green and decorated with decals of flowers and fruits. Her napkins were green, and in the middle of the table, she added a vase filled with pretty asters and cosmos and a few sprigs of autumn honeysuckle.
Lizzy stood back and surveyed her work, feeling satisfied. She and her mother would have a pleasant dinner and talk over whatever it was that her mother wanted to discuss—probably something trivial, like that green straw hat. She just wanted some attention, that was all, and Lizzy thought guiltily that she probably hadn’t visited her mother often enough the last few weeks. She would make it a point to drop in on her every few days. Then, when they had finished dinner, they would take their pie and coffee into the backyard, where they could enjoy the hollyhocks and morning glories still blooming along the fence and the marigolds and four o’clocks bordering the vegetable garden. And at one thirty, Lizzy would tell her mother that she had to leave for the Dahlias’ meeting. She had given quite a lot of thought to the way she would handle that worrisome business about the door key, and had a little speech already planned.
“Please stay and finish your coffee,” she would say, “but be sure and leave your key on the table when you go home. Otherwise, I’ll have to change the locks.” She would say it casually and sweetly but firmly, and then walk out the door and leave her mother to consider her options. Unlike her mother (by nature an argumentative person), Lizzy did not like disagreements. She always tried to think of a way to avoid unpleasant encounters.
But that wasn’t exactly the way things happened, for Mrs. Lacy delivered her news the moment she set foot in the kitchen, even before she took off the black gloves and wide-brimmed black straw hat with fanciful fuchsia flowers that she had worn to church. When she heard her mother’s announcement, Lizzy felt as if the roof had just fallen in on her, or the earth had opened up and swallowed her. In fact, she could think of nothing worse, unless it was cancer or tuberculosis, and even then there was sometimes a cure, and always hope, until the very end. But there was no cure for this, and no hope, either, as far as she could see.