“Listener,” Mama said again. “Bring your book and sit quietly and let the adults talk.” She opened her door and got out of the car. Leni rushed to meet her on the sidewalk.

Mama grabbed Leni’s hand and pulled her onto a walkway lined with sculpted hedges and up to a large wooden front door.

Mama glanced at Leni, muttered, “Here goes nothing,” and rang the bell. It made a deep clanging sound, like church bells, after which came the sound of muffled footsteps.

Moments later, Leni’s grandmother opened the door. In an eggplant-colored dress, with a slim belt at her waist and three strands of pearls around her throat, she looked ready for lunch with the governor. Her chestnut-colored hair was coiled and shellacked like one of those holiday bread loaves. Her heavily made-up eyes widened. “Coraline,” she whispered, coming forward, opening her arms.

“Is Dad here?” Mama asked.

Grandmother pulled back, let her arms drop to her sides. “He’s in court today.”

Mama nodded. “Can we come in?”

Leni saw how the question upset her grandmother; wrinkles settled in waves across her pale, powdered brow. “Of course. And Lenora. How lovely to see you again.”

Grandmother stepped back into the shadows. She led them through a foyer, beyond which were rooms and doorways and a staircase that swirled up to a shadowy second floor.

The home smelled like lemon wax and flowers.

She led them into an enclosed back porch with curved glass windows and giant glass doors and plants everywhere. The furniture was all white wicker. Leni was assigned a seat at a small table overlooking the garden outside.

“How I have missed you both,” Grandmother said. Then, as if upset by her own admission, she turned and walked away, returning a few moments later, carrying a book. “I remember how much you love to read. Why, even at two, you always had a book in your hands. I bought this for you years ago but … I didn’t know where to send it. She has red hair, too.”

Leni sat down and took the book, which she had read so often she had whole passages memorized. Pippi Longstocking. A book for much younger girls. Leni had moved on long ago. “Thank you, ma’am.”

“Call me Grandma. Please,” she said quietly; there was a tinge of longing in her voice. Then she turned her attention to Mama.

Grandma showed Mama to a white ironwork table over by one window. In a gilded cage nearby, a pair of white birds cooed at each other. Leni thought they must be sad, those birds who couldn’t fly.

“I’m surprised you let me in,” Mama said, taking a seat.

“Don’t be impertinent, Coraline. You’re always welcome. Your father and I love you.”

“It’s my husband you wouldn’t allow in.”

“He turned you against us. And all of your friends, I might add. He wanted you all to him—”