J. Ellis’s children were a source of unending pride for him. Never a misstep with either of them. Johnston Reed, Junior, and Elizabeth Reed Miller were both college graduates who had married well, procreated well, and were known as highly respected, upstanding citizens of Wooster. Important pillars of their community. J. Ellis would never have admitted favoritism, but it was Betty. Betty was her father’s daughter.

“Daddy, I know I said it before, but I simp-ly can-not believe it.” She’d bypassed his outstretched hands and marched the cake carrier straight to the maple credenza in the dining room, placing it firmly on the lace runner. “How dare someone do this to you!”

She had brushed her white gloves together before tugging them off, one finger at a time, and set them on the dining room table, then with hands on hips demanded to know where the plates and the cake knife were. Oh, and the forks. The dessert forks.

J. Ellis had feared he might not have the energy for that particular visit from his favorite child and had leaned slightly into the front door he’d still held open. It had been a relief to let the sunlight in, since the photographers weren’t there anymore.

“You know, if you’d hire someone like Dolly,” Betty had scolded, “you wouldn’t have to do all this yourself.”

He knew. It was a conversation they’d had before, and J. Ellis would not be entertaining it again, particularly not when he had the bank business to worry about. He was simply not comfortable with hiring a colored woman to clean and cook for him. He had argued that he wanted Betty’s mother to feel useful. She had a tendency toward depression when she didn’t have enough to do (that was true). And, she had been named after Florence Nightingale, for Christ’s sake. It was her job to take care of him.

“Where’s Mother?” she said, as if reading his mind. “MOTHER?”

Betty had marched over to the foot of the stairs and shouted in the direction of her parents’ bedroom, where Florence had been resting her eyes and her mouth. They’d had an argument about how J. Ellis was considering handling the aftermath of the robbery. J. Ellis had shaken his head at his daughter and finally closed the front door.

“Well, Betts, what do you have for us, then?” he’d asked, heading for the credenza.

His head had been throbbing for at least two days as he’d tried to wrap his mind around the robbery and what to do about it. He’d hoped whatever she’d brought would go well with a stiff drink.

“I won’t try to take credit for it,” Betty had chirped from the landing in front of the stairs. “You know how I hate the kitchen. Dolly made it, but I read the recipe to her from the Home Comfort Cookbook. I knew it was just the thing!”

Of course, J. Ellis had thought to himself.

“It’s a pineapple upside-down cake,” she’d gone on. “Because that is what those rot-ten thieves have done to our town, turned it right upside-down. I can-not be-lieve the gall!”