At a loss as to what to do, I ordered Peg to take the others home and asked Charlotte to help me load Miss Wise into her Cadillac. Charlotte took a step away from the car to close the door, but Miss Wise practically yanked her inside.

“Don’t leave me, Irene! Please!”

“But I’m Char —”

“No. We can’t let them separate us . . .” Miss Wise’s entire body trembled in an unfathomable fear.

Charlotte’s worried eyes connected with mine, neither one of us having a clue who Irene was, but the pain in that woman’s deep, raspy voice had me nodding my head for my sister to get in the back seat. I hurried around to the driver’s side and drove Miss Wise home.

Home was a gloomy wooden structure that faded into a weathered gray, looking as dreary as its owner.

“Sure could use a coat of paint,” Charlotte muttered as we pulled up. At the age of nine, my sister already seemed to have found her calling for decorating and such, always sprucing something up or rearranging furniture.

“And some of Foxy’s flowers,” I added, eyeing the barren yard and empty flower boxes under the two front windows that didn’t even have shutters dressing them up. I put the car in park and cut the engine, angling slightly to the stooped figure in the passenger seat. Her tangled hair barely held on to the lopsided bun. “Miss Wise, we got you home.”

She lifted her head and slowly blinked. After a few more blinks, the trancelike state cleared away. “Huh?” Her unfocused eyes cut to me.

She went from a trance to a state of confusion, so I didn’t know if we should walk her inside or go to the hospital. “Uh . . . Charlotte and I . . . we drove you home from church. Are you not feeling well? You need to go to the emergency room?”

Miss Wise exaggerated a blink, then scrubbed her hands down her face. “No, no. I’m fine,” she said from behind her hands and then dropped them to peer out the windshield, appearing uncertain as to what to do next. Her and me both.

I looked at Charlotte in the rearview mirror. She whirled a finger beside her ear and mouthed, Crazy. I shook my head, took a deep breath, and opened my door. “Let’s get you inside, okay?”

“Oh . . . Okay.”

I hurried around to Miss Wise’s side of the car and opened the door. She unfolded her long, narrow body from the car with Charlotte climbing out behind her. Her stride was so feeble that my sister and I instinctively flanked her all the way to the door. Once she unlocked the door, we retreated down the three porch steps.

“Do come in,” Miss Wise said.