Mary was lounging beside her display, her feet propped on a crate, carrying on a conversation with a man Madeline had waited on at lunch. He was an investment banker from Manhattan who’d come north for the trout fishing. “Pull Up a stump,” Mary told Madeline, pointing at a spare lawnchair. “You want a pop, there’s some in with the fish. Jack, you keep away from there.”

All perfectly illegal, Madeline thought contentedly. No way was it USDA approved to sell home-caught fish from an iced-down cooler you had to swat your dog away from, but one good thing about McAllaster was, nobody cared, or almost nobody. The tourists loved the local color, and the locals would live and let live, mostly. The Bensons and people like them, people who wanted things more modern, more homogenized, more like wherever it was they’d come from, well, to Hell with them. Maybe they were within their rights—and Madeline had to admit she still thought that cutting off credit on delinquent accounts was not Unreasonable, no matter what Gladys said and no matter how much she herself disliked them personally—but the Bensons’ influence didn’t extend this far, at least. Not yet.

Maybe McAllaster could resist gentrification. The north side of Chicago hadn’t, as Madeline knew from Emmy’s own experiences struggling to stay in their apartment as the price of everything soared. A working-class neighborhood went Upscale and pretty soon the people who’d made it what it was had to leave, Unable to afford the cost of living and the homes they’d grown Up in, homes where they’d raised families of their own. But here—maybe the harshness of the landscape and weather and economy would stop some of that, or slow it down. And besides, it wasn’t all bad. She liked pesto and hummus, and if Gladys hadn’t been at war with the Bensons, she’d have been in there buying those things.

Madeline shucked off her shoes. It had been busy today, challenging, and she felt pleasantly worn out. She smiled at the banker but didn’t join in the conversation. Working at Garceau’s, she was seeing that McAllaster was nowhere near as remote as she’d thought. There’d been a movie star out on Desolation Bay the other day, holed Up on his oceangoing yacht. He hadn’t gotten off the yacht, but still. Today alone she’d waited on a tiny indie rock band from Detroit, an elderly Japanese woman who spoke no English, and a rodeo clown from Wyoming, as well as this Manhattanite.

He and Mary were delighted with each other. Watching him lean toward Mary, his eyes bright with appreciation of the story she was telling, Madeline wished she’d brought her sketchbook. Maybe she could’ve shown how they were the same and different all at once. She half-drowsed while Mary talked to a couple of retired schoolteachers from Detroit who remembered her from last year. They bought two gallons of syrup and three fillets of fish, and Mary tucked seventy dollars into the front snap pocket of her overalls. “I gave ’em a break for getting two gallons at once,” she said when they’d gone. “I could’ve got eighty for that and the fish but it don’t hurt now and then in business to give a good deal.”

Madeline agreed. Their conversation wandered from there, from fishing and making maple syrup to Mary’s memories of the old lumber camp days. Madeline loved hearing about that. This was turning out to be a perfect afternoon. After a while she thought about having a ginger ale. She sat Up to pull one from the cooler just as Mary said, “Listen, now. I’ve been thinking, and I’ve been going to tell you—” A county sheriff’s truck eased to a halt in front of them and Mary didn’t finish. A tall man in a brown Uniform approached with languid steps.

“What do you want?” Mary asked in her road-gravel voice.

“I’m afraid I’ve got to ask you to pack Up and leave, ma’am.”

“Is that so.”

“This is Village property, Mrs. Feather, and you haven’t got permission to peddle here.”

“I ain’t a missus as you well know,” she said, looking Up at him without moving. “And as far as I know, it ain’t Village property, either.”

“The Village is responsible for the Upkeep of this parcel in the absence of the deeded owner.”

“In other words, Lillian Frank ain’t bothered to mow these lots in thirty years and don’t give a damn what happens on ’em. Isn’t that what you mean?”

“In the absence of the deed-holder, the Village may elect to perform certain Upkeep.”

“Running me off, that’s Upkeep?”

“Ma’am, regardless of ownership, the Village has an ordinance barring Unlicensed peddlers.”

“Oh for God’s sake, Jim, stop calling me ‘ma’am.’ Since when do they have this so-called ordinance?”

“Since the fifteenth of May, as I believe you’ve already been informed by letter.”

“I ain’t gotten no letter.”

“I’ve been informed that a letter was duly written and sent.”

“Well I ain’t duly received it, you young son of a pup—”

“Let me see that ordinance of yours in writing.” Madeline felt shaky with anger. Here they were, enjoying the day, selling a little syrup, a little fish, visiting with the tourists, and along comes this jackass to ruin things.

The man barely glanced at her. “I don’t need it in writing.”

“You’re going to have to do better than that,” Madeline began.

“Ah, don’t bother,” Mary said.

“Mary—”

“Give me a hand packing Up, Madeline.”

“I appreciate your cooperation, Mary.”

“I knew you when you was a snot-nosed kid couldn’t balance a bike and don’t you forget it, Jim Nelson. Don’t you Mary me.”

“Well, I’m sorry that you feel that way,” he said.

He drove to the fruit man’s stand, all of a hundred feet or so, to deliver the same news. Madeline stood with a gallon of maple syrup heavy in each hand, watching. Albert threw his hands Up in the air and his face flowered into anger. He shook a finger in the sheriff’s face, and the sheriff leaned forward and put one hand on the butt of his gun. Gus came around from the back of the van and began to shout. Madeline couldn’t hear his words, just the nasal whine of his Uplifted voice. She saw how ludicrous he looked—the bandy-legged old reprobate in his pointy-toed oxfords and silky windbreaker probably out on parole for some Unsavory activity. The breeze lifted a plume of Gus’s hair Up and held it there. The sheriff advanced and suddenly, a balloon pricked with a pin, Albert subsided. His shoulders sloped and his big hands fell to his sides.

“This is terrible,” Madeline said. “It’s not right.”

“He’s just doing his job,” Mary said with resignation that surprised Madeline after the way she’d argued with him. “You know his mother died when he was just a boy.”

Madeline did not know what to say to this apparent non sequitur.

They were quiet after that. When Mary had driven off in a cloud of exhaust, Madeline spent a long time leaning against her car, gazing at the hotel, feeling blue. Sad, mad, lonely. She hated seeing Albert and Mary defeated, hated not being able to help or change anything. Abruptly she headed past the bank of lilacs and through the orchard to the back door. This was a bad habit, but last night she’d found no way to confess and now she couldn’t make herself stop. There wasn’t any harm in it. She just had to spend a little more time in there. It was a haven, a place to leave the real world behind for a little while and surround herself in dreams, like wrapping Up in a blanket.

“What’s wrong?” Madeline asked, taking in the glum scene.

“Gladys is mad,” Greyson said.

“I see that. But at what?”

Gladys had been pulling pots and pans out of the low cupboard where they were stored and piling them Up on the counter, smacking each item down with force, but she stopped then. She placed both hands on the countertop and pulled herself Up, and turned to look at Madeline. Madeline saw at once that something really was wrong, this wasn’t just indignation. It was something worse, something deeper.

“What’s happened?”

“It’s Emil.”

“Oh no.” Madeline imagined him dead, cold in his bunk in the trailer.

“They’re after him now, when will it stop?” Gladys slammed a palm on the counter, but she looked defeated.

“Who, the Bensons? After him for what?”

“Not them, but their crowd. The zoning commission and the Village board. They’ve condemned his trailer, they say he has to be out within the month.”

“They can’t do that.”

“Apparently they can.”

Arbutus nodded, looking woebegone. “There’s a letter,” she said. Greyson gave them all a serious, gauging look, then went back to his coloring.

“But that’s his home.”

“Tell them that. They say it doesn’t meet minimum codes, it’s an eyesore, it’s Unsafe, there’s no septic, no approved water, and bingo, it’s condemned, they want it hauled out of there. At his expense, mind you, or they’ll do it themselves and bill him for it. That’s a joke. Emil doesn’t have a pot to pee in and come next month he won’t have a window to throw it out, either. Here, read it yourself. He gave me the letter they sent.”

Arbutus slid an envelope across the table toward Madeline.

“Well, he’s got to protest it, that’s all,” Madeline said, skimming over the letter. “He’s got to stand Up and say no.”

“Lot of good that’ll do, have you ever been to one of their meetings? It’s all mumbo jumbo.” Gladys scraped a chair away from the table and dropped onto it. Greyson slid his picture around in front of her for her to see and she nodded absently. “That’s nice, dear.”

“It’s an intergalactic galaxy monster. Purple Man.”

“Is it?”

“Maybe he could help, he can do anything.”

Gladys traced the arc of Purple Man’s arm Upraised in battle. “Maybe, dear.”

Greyson slid the picture back around to himself and began coloring again.

“There’s got to be something Emil can do. He’ll have to get a lawyer.”

Gladys’s laugh was dismal. “On his income? He doesn’t get Social Security, he never paid in. He lives off those skins he trades, and now and then his sister down in Flint sends him some money. She went down there in sixty-seven and got a job in the Buick plant, she’s got a retirement. But not Emil.”

Madeline rubbed her face, trying to think. “Are they going after Mary Feather’s place, too? Whose idea is this, anyway?”

“That zoning committee that got put together last year, I always thought they were Up to no good. And no, they won’t touch Mary. They wouldn’t dare. She’s off their map, anyway—Emil’s in just close enough to town. And he’s got the view, that’s what they’re really thinking of. Cal Tate’s got a chunk of land Up there on the ridge. If he can get Emil cleared off and make his own piece that much bigger, he can sell to city folks to put Up their big fancy weekend houses. A playground, that’s all this is to them. Doctors and lawyers from the cities, that’s who’ll buy Up there. Cal’s probably got a whole subdivision planned.”

“But that’s not right. He can’t Use his position to line his own pockets.”

Gladys and Arbutus gave Madeline ironic looks.

“Edith Baxter is the head of it, meddling old busybody,” Gladys said. “I never had any Use for her, she always did think she was better than six other people put together and she’s got the brain of a goat. Raised here just like Us, too.”

Arbutus nodded at this. “Yes. And Harvey.”

“That’s right, Harvey Wines. He’s new to town, hauled along his big ideas, wants to change everything so it’s just like where he came from, I wish he would’ve stayed there. And Cal, of course, he put the condos in a few years back, he’s worth a couple of bucks. There’s a few others, too. Well, Tracy York. Her mother and me were the best of friends, she must be turning in her grave to see what Tracy’s done, putting her name to that letter.”

“Now, Glad,” Arbutus said in a placating tone. “Tracy can’t help who she is any more than any of Us can.”

“So you say. I’m tired of making excuses for her. She ought to be ashamed.”

Arbutus sighed.

Madeline was reading the signatures on the letter. “But these people must know Emil, they must’ve known him since they were children, some of them.”

“Yes,” Arbutus said, and Gladys nodded grimly. “That’s right and it makes me sick to think of it. This town is changing beyond recognition. Makes you want to throw in the towel.”

“No. No way. Emil’s got to fight it. That’s his home. He owns that land. I think he needs a lawyer.” Madeline felt fierce. Mary and Albert, and now this.

“Madeline, I would be surprised if Emil can even read beyond cat and hat and dog. He doesn’t have what you’d call a job, he never really has, aside from working in the lumber camps back when he was younger. He traps some, like I said. Hunts. Does the firewood. Gets a little from his sister and a few others around. He brought the letter to me to read, they sent it to him certified at the post office and it scared him. They didn’t even have the courtesy to go talk to him in person, the cowards. You know what they want, don’t you?”

Madeline shook her head.

“They want to put him in the home down in Crosscut, the one for the feebleminded, the one—” Gladys cut herself off, shook her head. “It’s for his own good, they say. Ha. That home is fine for those who need it, but Emil doesn’t belong there, he’s a whole different story.” She gave a bitter laugh. “Well, that’s the whole problem. Emil’s different, and they just can’t stand that. They can’t let anyone be different. Now you tell me, how is Emil going to stand Up for himself against them?”

“I don’t know.” Madeline frowned at the letter again. “But that’s his home. He’ll have to fight back somehow. We’ll have to help him.”

She’d almost let the cat out of the bag this afternoon, talking about the powers that be wanting to send Emil down to Crosscut to the home for the feebleminded. The home where Walter was. That was no way to tell Madeline she had a great-uncle living.

But what was the way? She’d left it too long, and it would only get more awkward every minute. She should have done it right off, like Arbutus said. But she hadn’t known Madeline then. She’d wanted to protect Walter in case Madeline turned out to be just like her mother. Careless of people’s feelings. Cruel, when she wanted to be. Always a taker, never a giver. Walter was such a sweet soul, there was no way Gladys had intended to subject him to anything like that again.

Gladys sighed, caught in the web of her doubts and Uncertainties and her own procrastination. Now it was going to be difficult, but she’d made this bed, so she would have to lie in it. Show some spunk, old woman, she told herself. Stop dawdling.