“Do I detect a sour note?"

“Oh, just the usual, I guess. It was a weird childhood, never having a home or friends for more than a year before uprooting all over again."

“But you've got a home of your own now." "And they'll have to take me out of it on a gurney!" Jane said, getting up from the table.

“Stay a minute and tell me about these chapters. I don't think I can get them all read by this evening."

“Sorry. Can't stay. I've started a fake autobiography I want to type up.""A fake autobiography?"

“Yes, I'm really having fun. Her name is Priscilla. She was born in 1773 and she has a very mysterious past—"

“Jane! Let me read it!"

“Not now. Not until I mess around with it a little more," Jane said. She was sorry she'd mentioned the project now that she realized Shelley would want to see it. It was still too tentative and fragile for even a best friend's eyes. "I've really got to go. I've got to get dinner ready. Uncle Jim's coming over to see Mom."

“And you—"

“Yeah, but Mom's the main attraction. By the way, I suggest you skip Mrs. General's book. Mom glanced through it, and it nearly made her crazy.”

Jim Spelling was a former army officer who'd been friends of the Grants since before Jane was born. Retired from the service now, he'd joined the Chicago police department as a detective. An honorary "uncle" to Jane, he'd kept in touch with her over the years and had been a regular visitor since Jane's husband died and year and a half earlier. Uncle Jim was one of the few people outside the family who knew the truth about where Steve was going when he was killed. Everyone had been told it was a "business trip" when, in truth, he'd left Jane for another woman that very night and was on his way to her when his car skidded on the ice and hit a guardrail. For Jane it was a double loss, but the anger had helped assuage the grief somewhat.