Lampie puts her hand to her cheek. This is going to hurt really badly later, she can already feel it. But right now everything inside her is still glowing with shock. She did – and said – completely the wrong thing. She tries to catch her father’s eye. She wants to say, “I was only trying to help,” and she wants him to look at her and to see her again, which is what always happens after one of his outbursts. Sometimes it takes half an hour, and sometimes a few days. But he is always sorry. He doesn’t say so out loud; he can’t do that. But he says it with his eyes.
Before he can look at her though, Lampie feels a cold hand on the back of her neck, pushing her forward, into her bedroom. Miss Amalia. That is what she is called – Lampie has remembered now.
Miss Amalia follows close behind her; she has to duck as she passes through the doorway. The feathers on her bonnet brush the ceiling.
“A few dresses,” she says. “Underwear, nightdress. Socks.”
Lampie just looks at her. She has no idea what the woman means.
“And something for Sundays, of course.” Miss Amalia turns to look at Lampie’s shelf of clothes. It is just a sorry little pile. Impatiently, she snaps her fingers. “Give me your suitcase. I’ll pack it for you.”
“I don’t have a suitcase,” whispers Lampie. She doesn’t understand. A suitcase? Does she have to go back to school now?
“Or a basket? A bag?” Lampie shakes her head. With quick hands, Miss Amalia searches through the items on the shelf. She sighs with irritation as she tosses it all onto Lampie’s bed. Her little dresses, her badly knitted socks. An old flannel nightdress.
“This one too?”
“Do I have to go away?” asks Lampie. “Do I have to sleep somewhere else?”
“Yes, child.” Impatiently, Miss Amalia stuffs the clothes into a pillowcase. Which is also old and worn.
“You can come with me for now. Until we find a solution.” She drags Lampie back through the doorway and into the living room.
The sheriff and his men are moving things and carrying them around. They have taken everything out of the cupboards and piled it all up untidily in the corner. Pans, cups, the bread bin. The rug has been rolled up roughly and placed on top. One of the deputies comes in with two angrily cackling chickens and releases them into the room. Shards of Lampie’s mother’s mirror lie all over the floor. Her father is slumped in his chair, looking at the floor, not at her. He is still angry – he must be. She picks up a shard of mirror.
“No, no, no, child, put that down. You’ll cut yourself,” says Miss Amalia. She grabs Lampie’s arm. Suddenly Lampie remembers how Miss Amalia used to hit children on the fingers if they fidgeted or giggled. And that it was actually quite a relief when she had to leave the school.
“Did you drop it?”
Lampie nods at Miss Amalia like a good girl, but clamps her fist around the piece of glass. It gives her fingers a little nip.
Mother, she thinks. What on earth is happening?
“Come with me.” The woman takes her by the wrist and pulls her to the door. “I’ll see you tomorrow, sheriff. Gentlemen.”
The men tip their hats. “Miss Amalia,” they mumble.
“Oh, and you’re most welcome,” she says pointedly.
“Oh, of course, of course,” replies the sheriff quickly. “Thank you. Whatever would we do without you?”
“I often wonder that myself,” says Miss Amalia, pulling Lampie outside and into the night.
Lampie looks back over her shoulder one last time. Her father is sitting in the shadow; she can hardly even see him now.
He does not look up.