Into the Lion's Den by Linda Fairstein

Author:Linda Fairstein
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Young Readers Group
Published: 2016-10-18T08:57:35+00:00

17

“What are you girls working on in summer school?” my grandmother asked. “I’m told the Ditchley has a very ambitious program.”

Bridey had set a small round table for us against the window in the dining room, also fronting Central Park, but far more intimate than the long banquet table that held twenty-four of us at Thanksgiving and Christmas, when my relatives came to town.

I let Liza describe the courses she was taking while I tried to think of the best approach to enlisting Lulu in our crime-solving caper.

“Thank you,” I said to Bridey as she set a bowl of soup in front of me.

“What’s our starter?” Lulu asked.

“It’s a cold avocado soup, ma’am. Devlin’s favorite. And I’ve added some cucumbers and cherry tomatoes for color.”

“Very kind of you, indeed,” my grandmother said. “And on very short notice. Do go on, Liza.”

I loved Bridey’s soup but was still what Lulu referred to as a finicky eater. I tried to fish out the annoying cucumber slices, spearing them with my fork as though it were a pike, while Liza engaged her in conversation, but she caught me out of the corner of her eye.

“Your mother’s right about one thing, Devlin. Your table manners would have people think you were raised in a barnyard.”

“Sorry, Lu.”

“Eat the food in front of you; don’t play with it. It looks like you’re growing some muscles on that slim frame.”

“You know I need that for my swimming. I’ve got practice at nine o’clock on Saturday morning. Would you like to come watch?”

“I’d adore that, Devlin. You know I would,” Lulu said, turning to Liza, who had perfect manners to match the perfect posture as she raised the soup spoon to her mouth. Looking at her made me sit up straighter without even thinking about it.

“My grandmother was on her swim team, too,” I said to Liza. “All through high school and even at Vassar. Isn’t that fun? It’s one of the reasons I enjoy racing. I try to imagine that Lulu’s in the next lane and I’m determined to beat her. I wish I could time travel back and dive in together with her to see who would win.”

“Yes,” Lulu said, “we’re both champions at the Australian crawl. Not any longer for me, of course, but I love to root for Devlin. She’s got a better turn off the wall than I ever did, but my crawl stroke was so much cleaner than hers. You need to keep working on that, dear, don’t you?”

“It’s called freestyle now, Lu,” I said. “No one calls it the crawl anymore.”

“Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose, my dear. Do you speak French, Liza?”

“I do a bit. ‘The more things change, the more they stay the same,’ isn’t that the translation?”

“Good for you,” Lulu said. “You see, Devlin? You really need to start taking foreign languages. It so increases your reach, now that the world is shrinking. Besides, darling, I know the stroke is called freestyle now. It’s just that I crawled for so long that some habits are hard to change.

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