Elizabeth placed her full glass beside it. “Guess I’m not all that thirsty, after all.”
Her dog barked again. He was staring up at the bowl of meat for the meatballs, his drooling tongue hanging out as if he wanted to gulp down the whole batch in a single swallow. Grand’maman frowned at him.
Sophie tried to hurry Elizabeth and her dog out of the kitchen before Grand’maman started yelling at them. In French. “Do you want to come to my room and see my Star Girl comic collection?” she asked. “I’ve got the latest issue where she saves a whole bunch of orphans in an earthquake.”
“My mother says reading comics is very bad for your mind. She never allows me to read them. I only read fine literature.”
“Oh.” Sophie was puzzled. How could anything about Star Girl be bad? “Do you want to come and play checkers then?”
“Okay. Let’s go.”
“Better bring your dog,” Sophie said, leading the way to her bedroom.
“Doesn’t your grandmother even know how to speak English?” Elizabeth asked, pulling her dog along the hallway.
Sophie’s cheeks burned. “Sure. She speaks English all the time. She just likes French better. She’s more used to it.”
“Well, my mother says everyone who lives in British Columbia should speak English. After all, this is an English country. Did you know she named me after Princess Elizabeth?”
“Oh.” Sophie raised her eyebrows and rolled her eyes.
In the bedroom Sophie shared with her grandmother, there were two bureaus and a big bed. On her grandmother’s bureau was a statue of the Virgin Mary with flowing blue robes. In front of it Grand’maman had put a small vase of flowers from her garden and a candle she lit at night when she said her rosary.
Elizabeth’s mouth dropped open and she stared. “Oh, my! What’s that? I’ve never seen such a strange picture.”
Alarmed, Sophie followed Elizabeth’s eyes to the wooden frame above the bureau. In it was a picture of Jesus with his shirt open, showing his heart with blood dripping from it. Sacré Coeur was written in old-fashioned letters under it. “Oh, that’s Jesus.” Sophie shrugged. “We call it Sacré Coeur. That means Sacred Heart. It shows Jesus loves us with all his heart.” Actually, Sophie had barely noticed the picture before.
“Why do you have to have it in your bedroom? Doesn’t it give you the creeps?”
“It’s my gran’s.”
“But I thought this was your room.”
“It is, but it’s my gran’s, too.”
“You mean your grandmother sleeps here, too?”
“Sure. The bed’s plenty big enough for both of us. My three big brothers sleep upstairs and my mom and dad share the front bedroom with my little brother. There aren’t any other bedrooms, so where else would my gran sleep?”
“Humph,” Elizabeth snorted. “I’ve never heard of anyone having to sleep with their grandmother before.” She picked up a string of sparkling red glass beads and put it around her neck. “These beads are pretty. And they match my outfit, don’t you think? Although it would look a lot better if it didn’t have this cross on the end.” She patted back her hair and looked at herself in the small mirror on the wall.
“That’s my gran’s rosary.” Sophie looked at the door nervously. What would Grand’maman say if she came in and saw Elizabeth playing with her rosary so disrespectfully?
“Rosary?”
Sophie nodded. “It’s what my gran uses to count her prayers. See, each one of those beads is for a Hail Mary and—”
“Prayers? Oh!” Elizabeth quickly pulled off the rosary and dropped it onto the bureau.
On Sophie’s bureau was a stack of her comics. Elizabeth picked up the top one, a Star Girl adventure, and eagerly flipped through it.
“Didn’t you say you weren’t allowed to read comics?”
“Right.” Elizabeth placed the comic back on the pile and looked down at it longingly.
When a bird flew by the window, Elizabeth’s dog scuttled over and put his paws on the sill to yap at it. He bumped a jar and it fell onto the floor. The top popped off and a small green frog hopped out.
“Hoppy!” Sophie squealed. She lunged after her frog with the dog on her heels. They scuffled on the floor, the dog barking and Sophie screeching and trying to push the dog out of the way so she could rescue her pet.
When the frog jumped onto the bed, the dog scrabbled after it, pulling loose the blankets and sheets. Sophie clambered over the dog onto the bed and tried to snatch the frog, but it sprang onto the pillow. She dived and finally caught it between her cupped hands.
“Got you!” she said, breathing hard. The frog froze in her hands, but the dog still barked like crazy. Sophie crawled out of the twisted blankets, gently put her frog back into his jar, and screwed on the lid. “There you go,” she told him. “Into your home sweet home.”
Elizabeth’s dog wouldn’t stop barking even when Sophie put the jar on a high shelf. His tongue hung out and he drooled on Sophie’s legs when she tried to nudge him away with her knees.
“Why are you keeping that frog in ajar?” Elizabeth asked.
“It’s for my frog collection.”
“Humph. Whoever heard of a frog collection? Well, it must be almost lunchtime. Guess we’d better be going home now.”
“Want to stay for lunch? I bet my gran would let us have a taste of her boulettes.” Sophie smiled to herself. She knew what Elizabeth thought of Grand’maman’s cooking.
“No, that’s okay,” Elizabeth sputtered. “My mother’s probably wondering where I am. Come on, Bunny-boy.” She pulled her dog by the collar, hurried down the hall, and escaped out the front door.
Sophie shut the door after her and took a deep breath. “She thinks she’s so great! What a snob!” Sophie went back down the hall, wondering if Grand’maman would let her have a tiny sample of those yummy-smelling boulettes for lunch.
After a delicious pickle-and-boulettes sandwich on fresh homemade bread and another tall glass of lemonade, Sophie went out to the front gate and swung back and forth on the bottom rung. The hinges squeaked in a lonely way. She looked up and down the empty road. No one was out. Her next-door neighbour, Jake, must still be away on holidays with his family. Her three older brothers were busy in the backyard working on their bikes. She had no one to play with. If only she were still living in Montreal, she would be playing with best friend, Marcie. With Marcie around she was never lonely.
The gate rung dug into Sophie’s bare feet so she jumped off. She found a pointed stick and drew ovals for a marble game in the hard-packed earth beside the fence. She tried to remember where she had put her bag of marbles.
“Hi, Sophie. What are you up to now?”
It was Elizabeth Proctor again, but this time without her dog. She was riding a brand-new shimmering red bicycle with big, fat balloon tires. Attached to the handlebars was a fancy wicker basket with a paper grocery bag in it.
“Wow! Where did you get the new bike?” Sophie hopped around and stroked the bike’s shiny back fender. “Can I have a ride?”
Elizabeth