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old enough to be his mother, though her clinging posture and eyelash batting weren’t the least maternal.
    “Georgia Snellen,“ Shelley muttered under her breath.
    “Same family, I assume?“ Jane hissed back. Shelley nodded.
    “Closing up shop, I see,“ Georgia Snellen said as she released Derek and leaned casually against the corner post of the booth.
    Shelley didn’t bother to make the obvious reply. “I’m Shelley Nowack. We served on the Philharmonic Committee together a number of years ago.“
    “Not too many years, I hope,“ Georgia trilled girlishly. “Are you one of the Evanston Nowacks? Lovely family.”
    Shelley didn’t bother to deny it. She introduced Jane.
    There followed an interrogation of Jane’s social antecedents, during which Jane let Georgia make some unfounded leaps of belief, and Jane ended up related to both a highly respected family of Harvard philosophy professors and an early, though entirely mythical, Arctic explorer (Shelley’s contribution).
    “And what relation are you to the gentleman I met yesterday?“ Jane asked.
    “Georgia is Caspar Snellen’s sister,“ Shelley said wickedly.
    But Georgia had learned to deal with this unfortunate circumstance. “Poor old Caspar,“ she said sadly, but didn’t elaborate. It was an effective dismissal of the blood tie, and Jane had to give her credit for it. It managed to imply, in three harmless words, that they all had their crosses to bear, that Caspar was hers, and no doubt Jane and Shelley had batty old aunts who lived under bridges eating canned spaghetti, or a cousin in Leavenworth.
    “You girls will be at the groundbreaking ceremony, won’t you?“ Georgia asked. “Derek and I are just on our way over. You could walk along with us.“
    “We’ll be right behind you,“ Shelley said. “I have one more box to store.”
    Derek and Georgia drifted off, she firmly attached to his arm again. Jane laughed. “Shelley! You actually know that awful woman and never told me about her?”
    Shelley grinned. “I didn’t think you’d believe it. Honestly, I’d forgotten all about her until I saw her draped all over Derek.“
    “I should have told her I was related to Teddy Roosevelt on his mother’s side,“ Jane said. “Are you really?“
    “No. But it wouldn’t matter,“ Jane said. “She’d have loved it.“
    “What I don’t ‘get’ about her,“ Shelley mused, “is that she’s so stereotypically nouveau-riche acting, but she does come from very old money. At least three generations old, which should be enough. And she had a rich husband, too. Maybe he accounts for it.“
    “How’s that?“
    “Well, somebody on the Philharmonic Committee told me her husband was a self-made man in the plumbing-fixtures business. Has some kind of patent on portable-john elements or flush handles or something.“
    “But he was a Snellen, too?“
    “No. When they divorced, she apparently took back her maiden name, of which she’s inordinately proud.”
    Jane nodded. “Rather the granddaughter of the Pea King than the ex-wife of the Toilet Bowl Prince, huh? I’m not sure I wouldn’t feel the same way.”
    In the distance, an unskilled but enthusiastic band struck up a tune. “Oh-ho, we better get over there. Sounds like the ceremony is about to start,“ Shelley said.
    “What about the other carton?”
    Shelley looked at her pityingly. “Jane, there is no other carton. I just didn’t want to trail along behind Georgia and Derek like spear-carriers at the opera.”

    The site of the new museum was across the road from the festival area. The ceremony was to be the closing event of this year’s Pea Festival, and in spite of Regina Palmer’s death, the museum staff and volunteers did their best to create a celebratory atmosphere. Rows of folding chairs were set up in front of a raised platform where the speakers were to sit. Around the perimeter, stakes with colorful bunches of helium-filled balloons sported the Snellen Museum name