Miss Julia Lays Down the Law Read Online Free PDF Page B

fund-raiser. Since it was Coleman, though, who was doing the raising, I didn’t mind.
     • • • 
    The doorbell rang the next morning as I crossed the hall on my way to the kitchen to speak to Lillian. I veered toward the front door, opened it, and stood back as LuAnne Conover rushed in, flapping her hands.
    “I’m a mess, Julia,” she said, heading straight for the sofa in the living room, where she plopped down, straightened her skirt tail, and kept talking. “I’m so confused, I don’t know what to do. Did you understand a word Connie said yesterday? I didn’t. First she told us we ought to be proud of our town, then she said we ought to do something about it because it’s in the worst shape she’s ever seen
.
How in the world can we do both?”
    “Come to think of it,” I said, following her into the living room, “that was one thing she didn’t tell us. But she pretty much covered everything else we’re doing wrong.”
    “Well, one thing’s for sure,” LuAnne said, pulling a sheet of paper from her tote bag and waving it at me. “No matter what she said, I cannot do this.”
    “What is it, LuAnne?” I asked, sitting across from her in one of the wing chairs by the fireplace. “I can’t read it from here.”
    “It’s my instructions—where we’re supposed to meet, a town map, and my time to start. Connie gave it to me before we left. Julia,” she said plaintively, “I don’t know
why
I signed up. I mean, those sign-up papers started coming around and I didn’t see a thing I wanted to do, but I felt I should do
something,
so when this one came by, I just signed it and now I’m stuck.”
    “With what? And, for goodness sakes, why did you sign up for anything?” I recalled my sense of outrage when Connie had handed out five or six sheets of paper to go from person to person around the room, each one of which I’d passed along without delay. A quick glance had told me that they were sign-up pages for assignments to certain committees, like, for instance, the Committee for Listing Derelict Buildings, the Committee for Rejuvenation of Flora, the Committee for Ecological Planning, and, for goodness sakes, the Committee for Town Council Oversight.
    LuAnne leaned back against the sofa and blew out her breath. “I don’t know why I did. Everybody else was signing up, so I did, too.”
    “Everybody else was not signing, I assure you,” I said. “I didn’t, and neither did Mildred.”
    “You
didn’t
?”
LuAnne sat straight up and stared at me. “But how could you not? I mean, Connie was
watching
us, and after she’d cautioned us against being civic do-nothings—which I don’t think I’ve ever been—I guess I wanted to prove to her how active and willing we are. You know, that we don’t live in some backwater without knowing what’s going on in the world. And she made it plain that we ought to make ourselves useful for the betterment of everybody.” LuAnne frowned in thought as she glanced around the room. “I thought I was already doing that—being useful, I mean.”
    “You are, and I am, and so are the rest of us. And I will continue to do so, but in my own way,” I told her. “And it won’t be because somebody has laid a guilt trip on me.”
    “Well, I wish I’d known you and Mildred weren’t signing up for anything,” LuAnne said with some resentment. “I felt backed into a corner, so I just put my name down so Connie wouldn’t be disappointed in me.”
    “Oh, LuAnne, who cares if she’s disappointed? After she laid us all low yesterday, her feelings shouldn’t even be considered. She obviously had no concern for
ours,
the way she criticized us.
Scathingly
criticized us, I might add.”
    “Well, you’re right,” LuAnne agreed. “I just wish you’d told me you weren’t signing. You know me, I don’t like to be the only one holding out.”
    “What did you sign up for?”
    “Oh-h-h,” LuAnne wailed, reminded of what she’d let herself in for. “I