Chapter 6 Summary

Reta has a flashback to a conversation she had with Norah when her daughter was about nine years old. Her little girl wanted to know whether or not her parents were married. Reta had carefully explained to Norah about the attitudes toward marriage in the 1970s, how Daddy and she had exchanged vows in front of their friends, and about the lovely tea party that followed. Norah had seemed both satisfied and impressed.

Reta then brings the story forward to the present time and a recent conversation she had with a friend. Emma Allen, a medical journalist living in Newfoundland, had telephoned to ask about Norah. Reta's thoughts then jump to her husband, Tom, and she remembers his rebel ways as a young man. He is now a family doctor at the Orangetown Clinic, universally loved and admired by his patients. His hobby...