A Tangle of Knots

A morose Miss Mallory is the only person left at the Lost Girls Home now that Cady has found her perfect family. Miss Mallory grows pansies and petunias, and the local nursery owner gives her a hybrid of the two. She wonders, “Where did you put something that fit so perfectly in two very different places?” (118). Miss Mallory hears a thump and finds a powder blue suitcase that is empty except for a black ceramic bird. She pockets the bird because she feels “entirely certain that Fate had brought it to her” (119).

Mrs. Asher and Marigold drive around looking for Will after the post office informs them that the suitcase fell off the mail truck. Mrs. Asher criticizes Marigold’s uncharacteristic irresponsibility in mailing her brother, and Marigold says, “No one in this family understands anything about me” (121). Mrs. Asher reminds Marigold that she found her Talent when she was 27. Marigold asks her mother if she’s happier now, but she is too distracted with her worries for Will and her feelings that she’s failed as a mother to answer. Marigold assures her that they’ll find Will and suggests they look somewhere someone would go if they wanted to get lost.