"Joe said that you told him and Tony that you had talked to Ma a few times."
"Yeah. I did." She looked away. "I hope you don't mind."
"Not a bit."
"I don't know if Mom has said anything to you about it, but Patrick and Mary Liz Fitzgerald never let me in their house any more than the Murphys did. I never met them. Won't ever meet Patrick, since he's dead now. Probably won't ever meet Mary Liz, given the things she said about you and Mom at the hearing at St. Mary's."
"Pat never said anything."
"She wouldn't. But she thought she ought to take the other girls to see them sometimes. Not as often as she took them to Paul and Maggie's, though. Nowhere near. But maybe that was more so she could see Keenan at Paul and Maggie's." Noelle looked across the table at him. "She feels pretty bad about Keenan, you know."
"She hasn't said anything about that, either."
"She does. She thinks she let him down." Noelle took a sip of coffee. She didn't really like it; hadn't ever acquired a taste for it. But it was there in front of her and fiddling with the handle of the cup gave her something to do with her hands.
"But that's really why I never changed my name to Fitzgerald. I wanted to get rid of Murphy. I had wanted to get rid of Murphy for a long time. But even though it was Mom's maiden name, the Fitzgeralds didn't want me, either. The only ones who did were Denise and Suzanne and they go by their married names."
Dennis realized that she was working up to something, but he wasn't sure what. With employees, the best approach was just to keep his mouth shut and listen, so that was what he did next.
"So she—Juliann—was the only one of my grandparents I ever met."
"Oh."
"The first time I walked up to the door, I called her 'Mrs. Stull.' But she said that no one much called her that."
"Nope. Not even the garbage collector."
"So, for a long while, I didn't call her anything." Noelle started spinning the coffee cup slowly around in its saucer.
Dennis just stayed quiet.
"Toward the end, she asked me to call her 'Grandma.' Like Harlan does."
Dennis nodded.
"I wish I hadn't been off in Franconia for so long before she died."
"Things like that happen."
"Yeah."
"Did you?" Dennis asked.
"What?"
"Call her 'Grandma'?"
Noelle shook her head. "I just couldn't, quite. Maybe, eventually, I could have worked up to it. But not then. I called her Juliann."
"If that's easier for you. So far, you haven't called me anything."
"I could probably manage 'Dennis.' "
"That's better than nothing."
"Okay, then." Noelle shook his hand.
"Changing your name doesn't take a court order anymore. The judges are too busy with more important stuff." The clerk pointed her finger in the general direction of Central Funeral Home. "Just go over to the Bureau of Vital Statistics, tell them what you want, swear an affidavit that you aren't doing it for fraudulent purposes, get it notarized, file it, and Bob's your uncle. There are a couple of notaries working right there in the office."
"Noelle Brigitte Murphy?" the clerk asked in a flat voice.
"Yes," Noelle said.
"Changing to Noelle Brigitte Stull?" The clerk fished a form out from under the counter.
"Yes, that's right."
Noelle looked at Pat and Dennis. " 'Noelle' I can understand, since I was born at Christmas. But where did 'Brigitte' come from?"
Pat turned bright red. "It's for me. In a way. I hope the priest thought it was for a saint, but it's for me."
"How do you get 'Brigitte' from 'Patricia'?"
"Hey there," Jenny Maddox came out of the back office. "Hello, Pat, Dennis, Noelle. Focus. We have forms to fill out, I hear."
"Hi, Jenny," Pat said.
"Did I hear a question? Getting Brigitte from Pat?"
Noelle nodded.
"This I know from my parents." Jenny looked mischievous. "Dad and Mom and Dennis were friends back then—he and Mom were in the same class in school."
"I guess there's no escaping my past," Dennis said.
Jenny barged on. "Noelle, did you ever hear of an actress called Brigitte Bardot?"
"No."
"Well, probably not. She'd stopped making movies long before you were born. Tell her the truth, Dennis," Jenny said.
Dennis looked a little uncomfortable. "When Pat was a teenager, when we were dating, I used to tease her by calling her Brigitte."