Chapter 5

Lily's Crossing

Trailblazers · 4th–6th

Copywork

Tomorrow they’d line up at the deep-sea fishing dock, to climb aboard the Mary L. before the sun came up. They’d fish all day, the boat smelling of kerosene and heat.

Poppy’s eyes were open now, blue with paler flecks of gray, his face suddenly serious.

Each passage ends with a few words after a comma. What feeling does each ending leave you with?

For the educator Two passages, three sentences, in story order. The first comes as Lily rows the long way around the trestle and plans the weekend in her head. Its first sentence uses the contraction “they’d” (they would) and adds a purpose with “to climb aboard,” and the boat’s name, “the Mary L.,” keeps its period inside the sentence. The second sentence ends on a phrase joined by a comma, “the boat smelling of kerosene and heat,” which adds a smell and a feeling to the whole day without a new main verb. The second passage comes right after Poppy begins, “I have to tell you . . .” It opens with a short clause and then adds two describing phrases, “blue with paler flecks of gray” and “his face suddenly serious.” The second phrase turns the sentence, and the word “suddenly” turns the chapter. Side by side, the passages hold the last calm plans of the row and the moment the row changes.

Discussion

Narration Tell back the chapter in order. Start with Lily hunting for Albert in her sailor hat and lipstick, and stop when he sees her crying on the road.

1. After Lily says she practiced, Gram stands at the screen door and says nothing. What is Gram holding back?Inference

2. Poppy’s face turns serious, and Lily rushes in with news about the Dillons. How much has she guessed by then?Character

3. Poppy sighs just before he tells Lily what the war has wrecked. What is that sigh about?Character

4. Poppy says he loves Lily “more than Rockaway. More than anything.” Why does she answer with a question about Gram?Character

Make a Connection Think of a story, or a time in your own life, when someone heard hard news in a happy place. How did the place change the way the news felt?

Vocabulary

Crossword

1			2

3	4


		5

6


7

Across

Across 1. Worried and uneasy about what might happen, as Gram is while she waits to learn whether Lily has heard the news.
Across 3. To know who someone is when you see them, which Lily hopes her disguise will stop Albert from doing.
Across 7. Very large, important churches, like the ones Poppy says have been bombed in the war.

Down

Down 2. Changing direction quickly, as Lily swings the boat toward the station and later turns away from Albert on the road.
Down 4. Officials who read letters in wartime and cross out anything that might help the enemy.
Down 5. Onto or inside a boat, train or plane, as Lily and Poppy plan to climb onto the fishing boat.
Down 6. Tiny spots or specks of color mixed in with another color.

The words in the chapter

anxious Gram was standing at the edge of the ramp that led to the kitchen, smiling a little, looking anxious at the same time.
recognize Albert wouldn’t recognize her in a hundred years.
veering Lily dipped the oars into the water again, veering toward the railway station, hurrying now, anxious to see him.
censors She said the censors cross everything out in the letters.

cathedrals There’s been nothing but destruction in this war, families separated, villages ruined, cathedrals bombed . . .
aboard Tomorrow they’d line up at the deep-sea fishing dock, to climb aboard the Mary L. before the sun came up.
flecks Poppy’s eyes were open now, blue with paler flecks of gray, his face suddenly serious.

Critical thinking

1. Lily’s first question is “Who’s going to take care of me?” What scares her most, right then?

2. Gram asks Poppy if he told Lily, and Lily snaps, “Mind your business.” What does Lily mean by that?

3. By the end, Lily is in tears, running up the road on the soft tar. Is Lily more upset that Poppy is going to war, or that she was the last to find out?