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ER teacher's certainty it must be Mabel Made Maple first take notice of her name. She asked her father and he told her "Maple— Maple is right."

There's no such name."

As fathers about children, you tell teacher. You tell her that it's M-A-P-L-E. You ask her if she knows a maple tree. Well, you were named after a maple tree. Your mother named you. You and she just saw Each other in passing in the room upstairs, One coming this way into life, and one Going the other out of life—you know? So you can't have much recollection of her. She had been having a long look at you. She put her finger in your cheek so hard It must have made your dimple there, and said, 'Maple.' I said it too: 'Yes, for her name.' She nodded. So we're sure there's no mistake. I don't know what she wanted it to mean, But it seems like some word she left to bid you Be a good girl—be like a maple tree. How like a maple tree's for us to guess. Or for a little girl to guess sometime. Not now—at least I shouldn't try too hard now.