Owing to one of those mysterious social changes that come on as suddenly as elm blight, almost every hostess in Wingate was serving sandwiches for cocktail hors d'oeuvres that summer. No cheese. No nuts. No crunchies. Just dainty little sandwiches, very thin, water cress or cucumber or ham or some such. And that's how the vounteers at the local charity thrift shop, the Second Run, happened to inherit sandwiches for their tea that Friday afternoon. (Usually they had cookies from the supermarket.) Barbara Finney, the yongest volunteer, had brought sandwiches left over from the night before when she'd entertained her husband's boss.

As soon as Lucy Ramsdale bit into one, she knew why they'd been left over. "My God, what's in this?" As the oldest volunteer there, she was freer to say what she felt.

-from To Spite Her Face (1971)