The Lions Of Little Rock

When Marlee gets home after school, she asks Betty Jean about Negroes who pass for white. The maid tells her how dangerous this is since anyone who tries might get lynched. Distraught, Marlee runs up to her room. When Judy arrives to check on her, she confesses that Liz is Negro. Judy is sympathetic but ambivalent about allowing colored kids to attend school with whites. At dinner, Marlee’s parents discuss Liz and argue about how Marlee is supposed to feel toward her. To escape the bickering, Marlee goes to hide in her room.

The following morning, Marlee’s dad drives her to school, and she asks him to track down Liz’s address for her. Mr. Nisbett warns how dangerous it is for Marlee to continue a friendship with a colored girl. He then reveals that he’s received threats from the Ku Klux Klan after inviting a black minister to speak at the family’s church. Mr. Nisbett is frustrated because he supports integration, but his voice isn’t heard: “‘We are not just a town of racists, but those of us who believe in integration…’ He shook his head. ‘We can’t seem to find our voice’” (75).

When Marlee arrives home for dinner, she’s informed that the family is going out to eat. This doesn’t bode well because her parents usually break bad news in public so that nobody can make a scene. Mr. Nisbett announces that Judy will be sent to live with her grandmother in Pine Bluff so that she can attend high school there. The local high school has been closed indefinitely, and Judy can’t depend on TV classes to finish her education. Judy protests, and Marlee is upset at losing both her sister and her best friend. Judy is equally upset: “‘Thank you for ruining my life,’ Judy snapped. No one said a word as we drove home” (80). 

The next day at school, Marlee is still depressed, but it occurs to her that she might be able to find Liz on her own. She knows that the girl was spotted by Sally’s mother at a Negro church on South Chester Street. After class, Marlee rides her bicycle there and encounters Pastor George. This is the same minister who is her father’s friend, and he is also Betty Jean’s husband.

Marlee asks him to deliver a note to Liz: “I unfolded the note and handed it back to him. He took it like it was the tail of a dead mouse. ‘You owe me a magic book. Friday after school, the usual spot’” (84). Liz had promised to lend Marlee a copy of a book about magic squares if she presented the history project in front of the whole class. Even though the pastor denies knowing who Liz is, he says he will ask around.

That evening at dinner, tensions run high in the Nisbett household because of Judy’s hasty departure. Marlee says, “The next evening at dinner was quiet, not the good quiet […] but the bad quiet where you’re walking on eggshells even though the mean words are still in your head” (85).

Mrs. Nisbett announces that she intends to take a teaching post at the T. J. Rainey private school. Her husband protests that this school is trying to get around the integration rule by keeping colored students out. Mrs. Nisbett insists that her mind is made up and that she’s already signed the contract to teach there.

Later that night, a federal marshal arrives to tell Mrs. Nisbett that she won’t be allowed to violate her current contract with the local public school. She runs to her room in tears. Even though Mr. Nisbett reassures Marlee that everything will settle back to normal soon, she doesn’t believe him.

On Friday afternoon, Marlee shows up at the zoo to wait for Liz. Her friend arrives wearing sunglasses and a bandanna around her head. Liz explains that when her family moved to town, her parents wanted her to go to the white school because it would offer better opportunities. Now that her secret has been exposed, the students at the colored school are shunning her too. They act as if she doesn’t exist, and Liz begins to weep.

Marlee says, “I handed her my handkerchief, and she wiped her eyes. This wasn’t the Liz I’d known at all. The Liz I’d met at school was strong and confident, and this one reminded me a lot of myself” (94). Both girls fear that someone might hurt them if they try to remain friends, so they decide they will meet in secret. Liz writes a code in the magic squares book giving Marlee her phone number.

On Sunday morning after Bible class, Marlee’s Sunday school teacher, Miss Winthrop, tries to recruit Mrs. Nisbett to join the WEC. This stands for Women’s Emergency Committee to Open Our Schools. Mrs. Nisbett declines because she fears that the committee’s efforts will pave the way for integration. After her mother leaves the room, Marlee donates money to the WEC and tells Miss Winthrop that she wants to join.

Ever since Liz left school, Marlee has been eating her lunch separately in the classroom of her math teacher, Mr. Harding. One day, Harding proposes that he and Marlee should work on algebra problems together over lunch. He admits that Marlee is too advanced for seventh-grade math. Harding believes the space program needs women engineers too.

On Saturday, Marlee takes a chance and calls Liz. Because the phone is a party line, they use a prearranged script to speak to one another. Liz says they can’t meet because she has to take her brother to see the Wizard of Oz at a colored theater. Marlee decides to meet them there and says, “I imagined being the only white girl in a room full of Negroes and shivered. It was a little scary. But Liz had been the only colored girl in a whole school full of white kids […] If she could do it, so could I” (106).

Marlee shows up at the theater, where she finds Liz and her little brother Tommy. Liz is shocked that Marlee would dare to be seen in the colored part of town. Once inside the theater, a woman from Liz’s neighborhood warns her how dangerous a white girl in their midst can be. Just then, Betty Jean arrives to vouch for Marlee’s character. After the show, the girls agree that the safest place to meet is the old quarry outside of town. 

Back at home, Betty Jean says that it was foolish of Marlee to visit a colored theater, but she promises not to tell Marlee’s parents if the girl agrees not to see Liz again. Marlee consents but knows it’s a lie.

On Tuesday afternoon, Marlee goes to the rock crusher to meet Liz. Liz confides that everyone at the colored high school is still treating her badly. She says, “I know I make it worse. The words build up and build up until I explode and start screaming […] When I’m done, the others just laugh and go back to ignoring me. It’s embarrassing” (115). She says that Marlee is the best at keeping quiet, and Liz now wants her friend to teach her that skill.