Chapter 10: Grandmother's Table

Winifred Whitaker lived in a brick house with a wide porch, three streets off the river.

Nolan parked in the drive, and I sat in the car with my hands in my lap.

"She isn't going to bite," he said.

"She might," I said.

"She's seventy-one and she carries a cane."

"Then she'll hit you with it kindly."

The dinner table seated twelve, and tonight it held four.

Winifred sat at one end, Tate at her left, Nolan across from me.

A housekeeper brought plates of roast chicken, green beans and a bowl of mashed potatoes with a lake of butter.

I looked at the potatoes.

"Eat," Winifred said.

"You're a farm girl.

"Farm girls know how to eat at a table."

I ate.

She watched me, and she did not say anything for a long time.

Tate talked about the quarter, and the new warehouse deal, and a golf outing.

He was easy and funny, and every few minutes his eyes slid across my face and moved away again.

"Hattie," he said, passing the rolls.

"Winifred tells me you're from near Findlay.

"The Moser place, up on County Road 9?"

My fork stopped.

"Yes."

"Beautiful land," Tate said.

"I'd heard there was some trouble with the bank.

"The north field, wasn't it?

"Twelve thousand, I think."

The table stilled.

I put the fork down slowly.

"I didn't tell you that," I said.

"No," Tate said, with his friendliest smile.

"I like to know my colleagues."

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