Chapter 4: Sunday Dinner

I pulled the nightgown over my head and did up three buttons, and Patrick drew the bolt.

Beatrix stood on the gravel in her grey robe with a flashlight in one hand and her cane in the other.

She looked at me, at the open door behind me, and at her son in his jeans with the lamp behind him.

"Your wife was cold," Patrick said.

"Her bed is upstairs."

"I'll sleep in the room," I said, and I stepped past her. "Alone. Goodnight, Beatrix."

I felt her watching me all the way across the yard.

On Sunday the house filled for dinner at six.

The judge arrived first, a tall bent man of seventy, Beatrix's cousin.

He sat down in the chair at my left and unfolded his napkin without a word.

The doctor came next, a smooth pink man in a bow tie.

He kissed Beatrix on the cheek and shook Patrick's hand with both of his.

"Judge," Beatrix said. "Doctor. This is Edith."

"The nurse," said the doctor, beaming. "How wonderful for the old man. A professional in the house at the end."

"I'm only a night nurse," I said.

"Nonsense. Nobody sees more of life than the night shift."

The third place sat laid at Patrick's left, with its candle and its chair drawn out.

Nobody looked at it.

Everybody was working very hard at not looking at it, and that was how I knew it mattered.

Under the table, Patrick's knee settled against mine.

It was probably an accident.

It stayed there through the soup, and I felt the warmth of it all the way up my thigh.

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