The man nodded, withdrew his hand and put it, with the other, behind him. “You look well, son.”

“He’s lost some weight,” his mother clucked.

They all looked at each other in silence and Dewey realized now just how much they had changed: his mother, still pretty, but no longer young, was almost matronly. Her once sharp features had softened, her brown eyes had dulled. But more than anything she looked tired. His father seemed to have shrunk and wasted away more than aged, but he looked happier than Dewey had ever remembered him, less oppressed, less as if something were pushing down on him. Dymphna had become quite an attractive young lady, was dressed fashionably, a copy of her mother as she must have looked twenty years before.

He had expected something drastically different; he would not have been even surprised if only one of his parents had come to meet him, bringing the news that divorce proceedings had already begun. Or if both had come, he would have expected them to keep their distance from one another, to talk only to him, not to each other, with Dymphna standing between them like a partition of flesh and blood so they would not, even accidentally, touch. But all this; they were—too happy.

No one had spoken. They stood now on a near-empty platform. Toward the back of the train a brakeman blew his whistle and the line of cars began to back up. An outgoing train was announced; it would be heading North. After a few seconds, Negroes began to stream through the main doors, marching toward the next track.

“You ladies go ahead.” His father stepped forward and picked up one of Dewey’s bags. “We’ll join you at the car.”

Dymphna stood by watching; she knew Dewey and their father had never been very close, at times had argued bitterly, and she had been wondering how, when Dewey came back, her father would get along with him. She made no move until her mother pinched her arm.

“Come on, Dymphnie. This’ll give us time to put on new lipstick.”

Dewey watched them through the door, noticing Dymphna turn back once or twice. He smiled. “God, she’s such a busybody.” He shook his head and spoke out loud.

“She is that.” His father stepped to his side.

Dewey turned, resenting the intrusion. “What did you want to say to me?” He had been trying to hurt the man, and was surprised to find he had.

His father looked at the ground in front of him. “Dewey,” he started, sighing, “I realize your mother and I haven’t made things too easy for you.”

“You mean you haven’t.”

“That may be so, son.” Dewey had scored again; something was wrong, or changed; his father seemed almost human. He had started to say in answer that he knew it was so, but decided to hear his father out.