Alice went to the sunroom while Harry made drinks: a glass of rosé for Alice and a beer for him. He was really only drinking the beer so Alice didn’t have to be alone, but was also happy to be drinking it. He was rattled by the new information.

Once they were settled—Alice on the love seat, and Harry in one of the rocking chairs—Alice said, “We hired Annie as a huge favor. Her husband, Lou, was a fisherman, is a fisherman, and, you know, with the cod restrictions, he’d been out of work for six months. Your father heard about it, and offered Annie a job. It was last fall, when there’d been extra work.”

“I didn’t know about that.”

“Your father was back from a scouting trip with too many books, of course, so he offered Annie a job. Just to help out with cataloguing, but at twenty dollars an hour.” She shook her head, more of a tremor, at the memory. “And then, before you knew it, she’s coming around here to help Bill with the books in his office. I knew. I knew something . . .”

“How old is she?” Harry asked.

“Annie? She looks a lot older than she is. I don’t know, somewhere in her thirties.”

“And they were definitely involved?”

She tipped her glass back and almost finished her wine. Harry watched her throat muscles swallowing.

“Oh, they were, for sure, Harry. I’m sorry you have to hear this. I was hoping you wouldn’t, because I know how you felt about your father, how much you admired him, but it was very clear that something was going on. And I had to force him to get rid of her. And then when the detective told me that your father’s death was not an accident, I just knew. I didn’t say anything right away, because of you, Harry, but then I decided I had to tell them.”

Harry wanted to ask Alice for more specifics. Had she caught them together? Did his father confess to her that they were involved? He didn’t know why he was skeptical—especially considering the possibility that his father had also been having an affair down in New York City—but he did wonder if Alice was overreacting.

“So she was fired?”

“She was let go, let’s just say that, and that’s when her husband finally figured it out. John told me that he came to the store, threatened Bill, told him that if he ever came near Annie again he’d kill him with his bare hands. Something like that.”

“John told you this, or my father did?”

“John was the one who told me, because he was worried. I asked Bill about it, and he said it was no big deal, just a frustrated man blowing off steam. Your father could be . . . he could be too charitable at times.”

“So you think that Lou . . . ?”