“What about the rules for speaking English?”

“Well, yes. That’s different. We wouldn’t get very far grunting at each other and pointing, would we?” My grandfather gets this faraway look in his eyes when he’s got hold of an idea and he’s trying to separate out the parts. “And then there are family rules.”

He removed his glasses and polished them. His eyes looked old and naked until he put them back behind glass. Once he’s got the parts of the idea lined up in the right order, like cars on a toy train, he can pull the train forward.

“It might be: Don’t keep secrets from each other. Or it might be: Don’t give too much away. See what I mean? Rules can always be broken. Whereas facts,” he said, bending from the waist to examine a patch of mold on the statue’s knee, “you can’t break facts. You can’t disobey facts. They just are.”

“Grandpa?” Even thinking it made my heart flap in my chest like something trying to get out. “Do you really think I should try to find my so-called father?”

My grandfather took my arm the way Grandma does, though without the same need. We turned our backs on the statue and followed Barney up the sidewalk to the car.

“Yes,” he replied. “With all the aforementioned caveats, I really do.”

“Why are you smiling?”

“I’m not,” said my grandfather.

But he was. And we both knew it.

•  •  •

Two days later, in a voice that would not have carried past the living room sofa, I asked my grandfather what Antonio’s last name was. We were alone in the front hall. My mother and Grandma had gone into the kitchen. He glanced around and held out his palms in a helpless gesture that said: Don’t involve me. My face went red hot. It had been his idea in the first place!

My grandfather put his hands in his pockets and bounced his keys and coins. I could see in his eyes that he wanted to encourage me while refusing to collaborate. Was it: If he didn’t click the mouse himself then he would not be responsible for any ensuing disaster? Was it: Family business is women’s business? Was it: He couldn’t possibly tell Eve or Rose, so he should have kept his mouth shut on that park bench?