Very calmly, it seemed, lowering her hand from her mouth, Effie turned and walked back across the porch and into the house. Henry was too stunned at first to move.

“I guess this is goodbye,” Alma said, and he glared at her. “It doesn’t have to be,” she said. “I can wait for you.”

He left her there without a word, and went to follow his wife. He felt his way into the den, calling Effie’s name, but she wasn’t there. “Effie, baby?” He ascended the stairs, and at the first landing saw the closed door of the yellow bedroom, the sliver of light beneath. He ran up to it. Of course she’d bolted it.

“Effie,” he said. “Please, baby, please let me in. Let me talk to you. Effie, baby, please, I love you so much. Let me in.”

She didn’t answer, not even to tell him to go away. He could hear her moving things around. He gripped the doorknob and rattled it. “Effie!” he shouted, and struck the door several times with his palm until, giving up, he slumped his shoulder against it and slid to the floor.

He cried. All the pent-up guilt and shame and longing, all of his exhaustion, the nights without sleep, his frayed and exposed nerves—all of it broke inside him, and he lay against the door and cried. He wasn’t thinking—not grasping for a defense, not imagining what was to come, not even considering what he’d done. All of that would come later, when the shock faded and he was left, horribly, alone in his head. For now he was only a creature of feeling. He cried, and the only word in his head was please—please, please, please.

Finally Effie slid the bolt back and opened the door and he sat up straight. She wore her tan overcoat and her stockings and heels. From her shoulder hung a large paisley bag he didn’t recognize. She looked down at him. She hadn’t been crying. She’d put her makeup on and pinned her hair up. Her calmness was unnerving.

“Effie,” he said. “Can we talk, baby, please?”

“I don’t want to talk to you,” she said. “I don’t want any explanation from you. I don’t want to be in the same house with you.”

“Where are you going?”

“I’m going out,” she said. “It’s none of your business where. If you come after me, if you touch me, Henry, I’ll kill you.”

She stepped over him and started down the stairs into the dark.