Kate had laughed too—the quickest and best self-protection. What would her son do? What had he done after he went quietly away?

She thought of Cal’s eyes with their look of sluggish and fulfilled cruelty, peering at her as he slowly closed the door.

Why had he brought his brother? What did he want? What was he after? If she knew she could take care of herself. But she didn’t know.

The pain was creeping in her hands again and there was a new place. Her right hip ached angrily when she moved. She thought, So the pain will move in toward the center, and sooner or later all the pains will meet in the center and join like rats in a clot.

In spite of his advice to himself, Joe couldn’t let it alone. He carried a pot of tea to her door, knocked softly, opened the door, and went in. As far as he could see she hadn’t moved.

He said, “I brought you some tea, ma’am.”

“Put it on the table,” she said, and then as a second thought, “Thank you, Joe.”

“You don’t feel good, ma’am?”

“The pain’s back. The medicine fooled me.”

“Anything I can do?”

She raised her hands. “Cut these off—at the wrists.” She grimaced with the extra pain lifting her hands had caused. “Makes you feel hopeless,” she said plaintively.

Joe had never heard a tone of weakness in her before and his instinct told him it was time to move in. He said, “Maybe you don’t want me to bother you but I got some word about that other.” He knew by the little interval before she answered that she had tensed.

“What other?” she asked softly.

“That dame, ma’am.”

“Oh! You mean Ethel!”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“I’m getting tired of Ethel. What is it now?”

“Well, I’ll tell you like it happened. I can’t make nothing out of it. I’m in Kellogg’s cigar store and a fella come up to me. ‘You’re Joe?’ he says, an’ I tell him, ‘Who says?’ ‘You was lookin’ for somebody,’ he says. ‘Tell me about it,’ I says. Never seen the guy before. So he says, ‘That party tol’ me she wants to talk to you.’ An’ I told him, ‘Well, why don’t she?’ He gives me the long look an’ he says, ‘Maybe you forgot what the judge said.’ I guess he means about her coming back.” He looked at Kate’s face, still and pale, the eyes looking straight ahead.

Kate said, “And then he asked you for some money?”

“No, ma’am. He didn’t. He says something don’t make no sense. He says, ‘Does Faye mean anything to you?’ ‘Not a thing,’ I tol’ him. He says, ‘Maybe you better talk to her.’ ‘Maybe,’ I says, an’ I come away. Don’t make no sense to me. I figured I’d ask you.”

Kate asked, “Does the name Faye mean anything to you?”

“Not a thing.”

Her voice became very soft. “You mean you never heard that Faye used to own this house?”