She reaches up and takes hold of my arm, like someone clinging to a ship’s rail in heavy weather. “Those last weeks before she died,” she says, “I knew something strange was going on. It had been a long time since Tom had gone on so many house calls, or stayed out that late. So, one night I followed him. As soon as he turned onto that little road, the road to Cora’s house, I knew where he was going. It was the same house Viola’s parents had lived in back in . . . before.”

“You knew about the affair back when it happened, didn’t you? In 1968.”

Mom hesitates, then nods.

“Nothing ever got by you, did it?”

“Not much. In this case, I wish it had. Today, in court, I realized that I hadn’t known about the affair until after it ended. After Viola was raped, she stopped sleeping with Tom. He was acting like himself up to that time. But when she ended it, he changed. Overnight. He couldn’t sleep, he got short with me, with everyone.”

“Did you have any idea what Viola had done to Frank Knox?”

“No. I didn’t know about the rapes at all. Not then.”

“What did you know?”

“Only that something was wrong with my husband. So I followed Tom one day, just like I would forty years later. And he drove to a little house on the colored side of town. Nellie Jackson owned it, as Tom said today. Viola was hiding there.”

A prickle of apprehension raises the hair on my neck. “What did you do, Mom?”

She shakes her head slowly, her eyes focused on a scene from the deep past. “I waited for Tom to leave. As he did, I saw Viola through a crack in the door. Just a glimpse, but in that instant I understood everything. Wives are very sensitive to that kind of threat. I was sure he was in love with her—which he was. I didn’t go inside then. I drove around for a while, scared to death. I was terrified that Tom would leave us to be with her.”

“You should have known better than that.”

“Don’t be so sure. He came closer to leaving than he’ll admit. And if Viola had wanted him to leave us, he might have. She was a good person. Remarkable, really. In most ways . . . I couldn’t compete with her.”

“Mom, that’s—”

“There’s no use lying now, son. Anyway, the next morning, I went back to that house while Tom was at work, and I knocked on the door. Viola let me in. She was a mess, Penn. Suicidal. Nellie had a man staying with her. I think she would have killed herself if he hadn’t been there. Viola was frantic. She was certain her brother was dead. She didn’t know what to do.”

“What did she do?”