The “nephew” bit is going to take a little clarification. Mary Alice’s second husband was also Philip Nachman. Haley’s new husband is his nephew, named for his uncle. So Haley and Philip are Mary Alice’s niece and nephew (Philip by marriage). The “nephew” is to keep from confusing him with the original Philip Nachman, dead and buried at Elmwood Cemetery beside Sister’s other husbands long ago, but still alive (so she says) in her heart. Certainly in her bank account. Each of her three husbands left her richer than the preceding one.

She leaned forward. “Don’t you think so?”

“What? That Haley’s happy? Sure.”

“It’s the Nachman genes.” She stirred her coffee. “I almost asked Haley, but I decided not to.”

“Asked her what?”

“Well, my Philip, when we were making love, just before he’d,” Sister paused. “Well, he had this unusual thing he’d do.”

“What?”

“He’d stop for a second and say, ‘Lord, the saints are marching in.’” She smiled.

I thought about this disclosure for a moment. “Somehow I don’t think that’s genetic, Sister.”

“Probably not. He did go to Tulane. But every time I hear that song I get misty-eyed. I wanted to have a New Orleans band play it at his funeral, strutting down the path at Elmwood with their umbrellas, but I wasn’t sure it was kosher.”

“I wouldn’t think so.”

Mary Alice looked into her coffee cup thoughtfully. “He was a lovely man, Mouse. Very much in touch with his inner child. No big alpha male hang-up like Fred has.”

“Alpha males don’t kiss the ground when they get home.”

“Ha. I knew he didn’t trip.” Mary Alice got up, put her mug into the dishwasher, and turned to face me. “I might as well tell you, Mouse. I’ve made a New Year’s resolution to get married this year.”

“To Cedric?”

“Who?”

“The last man you were engaged to.”

“Of course not. I’m serious.” She leaned over the counter toward the table where I was still collapsed. “I was thinking while we were crossing the Atlantic that my ‘sell by’ date is fast approaching and I want some steady company, preferably someone who can dip me when we dance.”

“Just keep changing your ‘sell by’ date. That’s what 20/20 says they do at all the grocery stores. You’ve already backed it up two years.” On her last birthday, Mary Alice had been sixty-six, but had decided to count backward from now on. I am now three years younger than she is instead of five.

“Oh, I plan to. I still think it’s time I settled down, though.”

“Bill Adams?”

“I don’t know. Maybe. He’s a little alpha.”

What was this “alpha” stuff?

“Fairchild Weatherby?”

Sister straightened up. “No way. Terrible things happen to his wives, like people murdering them.”

“Is age a factor here at all?”

“Of course. Forty to eighty.”