He stopped with a forkful of potatoes and lay the fork down and turned back to me. “A black man accused of raping a white woman. We have to proceed so carefully. But let’s not talk about that. Do you live here, in Montgomery?”

“She’s visiting from Dunleith,” Derry said. “She loves poetry, Jim. Isn’t that your forte?”

“I got this great book today,” I said. “The Oresteia. I just started reading it. It’s a new translation.”

“The Oresteia,” he repeated. He ate the potatoes, then lay his fork down again. “I read it one night to cram for an exam. I remember getting about two-thirds of the way through it and thinking, damn, this stuff is good. I wish I had read this when I could pay attention to it.”

“You could read it now. I would let you read it.” He smiled at me again. He was not paying attention to anyone at the table except me.

“Charles William hasn’t told us about Frank Lloyd Wright yet,” Derry said. “Is a building like a play, Charles William? Can we learn our secrets from it?” The talk drifted into architecture and the summers Charles William had spent at Taliesin. We finished our dessert and coffee. I helped Derry take the plates to the kitchen. Anytime I glanced his way Jim Phillips was looking at me.

After dinner we went into the living room and drank brandy and listened to Nina Simone and the phone continued to ring. Lawyers called and politicians and reporters. Derry would listen very intently, then answer in a low voice, then hang up and the phone would ring again. Around eleven o’clock I remembered to call my mother and give her the phone number. “Have you been drinking, Rhoda?” she asked. “Have you been drinking again?”

“No, I haven’t been drinking. Are the babies all right?”

“Malcolm called you twice. Your husband. He wanted that number but I didn’t have it to give to him. Do you want the number he gave me? Do you want to call him?”

“No.”

“Wait a minute. Your father wants to talk to you.”

“Sister.”

“Yes, sir.”

“That boy’s been calling here all night. Now, Sister, Judge Pointer’s about got these papers ready. They got it all straightened out so your mother and I can adopt those children while we’re at it. Now wait a minute, it won’t change your rights. It’s just so if anything happens to you in an accident we could have them to raise. I wrote and told that boy about it so that’s probably why he’s calling you. Just leave it alone until you get home and we’ll call him together. Don’t go calling him on your own.”

“What’s the phone number, Daddy? Where is he?”