“Keisha! Hello! You’re here—too?”

Keisha sees me and recognizes me. One of the grocery store customers! She blinks at me, confused and alarmed.

“What a coincidence! You are the other ‘recipient’ … Congratulations!”—my voice is lowered, discreet. It will take a few seconds for Keisha to comprehend the circumstances: the coincidence that the other of two Deserving Americans summoned to the Delaware Inn is someone known to her.

To placate any suspicion she might have about this remarkable coincidence, I show Keisha my letter from the Society of Deserving Americans, near identical to her own, which she hurriedly skims; but Keisha has not a suspicious bone in her body, thus no reason to wonder at the coincidence, if that’s what it might be called. Judging from my manner, she has no reason to suspect that I know anything more than she does about the mysterious award we are each to receive.

A flawless ruse! Presenting myself not as the master plotter of the Society of Deserving Americans, but one of its Deserving Americans.

Awkwardly, we introduce ourselves. (Of course, I provide a fictitious name.) Yet more awkwardly, we shake hands. (It’s clear that Keisha is not accustomed to shaking hands.)

For this daunting occasion, which must also be a secretive occasion, Keisha has made herself up like a high school girl at a prom. Her sallow skin glows, her thin lips are fire-engine red. Shadows and dents beneath her eyes seem to have vanished. The scanty eyebrows have been penciled into thin crescents, but there is nothing to be done about the chemo-ravaged, lashless eyes that stare wonderingly at me.

Naturally, I take charge. Keisha looks to me to lead her. Where, as a customer at McGuire’s, I am somewhat stiff, formal, unsmiling, now, in the foyer of the Delaware Inn, in this startling new setting, I am gentlemanly and affable, smiling easily.

“Yes, we’re both to be congratulated! This is an amazing honor …”

“Did you—tell anyone about it?” Keisha’s voice is strained, hoarse.

“Of course not. It has to be a secret. You didn’t tell anyone, did you, Keisha?”

“N-No. I did not.”

“Because I think they would nullify the award if we did,” I tell her sternly. “It would be—I think—a violation of our contractual relationship with the Society, which we have acknowledged by coming here today …”

This sequence of words is so plausible, so legal-sounding, Keisha nods grimly. It is good for her to be told such a sentiment by me, an older gentleman, seemingly an “educated” gentleman, to assuage any doubts or ambivalence she might have.

Allowing me then to lead her into the River View Room overlooking the dazzling Delaware. Amid so much that is banal and predictable, a river is always in a way fresh and unexpected.

Our reserved table?—an affable host escorts us to it, the very table I’d requested, in a farther corner. At this hour of the day the River View is virtually deserted, sepulchral. Unobtrusively I will remove two envelopes from a briefcase to place on a ledge beside the table, as if they have been awaiting us.