I glanced at my watch. "Better not. I'll see you later up at Rosie's."

"I'll be there closer to seven than to six. She's actually on her way over so I better get washed up. She's asked me for help, but she won't say with what."

I said, "Uh-oh."

He waved dismissively. "It's probably something simple. I don't mind a bit. If she shows while I'm gone, tell her I'll be back in a flash, as soon as I've cleaned up."

Henry crossed to his backdoor and went into the kitchen, where I could see him through the window, scrubbing up at the sink. He smiled when he caught my eye and started whistling to himself again.

I turned when I heard the gate squeak. Rosie appeared moments later, toting a brown paper bag. She owns the Hungarian tavern where Henry's older brother, William, now functions as the manager. William and Rosie were married Thanksgiving Day the year before, and they live in an apartment above her restaurant, which is half a block away. William is eighty-seven years old, and where Rosie once swore she was in her sixties, she now admits to being in her seventies, though she won't specify where. She's short and top-heavy with a coquettish cap of red hair dyed the color of Florida oranges. As usual, she was wearing a muu-muu, this one a gaudy jungle of orange and gold, the skirt lifting, sail-like, against the rising wind. She brightened when she saw me. "Kinsey, is good. Here's for Henry," she said, opening the bag for me.

I peered at the contents, half-expecting to see kittens. "What is that? Is that trash?"

Rosie shifted her weight from one foot to the other, refusing to make eye contact, a strategy she employs when she's guilty, ill at ease, or maneuvering like crazy. "Is my sister Klotilde's medical bills for hospital and after she died. Henry's going to explain. I can't make into heads or tails with this." Rosie's perfectly capable of speaking grammatically. She only butchers vocabulary and syntax when she's trying to seem helpless, thus conning you into doing her some outrageous favor. This is especially true when she's dealing with her state and federal taxes, which Henry's done without a murmur for the past six years. Now slyly, she said, "You gonna help I hope. He shouldn't do by himself. Is not fair."

"Why can't William pitch in?"

"Klotilde preferred Henry."

"But she's deceased," I said.

"Before she deceased herself, she preferred," she said, smiling coyly, as though that cinched it.

I dropped the argument. It was really up to Henry, though it irritated me intensely that she'd take advantage of him. The Klotilde in question was Rosie's cranky older sister. I'd never been able to pronounce her Hungarian surname, which abounded in consonants and strange punctuation marks. She'd suffered for years from an unspecified degenerative disease. She'd used a wheelchair since she was in her fifties, plagued by a variety of other ailments that necessitated copious medications and numerous hospital stays. Finally, in her seventies, she'd been advised to undergo hip-replacement surgery. This was in April, some seven months back. Though the surgery had been successful, Klotilde had been outraged by the rigors of convalescence. She'd resisted all attempts to get her on her feet, balked at nourishment, refused to use a bedpan, pulled out catheters and feeding tubes, flung her pills at the nurses, and sabotaged her physical therapy. After the customary five days in the hospital, she was moved to a nursing home where, over the course of the next several weeks, she began to decline. She'd finally succumbed to pneumonia, dysphagia, malnutrition, and kidney failure. Rosie had not been exactly stricken when she "passed."