And there was Tyler. He had crept into her affections. He was a peculiar little kid, and he had fallen for Josie. Her third week at the house, Josie had cut a basket of strawberries into inch-long pieces and let Tyler carefully dip each into chocolate. It made him deliriously happy—all that dipping and placing, dipping and placing—and after, he had snuggled up to Josie on the couch and astounded Mary. Tyler did not take to people, and he certainly did not cuddle them; he rarely let his mother that close to him. For whatever reason, Mary said, Tyler had chosen Josie. And the way Mary said it—like she was bestowing a blessing—and the way Tyler felt against Josie’s side—firm and unwavering—made Josie believe that perhaps she had found something good and solid.

Now Josie pulled into the driveway and honked the horn, and Mary came out to help with the groceries for tonight—a dinner party for nine people. Nine people and a man named Devesh Khanna. Devesh, who the dinner party was really for. Devesh, for whom Mary had composed ten different e-mails before impulsively picking up the phone and calling. He was a trauma surgeon at the teaching hospital where Mary worked and had first called Mary to consult on a case. “The patient was febrile and not responding to first-line treatment,” Mary told Josie excitedly. “He wanted to know what drug regimen to give!”

Josie had finally met him last Thursday when she and the children had gone to pick up Mary from the hospital. He had been waiting with Mary on the quad, and when Josie pulled up, Mary made Josie get out of the car to meet him. He was dark-skinned and stood close enough to Mary to graze her briefcase with his stiff white shirt cuff. Josie looked at him, looked at Mary, and felt a prick of apprehension at the base of her spine. “You’re the children’s nanny?” he had asked. “Josie’s more than a nanny,” Mary answered, but Devesh had fastened onto the idea. “More than a nanny,” he smiled. “Is that what it said in the job description?” Josie tried to laugh politely but was grateful when Tyler interrupted. “Africa is more than eleven point five million square miles, that’s twenty percent of the earth’s surface,” he said. “Its highest point is Uhuru Point at nineteen thousand three hundred and forty feet.” Mary quickly got in the car and rolled up the window.