They were a real problem, Rose and Amy. A lot bigger problem than I realized.

The farm house was all steamy and kind of smelly when Rose let me in. She apologized for it, nodding toward the black dress that was hung up over the stove.

“I had to give it a hurry-up dye job, honey. But the goddam thing ought to be dry pretty soon. You want to come into the bedroom, and wait?”

I followed her into the bedroom and she started taking off her shoes and stockings, which was all she had on. I said, “Looky, honey. Maybe we shouldn’t do this right now.”

“Huh?” She frowned at me. “Why the hell not?”

“Well, you know,” I said. “You’re just now officially a widow. It just don’t seem decent to hop in bed with a woman when she ain’t hardly been a widow an hour.”

“What the hell’s the difference? You slept with me before I was a widow?”

“Well, sure,” I said. “But everybody does things like that. You might say it was even kind of a compliment to a woman. But this way, when a woman ain’t been a widow long enough to get her weeds wet, it just ain’t respectful. I mean, after all, they’s certain proprieties to observe, and a decent fella don’t hop right on a brand-new widow any more than a decent brand-new widow lets him.”

She hesitated, studying me, but finally she nodded.

“Well, maybe you’re right, Nick. Christ knows I’ve always done my goddam best to be respectable, in spite of that son-of-a-bitch I was married to.”

“Why sure you have,” I said. “Don’t I know that, Rose?”

“So we’ll wait until tonight. After Myra goes to sleep, I mean.”

“Well,” I said. “Well, uh—”

“And now I am going to tell you a surprise.” She gave me a hug, eyes dancing. “It won’t be long now before we can forget about Myra. You can get a divorce from the old bag—Christ knows you’ve got plenty of grounds—or we can just say to hell with her and leave here. Because we’re going to have plenty of money, Nick. Plenty!”

“Whoa, whoa now!” I said. “What the heck are you sayin’, honey?” And she laughed, and told me how it was.

Back in the beginning, when Tom was still sugarin’ up to her, he’d taken out a ten-thousand-dollar insurance policy. Ten thousand, ‘double indemnity’. After a year or so, when being nice got tiresome, he’d said to hell with the policy and to hell with her. But she’d kept up the premiums herself, paying for them out of her butter and egg money. Now, since Tom had been killed instead of dying a natural death, she’d collect under the double-indemnity clause. A whole twenty thousand dollars.

“Isn’t it wonderful, honey?” She hugged me again. “And that’s only part of it. This is damned good farm land, even if that son-of-a-bitch was such a no-good bastard that he never put any improvements on it. Even at a forced sale, it ought to bring ten or twelve thousand dollars, and with that much money, why—”