Again I thought things but didn’t say them. I thought how it was Mom who had given Rachael all those speeches about how your conscience was like a tender new plant and you had to care for it night and day and how you should always heed its still small voice and do what it said, which was like letting sunlight into a dark room so the tender little plant could grow. Well, Rachael’s conscience had grown all right, like the vine in “Jack and the Beanstalk.” And if Rachael heard or saw or even thought anything bad she told or admitted it and seemed to actually enjoy the punishment she got. Her conscience had had a lot of water and sunlight. It was so healthy it made Rachael a menace. If you could get some kind of weedkiller for consciences I would have poured it on Rachael’s head—or her chest, if consciences are in your heart. I’d probably have poured it on both places.

Mom stood there a second, then said, “I hope you’re satisfied!” She turned and walked out and shut the door behind her very quietly.

That night at supper Dad seemed fine, he even joked a little about the toilet tank hitting him and said how he liked being right in Portofino after all and how the Hotel Nazionale was quieter at night, even counting the sound of people in the square, that anything was better than listening to the pounding of music from the night club La Busola in Paraggi.

The manager came over to our table and handed Dad a letter. “Thees lettera camea for youa today.”

Dad looked at it and put it down next to his bread sticks face up. I glanced over. It was marked “Personal and Confidential” in red letters. It had a Swiss stamp on it. I wondered what it was. Then I looked up at Mom because she had made a gasping choking gurgling noise in her throat. I saw her staring at the letter.

Dad finished his plate of ripe figs and prosciutto and picked up the letter and said, “I wonder what Jonathan Edwards wants?” as he slit it open with his table knife. Mom made some little hissing noises and Janet sort of sighed and Rachael actually squeaked like a mouse. I don’t know if I made any frightened noises or not but my heart pounded pretty hard. Dad got the letter out and started to read it out loud even though it was marked “Confidential.”