It was out now, and the others could only gape. Schoenstein, Leland could sense, was stunned. “Teddy” had done it to him. It was the first time Leland had used the name. Later he would want to know how Leland had felt so sure of what he had suggested. It had been more than a feeling. Susan Starrett had moved through the house with authority. Mrs. Howard, who had saved her foster son’s letters, would not have encouraged his former girl friend. Howard would not have promoted the girl out of goodness of soul. Not him. He had brought her along and bided his time. Perhaps it had taken years. His behavior settled it. It had taken Leland too long to recognize it for what it was. Howard had been playing bull of the herd. Some men did it with all women, but the way he had treated her had shown none of the sly self-consciousness that would go with pretense in him. For Leland it had been a question of believing what the others had not wanted to believe. It was a mistake to forget how many kinds of people there were in the world. Now what Leland wanted to see were the letters from Leikman to her, after he had learned of what had happened with Howard. Leland felt less sure of this ground, but it was still worth crossing.

She had her coat. He followed her to the porch. “Just over there,” she said, indicating another two-story frame diagonally across the blacktop. The house needed paint and repairs. “My mother’s down to church, so there’s nothing we can’t talk about. Good thing you came in a police car and it’s in all the papers. People here peep around the curtains all the time.”

“If it will help, I’ll pin on my badge.”

“They don’t know about me and Walt,” she said. “We’ve been careful. He doesn’t know that I have letters from Ted. I’m glad you didn’t say that in there. I saved mine, too. How do you like that?” She was mocking Howard now. She must have listened at the kitchen door.

“I like it very much,” Leland said, mocking himself.

“Look at that shack. You’d think Walt would paint it for us, for what I’m giving him. But he says people will get suspicious. He’s not fooling me. You men are all alike. My father was the same way. My mother’s told me things,” she said, believing it. “Even Teddy. There’s no such thing as love, I learned that much.”

It wasn’t Leland’s job to argue with her.

“When Teddy went away,” she said as they went up the walk, “I thought my heart would break. He ruined me for anyone else. I guess this is his reward—I’ll never get a decent man. Now he doesn’t have anything, so I guess it’s fair. I have to say you got that fat old man good back there. I thought his eyes would jump right out of his head. It’ll be something for me to think about for a long time to come.” They went inside. “My father died three years ago. We bought new furniture with the insurance. I have a job downtown, so we get by. Sit down and I’ll get the letters.”