“Why do you want to know about Jerry?” she asked. At another time, I thought, she might be a polite sort of person, but the threat of another woman had at some point become great enough to make her forget her manners.

My usual inclination at a time like this would be to make something up, to invite them to church the way Carlo would, but I just couldn’t be that dishonest. It would be victimizing her even more, and it wasn’t worth it just to satisfy my curiosity. Instead, I found myself wanting to help her.

Silence makes people want to fill it, and I discovered I’d been thinking too long when she said, “Does he know you?”

The unspoken messages were coming thick and fast now. Does he want you instead of me?

“Look,” I said. “I live in the neighborhood. Jerry helped my husband,” subtle emphasis on husband, “move his telescope. He just happened to be passing by and they met. Has he mentioned Carlo?” Again, a little emphasis on the Carlo.

Now, with all the other emotions coming and going across her face, I noticed a new one: shame.

“No” was all she said, and I could tell she was ashamed of not knowing such a simple innocent detail about her husband’s, boyfriend’s, whatever’s, doings. Then she looked suspicious again, sending the lines between her eyes deeper. She wasn’t even buying the truth. At least, she would be feeling at some unconscious level, it was better than being ashamed.

She wasn’t moving toward the door, which I realized I had been blocking. I stepped out of the way now, but she stayed where she was with a hateful, narrow-eyed stare. Whatever I was, whatever I had come for, I was the enemy. For some time now, everyone had been the enemy. I had no reason to stay, but I couldn’t just leave this woman to herself and—what else? Was it Jerry Nolan who had made her this way? Or had he just found her and made the most of it? Were they married? I didn’t need to ask. I could find out everything on my own now.

One more try. “I wanted to invite both of you over for dinner. Sometime,” I said, implying that Jerry had told us all about this woman. I hoped in the course of things she didn’t realize I hadn’t called her by name just in case it wasn’t Gloria Bentham.

“Thank you,” she said, summoning the woman she might have once been, polite, gracious. “But I don’t think—”

“Just something casual. Carlo will grill something.” Okay, so we didn’t have a grill but I was sure I could get one and one of us could learn how to use it.