Page 52 of The Housekeeper

Chapter Twenty-two

I have noexcuse for what happened next.

That being said, I’ll try anyway.

It started with Tracy.

“So, hypothetically, would you want someone to tell you if your husband was having an affair?” she asked, the supposedly hypothetical question clearly one that she’d been mulling over all evening.

It was Friday night and we were sitting across from each other at my parents’ dining room table, Tracy sipping her second cup of espresso, me finishing off a second piece of the peach pie Elyse had baked for dessert. Our mother was upstairs in her bed. Our father had excused himself moments earlier to check on Sam and Daphne, who were watching cartoons downstairs. Elyse was in the kitchen, tidying up and singing softly to herself.

I’d phoned that morning to ask if I could impose on her generosity one last time and bring the kids over for a few hours the next afternoon so I could meet with a client, explaining that Harrison was out of town for the weekend. She’d said yes immediately, then invited me and the kids over for dinner. “I’ll ask Tracy, too,” she’d said. “I think it’s good for your father to havehis daughters and grandchildren around as much as possible. And I know your mother will be so happy to see you all again.”

I don’t know why I didn’t find it odd that it was Elyse who’d issued the invitation, and not my father. Or that she would do so without first checking with him. I guess that it felt so seamless that I didn’t think to question it. Elyse was the one cooking dinner, after all, and she obviously had my parents’ best interests at heart.

We spent some time at my mother’s bedside when we first arrived, but she was alternatively unresponsive or overly agitated, and we all breathed a sigh of relief when Elyse summoned us downstairs for dinner.

“So?” Tracy asked, returning her espresso cup to its tiny saucer. “Would you?”

“Would I what?”

“Would you want someone to tell you if they knew your husband was having an affair?”

“What are you getting at?” I asked bluntly, in no mood for Tracy’s “hypotheticals.” “You’re suggesting that Harrison is having an affair?”

“Look. I’m not trying to upset you…”

“Whatareyou trying to do?”

“Just that, if it were me, I’d want someone to tell me. I’d want to know…”

“What is it youthinkyou know, Tracy?”

She looked toward the kitchen, then lowered her voice. “I saw him this afternoon after the closing luncheon. With that girl. The one I saw him with before.”

“She’s his student, for God’s sake.”

“I know that.”

“So…what?” I asked, picturing Harrison slamming into me against the wall of our living room. “Did you catch them in some sort of compromising position?”

“Not exactly.”

“Whatexactly?” I repeated, looking around the table for something to throw at her head.

“He was putting her overnight bag into the trunk of his car.”

I dug my fingernails into the palm of my hand, trying not to let my shock register on my face.

“Then she climbed into the front seat next to him and they drove off. They were laughing and they didn’t see me,” she added, lowering her voice another notch.

It took me a few seconds to formulate a response. “Her parents have a cottage in Prince Edward County,” I said, repeating what Harrison had told me. “She’s the one who arranged for Harrison to be the guest speaker at this weekend’s event. It’s only natural that they’d drive there together,” I added for good measure, angry that Harrison had chosen to omit that little detail from his account.

Then I remembered that I’d neglected to mention my dinner with Roger McAdams.

“What are you girls whispering about in here?” Elyse asked, returning to the dining room to clear the rest of the dishes. “No, you sit,” she directed as I rose from my chair to help her. “Finish discussing whatever it is that has you looking so serious.”

“I was just asking Jodi what she thought about this idea I have for a story,” Tracy improvised.