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"Can't sleep?" I took the cup from her and she sat down across from me.

"No."

"Is it Gregory?"

"It's everything." She wrapped both hands around her cup. "It's Benny, actually. He rang at eight to ask what I want done with the arch."

"The arch?"

"It's still standing out there. The frame of it, anyway. He said he'd have somebody come for it Wednesday, and did I want the flowers stripped first. I said yes, and then I sat down on the stairs and cried for twenty minutes about a wooden frame." She sipped. "I'm not upset about the arch."

"I gathered."

She reached over and pushed my hair off my forehead.

"You did the hardest thing any of us did this week, and you did it standing up in front of everybody, and I haven't told you how proud I am." Her hand stayed where it was. "You're a strong man, Blaine. You always have been."

"I ruined Steven's life,” I mumbled.

"No, you didn't."

"I humiliated a man who never did one thing wrong to me."

"You saved him from years of heartache," said my mother. "A marriage needs two people completely in love and willing to put up with the good and the bad. You were never going to be that man for him. Steven will work that out. He may already have."

He had, actually. He telephoned to say so, and it was the worst kindness anybody has ever done me. I didn't mention it. Mom reached across the table and patted my hand.

"Darling."

"Don't say anything more about Steven, or about—"

"I wasn't going to." And then she gave me the look. It's the look mothers give their children when they are about to say something they believe is important. "I'm going to say one thing, and then I'll leave you alone about it forever."

She put her cup down.

"Gregory loves you."

"Mother—"

"No, I'm saying my piece." She held up a hand. "I've been thinking about it all day and I keep arriving at the same place. So I'm going to say it out loud, and then you can do whatever you like with it. That man loves you very much. It's the only explanation that fits."

"It isn't the only explanation. There are several." I rolled my eyes.

"Name one."

I opened my mouth and nothing came out.

The truth is that I had spent hours upstairs trying to establish Gregory's motive. Pride. Ego. A man who cannot bear to lose. A producer who wanted the ending he'd already written.

It's a good case. I could take it into a courtroom and win with it. But it also doesn't fit the facts, and I'd known that since about midnight. Because a man who wanted to win would have left already. A man protecting his pride does not stand in this kitchen and tell my parents that he threatened somebody who lives in his car. None of it made him look good, and he did it anyway, with me standing by the door making sure he didn't make it sound pretty.

"He sold his boat," said my mother.

"I know what he sold."

"He sold his home, darling. That's where he was living."

"I know."