Against the softly faded backdrop of my farm, she was too vivid, like a color cutout pasted on an old photograph. Her presence felt inappropriate, like a party dress at a funeral.

“I’m Abe.”

“I meant Abraham Senior, I guess. I’m the granddaughter of one of his old army buddies, Patrick Wolinsky.”

“There’s no other Abe Griffin.”

She glanced behind her at the long driveway. “Is there another Griffin residence around here? The man I’m looking for would be really old. He was in the second World War with my grandfather.”

“You have the right house. I know Patty, what does he want?”

“Oh, I’m so sorry!” She touched a hand to her mouth. “Did he pass away? He must have been your grandfather.”

Assumptions make for the best lies, second only to ambiguity. “What can I help you with, ma’am?”

“Can I come in?”

I tried to be gracious as I stepped back from the door and waved her into my living room, but I probably looked as irritated as I felt. She stepped past me trailing crisp fall air and too-sweet lilac perfume. The room was dim and cave-like, so I opened the curtains to let the morning sun flood in. I kicked myself as habit took over and I said, “Can I get you some coffee?”

She looked relieved at this first sign of civility and nodded. I spent few minutes in the kitchen glaring at the percolator, and when I came back she was sitting in my easy chair. She had a picture frame in her hand, taken from a shelf across the room. It was, of course, of my old squad. “You look so much like your grandfather.”

I ransomed the picture with the cup of coffee and delivered it back to the shelf where it belonged. I stood for a moment after setting it carefully back in the dust-free rectangle it had left behind and locked eyes with myself. That poor sap grinning back at me from under his steel pot helmet had no idea what was going to happen to him three months later. I silently communed with him, feeling for that sense of rightness, when everything was still fine and I knew everything there was to know about the world. I didn’t find it. I turned my back on that smiling soldier and faced my visitor.