And Marne didn't know why she found that revelation so surprising. Most likely she did because she couldn't imagine anyone being close and not seeing each other but two or three times during a fifteen-year span-especially in a modern age of planes. And if they hadn't visited with each other in person, there had always been the telephone. Marne couldn't think of a time that she had heard Creagon and Melissa on the phone, talking together.

"Melissa used to be so gay and full of life," Creagon said, his voice again holding tinges of sadness. "My father sapped all of that out of her, leaving her a beautiful facade with nothing much inside."

Little clicks began going off inside of Marne's mind as she felt pieces of the jigsaw suddenly beginning to fall into place.

"You and Melissa?" Marne asked, wondering if it were possible. Frankly, Marne sometimes found it impossible to picture Melissa in John's bed. Now naked and with Creagon?

"Did you never wonder why I left home, why my father disowned me?" Creagon asked, knowing full well that his wife had indeed wondered but had kept from asking only out of respect for her husband's personal privacy. But, had Marne never really suspected the reason-the real reason for the break? Or, had Creagon gone around with his guilt for so many years that he thought it stood out on him like a blinking neon sign?

"I knew you'd probably eventually tell me," Marne said. "But never once did I even think to guess that it was because of anything you and your sister might have done."

"We began by playing around harmlessly like kids will," Creagon said, warming up to the subject now that he'd started. "This house is a mighty big place, as you can well see. Melissa and I had tutors but few kids our own age to play with. Mother was dead. Father was always away on business. We two children had to make up our own ways to amuse ourselves."

Creagon paused, carefully looking at his wife, trying to read how she was taking this.