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time."
    Uncle George closed his magazine. Good; now he was really paying attention. "Who?" he asked.
    "The seventh-grade girls' basketball team," Anastasia replied. "Go on. Ask the next one."
    "What?" asked Uncle George.
    "Won their fourth game in a row. Go on."
    "When?"
    "Last Friday afternoon."
    "Where?"
    "At Lexington Junior High. Okay, next?"
    "Why?"
    "In continued pursuit of the regional championship. Do you like that phrase, 'continued pursuit'? I thought it up all by myself."
    Uncle George nodded. "It's quite, ah, sophisticated. Yes, I like it very much."
    Anastasia spooned up the last of her corn flakes and took her empty bowl to the sink. "I'll let you do one more, Uncle George, now that you're getting the hang of it. Start asking the questions again. Start with 'who.'
    Uncle George grinned and said, "Who?"
    "Anastasia Krupnik—"
    "What?"
    "Unfortunately has found it necessary to cancel her plans to visit her friend's new apartment—"
    "When?"
    "This morning—"
    "Where?"
    "About half a mile from this house—"
    "Why?"
    "Because it's raining," Anastasia said angrily. "It's
pouring,
and it's not ever going to stop."
    "If your dad will let me borrow his car," Uncle George suggested, "I could give you a ride to your friend's. I don't have any plans this morning."
    "
Would
you? Hey, that'd be
great,
Uncle George! Dad, is that okay?"
    Myron Krupnik looked up from the newspaper. "Mmmmmm," he muttered, and looked back down.
    "I'll just go get my jacket," Anastasia said. "Do you want me to get your jacket out of the guest room, Uncle George? Or maybe a necktie or something?"
    Uncle George looked down at the old plaid flannel shirt he was wearing. "Isn't this all right?" he asked. "Do I need a necktie to give you a lift to your friend's?"
    "Well, no, I guess not. But I just thought that maybe, on the remote chance that we
might
meet Daphne's very attractive mother—"
    Katherine Krupnik looked up from her crossword puzzle. "Anastasia," she said in a warning voice.
    "You look just fine, Uncle George," Anastasia said hastily.
    ***
    Anastasia glanced over at her uncle as he backed the car out of the garage. He really
did
look like Clark Gable, even from the side. He had that nice mustache and a very warm smile.
    And widowers, she knew from magazine articles, were by far the best husbands. Much better than divorced men. It was because they remembered their wives fondly, instead of gritting their teeth and writing alimony checks each month. Probably Uncle George remembered Aunt Rose so fondly that already he was wishing he could find somebody just as nice as she had been. Someone like, maybe, Caroline Bellingham, Daphne's mother.
    "We go that way, straight ahead, for three blocks; then turn left," Anastasia said as Uncle George pulled out into the street. "I suppose you remember Aunt Rose very fondly," she added.
    He shifted gears and the car lurched and sputtered. It was an old, temperamental car. "Straight ahead," he repeated, "and then left after three blocks. Is that what you said?"
    "Right. And also I said that I suppose you remember Aunt Rose very fondly."
    "Well, ah, yes," Uncle George replied. "Yes, I do. I'm sorry you didn't know her, Anastasia."
    "Mom and Dad told me what a nice lady she was. And that you were very happily married."
    "Yes, that's true."
    "Do you suppose—here, Uncle George; here's where you turn left—do you suppose it will take you a very long time to recover from the shock of her dea——ah, her passing away?"
    Uncle George turned the corner. "It will take time," he said. "It was sudden. Do we go straight now?"
    Anastasia nodded. "Straight for half a mile. I'll tell you when to turn onto Daphne's street. By the way, Daphne's mother is also recovering from the shock of the very sudden loss of her husband."
    "Oh? I'm sorry to hear that." Uncle George looked sympathetic in a Clark Gable-ish way. Anastasia hoped he wouldn't ask her the
cause
of the loss of Mrs. Bellingham's husband. The sinister Sal