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with light, curly hair, Grady had been Bennie’s associate and was now her live-in lover. They were renovating an old rowhouse together, rebuilding the shell floor by floor, even though Grady was a business lawyer who had as little spare time as Bennie. They talked about getting married in the house if it didn’t collapse first.
    “Okay, that’s everything,” Bennie said, whisking sawdust off the plywood with her hand. “You ready to examine Exhibits A, B, and C?”
    “Ready,” Grady said. He leaned against the two-by-fours that would reinforce the dining room walls. His gray eyes scanned the photos from behind gold wire-rimmed glasses, and he had already changed into the white DUKE T-shirt and jeans he wore to work on the house. “You say her name’s Alice Connolly?”
    “Yes. Now. The first photo, Exhibit A, you saw already. It’s the one with the airmen in front of the plane, the one I showed my mother. Exhibit B, the second photo, is of the same pilot, Bill Winslow, my father. Holding two babies about the same age.”
    “The same age?” Grady leaned over the black-and-white picture and compared it with the pilots’ group photo; a young, fair-haired man in a white T-shirt and rolled-up blue jeans was sitting on a brick step, grinning. It did appear to be the same pilot and in his arms were two infants swaddled in white blankets. “I can’t tell if they’re the same age. The photo’s so grainy and the babies so tiny, I can’t see their features.”
    “Me neither. They could be twins, but who knows? It’s Winslow, though.”
    “How do you know for sure? You never met your father, did you?”
    “No, but I think it is. Maybe he came back for this photo, I don’t know. That’s his name and his eyes are like mine. Now, this is Exhibit C.” Bennie picked up the last photo, suppressing the emotion it evoked. It was a picture of her mother and two other young girls, seated on a round stool at the type of luncheonette counter that didn’t exist anymore. Her mother’s eyes were fully made-up and her dark hair pin-curled around her ears. She had a rich mouth, vivid with lipstick, and her body curved amply in a sweater set and a slim skirt with a slit up the back. “Check this out, Grady. The hot number is my mother.”
    He grinned. “She looks so pretty. How old you think she was?”
    “Sixteen, seventeen. A lot younger than I am now. Isn’t that weird?” Bennie gazed at the photo. She was far too old for it to be a revelation that her mother had a life before she came along. The revelation was that she was ever healthy.
    “I don’t think I’ve ever seen a photo of your mother that you haven’t taken. Let me see that.” Grady slid the photo from Bennie’s hand and flipped it over. There were tufts of torn black paper in its four corners and on the back, in a feminine script, was written, F OR B ILL . “Interesting,” he said.
    “That’s my mother’s handwriting. I’m supposed to believe she gave the photo to Winslow, who gave it to Connolly. Who says she’s my twin.”
    “Do you believe her?” He raised a faint eyebrow.
    “No, of course not. Although it’s strange that she had these pictures, especially the one of my mother.”
    “Wait a minute.” Grady handed Bennie the photo with a frown. “This is a photo of your mother with two young women. The photo could have come from anywhere. Connolly could be the child of one of the other women.”
    “But it says ‘For Bill’ on the back, in my mother’s writing.”
    “Maybe Connolly forged it.”
    “Yeah, but how?” Bennie turned. “And what about the tufts of paper on the back of the photos? It looks like they were all taken from the same photo album.”
    “I don’t know, but I don’t like you being manipulated by some con.” Grady folded his arms and his T-shirt edged up over slim, ropy biceps. Golden hair covered his forearms, and his wrists were narrow, so his Swiss Army watch seemed crudely oversized. “Does Connolly