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ones.”
    “Three kids? How tight can it be?”
    “You’d be surprised, sweetie. I’ve had five. They stitch you up tighter than it was when you were inexperienced. Made Tony happy. Back in the day. These days only his work makes him happy.”
    “Where did it occur, the alleged rape?”
    “Try not to talk like a son of a bitch, Eliot. Alleged. There were vaginal abrasions. Visible.”
    “You saw them?”
    “Do you suddenly not understand ‘visible’?”
    “It occurred where?”
    “At home.”
    “Where were the children?”
    “In school, I presume, except for the four-year-old, who pounded the whole time on the bedroom door.”
    “And the newborn?”
    “She never said anything about a newborn. Where’d you get that thought?”
    “Seems that’s what Robby told me. Who I presume heard it from you.”
    “I told him no such thing. I don’t like your assumptions, Eliot. As if I had some hidden agenda in all of this. Trying to trip me up as if I were some kind of –”
    “I’m sorry.”
    “About what?”
    “The skeptical impression I’m giving you. It’s just what I do.”
    “Take everyone as concealing?”
    “Most everyone.”
    “She said she was humiliated by him.”
    “Did she spell it out?”
    “No.”
    “He has anal proclivities, you know, Millicent.”
    “How would I know? Or you, for that matter?”
    “That’s why we called Michael Coca ever since the eighth grade Michael
Caca
. As we grew older we grew merciful and called him Michael C. He understood the reference.”
    “He is shit.”
    “Do you know Denise?”
    “Very well.”
    “Did she ever indicate anything of an unusual sort, girl to girl, concerning his proclivities?”
    “No, and what the devil does this –”
    “Did he rape her anally?”
    She looks away, pained.
    “You have beautiful hair, Millicent.”
    “Why thank you, handsome.”
    “I bet Ann Iacovella does your hair. They say there’s no one in Ann’s class in this town.”
    “I don’t have white hair, Detective. You come here to talk about my hair?”
    “Sorry. I’d rather talk about your lovely appearance than rape. Can you blame me?”
    “You know how to talk to a girl, Eliot. Give my husband some pointers.”
    “Why do you suppose she came to you? I mean, given the threat against her husband?”
    “I have to tell you, hon’, she danced with the bastard at the Labor Day Ball. That comes out, a lawyer will insinuate from that. Tear her apart. I wouldn’t be surprised if he danced with all his victims.”
    “He dance with you?”
    “He did, but he didn’t fuck me.”
    “He came to her house in broad daylight?”
    “And in uniform.”
    “Shrewd. If he’s spotted, it’s official business in a neighbor’s mind. What do you and Robby want me to do, Millicent?”
    “Stop him.”
    “How?”
    “I heard from Tony that you have a way with bastards.”
    “He exaggerates.”
    “How did you get that pederastic minister to leave the state?”
    “Showed him a picture.”
    “Tony said you made David Del’Altro leave Utica. The teenage bully, wasn’t he, who kept on bullying into his late forties when, thanks to you, he moved to Akron? According to what they say. You have stature, Eliot. I can’t imagine Akron.”
    “Robby exaggerates.”
    “Among those who know these things, you are regarded with awe. Other people say other things. People, you know, trying to get at the questionable father by calumniating the good son. In my opinion.”
    No response.
    “Tony said you did something, but you wouldn’t tell him what. You just giggled. Give Milly the details, sweetheart.”
    “True, Del’Altro beat up kids in grade school, high school, even at Utica College and on into his thirties and forties he’d physically intimidate co-workers at the post office. This is well known. In a small town, everything is well-known. Nothing actionable, you understand. Can you arrest or sue someone who shoves an elbow into your ribs in close quarters? Or spits on your