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    He followed her into the kitchen. She did not speak to him as she put the groceries on the counter.
    â€œSo what’s up?” Lofton asked. The question sounded awkward, foolish. Amanti let it hang in the air unanswered.
    She put the groceries away with brusque movements, ignoring him, as if he were a neighbor who had stopped by uninvited. When she had finished, she glanced about the room, avoiding his eyes. She seemed confused, as if trying to remember something she had forgotten. Then she took a step toward him, placed her fingers on the kitchen counter, and let out a quick sigh. Lofton studied her fingers. She held them very still on the countertop.
    â€œI know I told you I had a story, but now that I’ve had time to think about it, I’m not sure, really, that it would be the best thing.…”
    Lofton said nothing. Some people, when they told you something—whether you were a reporter, or a lifelong friend, or the slob next door—blurted the thing out to you, giving it up all at once. Others wanted you to ask questions, to work the information free, while they pretended they didn’t want to let go. Either way, whether you were quiet or asked questions, once they had decided to tell something, they usually told it. People knew, mostly by instinct, that the only way for a person to remain objective was to remain ignorant, and once they had told you what they had to say, you were no longer outside the situation, but inside it. You were involved, and that’s what they wanted.
    â€œThe reason I hesitate is that it has to do with one of the owners of the Redwings. Jack Brunner.”
    She mentioned Brunner’s name so casually—in the same way she might tell him she had forgotten to buy something at the store—that he wondered if what she had to tell him would be important, or even interesting. Then he saw her seriousness: the tenseness in the way she stood, in the way she turned her head when he tried to look at her directly. There was an incongruity in her manner he could not place. Maybe it lay in her features: the high cheekbones of a German woman, the blue and crystalline eyes, yet the dark skin of a Mediterranean. And there was that birthmark, or scar, a place on her cheek where the skin was white and mottled, as if she had stayed out in the sun too long and her skin were peeling. She lit a cigarette, its acrid, unhappy smoke filling the air around them. Without asking, he reached to the pack and pulled one for himself. For a second he imagined that moment of stillness on the ballfield, that infinitesimal pause in which the pitcher, already wound up and ready to throw, stood balanced on one foot, his weight hung back, the other foot in the air, and the batter stood waiting, his bat cocked—a moment as quiet, and as brief, as the moment between heartbeats.
    â€œYou don’t have to tell me anything,” he said. “I can just turn around and walk out the door. It’s up to you.”
    â€œNo, why don’t you sit down?” She blew out smoke as she said it and gave him an unsure glance he found seductive. He nodded but remained standing. Amanti still held her fingertips pressed against the counter. The tips were turning white.
    â€œBrunner’s burning Holyoke. He’s doing it for the insurance money.”
    â€œSo?” Lofton heard the edge in his voice. The sudden revelation bothered him. Why was she telling him this?
    â€œI found out by accident. I don’t want Brunner to know.”
    Amanti’s face seemed suddenly old. He lit the cigarette he had taken, looked at the smoke curl from its end, then put it out without smoking any.
    â€œWhy don’t you go to the police?”
    â€œI don’t have any proof. Besides, he owns Holyoke. They all love him there. And other reasons. I just can’t go to them myself. I’m too close to the whole thing.”
    He was about to ask her what difference it made, why