My daughter Emily had not come to the wedding yet.

She’d sent a message that morning saying she had a terrible migraine and might be late, and Rebecca had smoothed it over the way she smoothed over everything, with a sad understanding smile.

“Your daughter doesn’t accept me, Walter,” she’d told me more than once, gently, never bitterly.

“But I’ll be patient.

Love takes time too.” And I had believed that.

I had let myself believe that my daughter’s coolness toward my bride was jealousy, or grief for her mother, or a difficulty of the heart that time would soften.