I believed him, for whatever it was worth.

Dennis was not a cruel man; cruel men do not sit with their eyes fixed on the carpet, unable to defend themselves, offering an apology they already know is far too small for the thing it is meant to cover.

He and Carol had loved Daisy — you could see it everywhere in that house, in the photographs on the walls, in the careful ordinary evidence of a well-raised child.

They had simply committed one enormous wrong against her out of fear, and then let it harden for years because each passing day made the confessing harder, and now it had climbed the stairs to meet them.”