“But we really ought to get this little bit of power-of-attorney paperwork signed today.

Just so no bank manager tries to push you around during this difficult time.

You know how they can be with a woman on her own.”

She slid several pages across my kitchen table and set a black pen down on top of them, and she watched me with that soft, attentive warmth, and I understood — because my husband had told me, in his own hand, less than twenty-four hours before — exactly what I was looking at.

Twenty-four hours earlier I would have seen a thoughtful sister-in-law sparing me a trip to the bank and a bullying from the officials.