She had been told, three days earlier, that Mommy was very sick and was not going to get better.

She had absorbed that the way a four-year-old absorbs anything, which is partially and in the wrong order.

I told her that her mother had died.

I said the word, because a chaplain had told me to say the word, and it is the single best piece of advice anybody gave me that summer.

She asked whether Mommy was coming to the house.

I said no.