I remain completely still and quiet, allowing him to navigate the narrative at his own pace.
“She was my cousin by marriage,” he explains, “Her mother married my father’s younger brother when Evelyn was about fifteen years old, and I was seventeen.”
“Were the two of you ever actually together?” I ask. “Romantically?”
“Briefly, while I was in college,” he admits. “Then we both realized that we were better at being family and allies than partners.”
“Did your parents know about it?”
“They knew we were close. They certainly would not have approved of anything beyond a platonic relationship.”
“Because she wasn’t originally born into the same upper social class?”
“Because they believed that her mother had strategically married into the wealth, rather than belonging to it by blood.”
I ma
