The only place left for me was a trailer near the county road.

Ruth’s old trailer stood at the end of a gravel lane. I pulled my suitcase up the uneven steps and remained in the kitchen for a long time, listening to water drip from the faucet. My sister had been gone four years, but her dish towels still hung from the oven handle.

Ruth had left the trailer to me when she died. Out of habit, I had continued paying the lot rent, never imagining I would someday need to live there.

The first nights were the worst. I slept wearing the housecoat my high school sweetheart had bought me because a trace of his aftershave still clung to it. I wept in a way I had not since Howard died.

On the third morning, I picked up my phone and called the mansion. Margaret answered.

“It’s Eleanor,” I said. “Please. I just want the picture from the mantel, the one of him fishing. I’ll pay for the shipping.”