"The beginning is always the hardest," she said.

"Well actually I've already begun…" I said, a little tentatively. Despite the fact that she'd neither said nor done anything to intimidate me, I was still-perhaps unfairly-anxious that she'd blindside me with some attack or other.

"How?" she said.

"How did I begin?"

"Yes." f

"With the house, of course."

"Ah…" I heard the smile in her voice. "With Mr. Jefferson?"

"With Mr. Jefferson."

"That was a good idea. To begin in the middle that way. And with my glorious Thomas. He was, you know, the love of my life."

"Jefferson?"

"You think it should have been your father?"

"Well-"

"It was nothing like love with your father. It became love, but that's not how it began. When such as I, and such as he, mate, we do not mate for the sake of sentiment. We mate to make children. To preserve our genius, as your father would have said."

"Perhaps I should have begun there."

She laughed. "With our mating?"

"No I didn't mean that." I was glad of the darkness, to cover my blushes-though with her eyes she probably saw them anyway. "I… I… meant with the firstborn. With Galilee."

I heard her sigh. Then I heard nothing; for such a time I thought perhaps shefd decided to leave me. But no. She was still there in the room.

"We didn't baptize him Galilee," she said. "He took that name for himself, when he was six."

"I didn't know that."

"There's a great deal you don't know, Maddox. A great deal you can't even guess. That's why I came to invite you… when you're ready… to see some of the past…"

"You have more books?"

"Not books. Nothing so tangible…"

"I'm sorry, I don't really understand."