Before entering the cab, Grandfather looked up at me and added: “Please do not refer to the sport as ping-pong. Its proper name is table tennis. Had you used that belittling term in Joshua’s presence, his predictable eruption might have driven us from the house.”
Caleb was not the chatterbox who drove us to the Cushman residence and for the most part kept his eyes on the road except to look back and hand me a business card: “Be sure to ask for me next time you’re in town.”
I assured him we would, and we exited the cab in front of the Fairfield train station, a large hut like structure with an interior furnished with a series of once-polished wooden benches with armrests, most speckled with gum residue and food or beverage splatters. The station was deserted except for a solitary sales wi
