The three people of William Trevor’s title are an old man, his unmarried daughter and a younger man who comes to their house. Each of the trio has their own version of why these visits have been happening for years, but only two of them know what’s behind it all. “The darkness of their secrets lit, the love that came for both of them through their pitying of each other” is gradually revealed by the old master of the genre. Even before we learn the true story, or what passes for it, we want to turn away from it, so devastating it promises to be. Towards the end, we come to envy the old man, who will die unburdened by it. “The truth restored, but no one else knowing it.”
Collected in The Hill Bachelors, Viking, 2000
A Personal Anthology 