Ralph couldn’t tolerate feeling left out, even for a few minutes, although Mirella felt that way every day—when someone on the subway asked her for directions and she fumbled her vowels, when the black women at the supermarket stared at her and her light skin as she wandered the aisles, when the white ladies she worked for didn’t look up from their hefty magazines to say thank you and good night, when the teachers at Penelope’s school referred to her as “Ralph Grand’s wife.”
