Sandy Hewitt

Sandy Hewitt is Adam Wright’s partner, introduced to Tova Sullivan at a luncheon and later encountered by chance in the produce aisle of Shop-Way. Her most consequential role is passing along Adam’s recollection that the girl Erik Sullivan was seeing was named Daphne. The information is small but decisive: it gives Tova a name to pursue in a mystery that has remained unresolved for decades.

Introduction and Connection to Adam

At the luncheon, Adam introduces Sandy to Tova as they take their seats together. Sandy is described as a short woman with curly auburn hair; Adam squeezes her arm and calls her his better half. Their relaxed couple’s presence is set against Adam’s conspicuous drinking: he takes a long gulp of a martini, recalling to Tova how he had once chugged her water at Hamilton Park.

Sandy later appears at Shop-Way, where Tova recognizes her from Mary Ann Minetti’s luncheon. By then, Tova knows her as Adam’s partner and has been wondering whether Adam might remember more about Erik’s purported sweetheart. She has even driven through the neighborhood where Adam and Sandy live, hoping to catch sight of them, then chastises herself for intruding on their privacy. Their grocery-store encounter brings that private uncertainty into an actual conversation.

The Conversation at Shop-Way

While picking Rainier cherries, Sandy apologizes for Adam’s behavior at the chophouse, specifically his drinking at noon. She explains that he has been under stress from the move and work. Tova tells her it is all right and means it, but Sandy remains uneasy about the earlier conversation concerning Erik’s former girlfriend.

Sandy then tells Tova that Adam remembered the girl’s name. She acknowledges that Adam had not thought she should disclose it, but reasons that someone who had lost a child might want even a small piece of information previously unknown to her. The disclosure is measured rather than dramatic: Sandy says the girl was named Daphne, while making clear that Adam could not remember her last name and recalled only that she attended his high school.

Significance to Tova’s Search

The name lands with physical force. As Sandy speaks, the cherries blur for Tova; she braces herself against a produce scale and repeats Daphne’s name. After a pause, Sandy observes that Tova now knows it. Her intervention does not solve the mystery or establish the girl’s full identity, but it changes what Tova can investigate: the unidentified sweetheart now has a first name and a connection to Adam’s high school.

Sandy’s importance rests on the care with which she handles that incomplete knowledge. She recognizes both Adam’s reluctance and Tova’s potential need to know, then chooses to share the limited fact without pretending it is more complete than it is. In the ordinary setting of a grocery store, her disclosure reopens a question Tova has carried for thirty years and gives the search a concrete lead.