Todd turned on a bedside lamp, which fizzed at him, flickered on and off a few times, and eventually settled down to a dull yellow glow. He turned on the TV, checked the phone was working, and lay on the bed.

Half an hour later, the phone rang. It was Coughlan and he sounded pretty clenched.

“You found me then,” said Todd.

Coughlan got straight down to it.

“You have a deal,” he said. “Sign the papers this week and Mrs. Milstead will grant you a divorce on her original terms.”

“Thanks,” said Todd.

“I have to say, I am not happy with this arrangement,” said Coughlan. “I strongly advised her to go for new terms based on your new potential financial situation. But she said, and I quote, ‘let him have what he wants.’”

“I knew she would,” said Todd, who had known nothing of the sort. “Goodbye, Mr. Coughlan.”

“I’ll send the documents—” Coughlan began.

“No,” said Todd. “I’ll swing by in the morning and sign them in your office.”

“Okay then,” said Coughlan. It was the first time Todd had ever heard him sound surprised.

*  *  *

There was a bar across the street from the motel. It wasn’t very nice, but it was warm and there were people in it. Todd went in, sat down, ordered a beer and a whiskey, and stayed there until he was warm enough, and drunk enough, to go back to his room, where he fell asleep on the counterpane, woke up in the early hours, went to the bathroom, and—unable to find the bed again—stumbled into the armchair and fell asleep in that instead.

Todd woke up with a hangover and a renewed sense of resolve. He showered, if that was the right word for standing under a kind of spitting metal tube with a sprinkler attached to it, pulled a clean shirt from his grip, and drove down to Coughlan’s office.

“He’s expecting me,” Todd told Coughlan’s secretary Gillian.

“Are you sure?” she said.

“I spoke to him late last night,” said Todd.

Gillian looked as though she were about to say something about that, but didn’t. Instead she said, “Well, there’s nothing in the diary.”

Just then Coughlan came in.

“I beat you to the office,” said Todd.

“Milstead?” said Coughlan. “What brings you here?”

Todd looked around for a witness to this new-minted madness.

“Is there an epidemic of amnesia around here?” he asked. “I told you on the phone last night that I was coming over.”

Coughlan exchanged a look with Gillian.

“Hold my calls,” he said.

Todd followed Coughlan into his office.

“Hold his calls,” he said, and winked at her. Todd felt good to be alive.

Once the door was shut, Coughlan said, “What the hell are you playing at, Milstead?”

Now Todd was confused. “I told you,” he said. “We spoke on the phone last night.”

Coughlan looked blank.