“Can't say that I blame her. When I saw her two days ago, she really opened up about the girls' problems. They're having plenty of them. And Donald wrote me a letter—no remorse, just tooting his own horn as a good dad.”

“Wrote you a letter?”

“His lawyer's been calling me, too.”

“Any intimidation?”

I hesitated. “No, just nagging.”

“Too bad. No law against that . . . no, can't say that I blame her either, Alex—off the record. Do you want to wait and try again, or just write up your report now—document all the crap she told you?”

“What's the difference?”

“The difference is how quickly you want to get paid versus how much lead time you want to give her, if she has hightailed it. Once you put it in writing and I receive it, I'm obligated to send it over to Bucklear. Even with reasonable delays he gets it in a couple of weeks or so, then he files paper and gets warrants out on her.”

“A murderer gets warrants on a grandmother taking her grandkids out of town? Do we file that under “I for irony' or “N for nuts'?”

“Do I take that to mean you'll wait?”

“How much lead time can I give her?”

“A reasonable period. Consistent with typical medical-psychological practice.”

“Meaning??”

“Meaning what shrinks normally do. Three, four, even five weeks wouldn't chafe any hides—you guys are notorious for being sloppy about your paperwork. You might even stretch it to six or seven—but you never heard that from me. In fact, we never had this talk, did we?”

“Judge who?” I said.

“Attaboy—oops, bailiff's buzzing me, time to be Solomonic again, bye-bye.” I put the phone down. The bulldog placed his paws on my knees and tried to get up on my lap. I lifted him and he settled on me like a warm hunk of clay. At least thirty pounds.

The Hockney was right in front of me. Great painting. As was the Thomas Hart Benton drawing on the opposite wall—a mural study depicting hypermuscular workmen cheerfully constructing a WPA dam.

I looked at both of them for a while and wondered what Robin and Milo had talked about. The dog stayed as motionless as a little furry Buddha. I rubbed his head and his jowls and he licked my hand. A boy and his dog . . . I realized I hadn't gotten the number for the bulldog club, yet. Almost five p.m. Too late to call the AKC.

I'd do it tomorrow morning.

Denial, avoidance, whatever.

That night I slept fitfully. Friday morning at eight I phoned North Carolina and got an address for the French Bulldog Club of America, in Rahway, New Jersey. A post office box. No phone number was available.