All the way out to New Solway, I’d tried to think of a persuasive argument to get me into the Bayard house. Nothing came to me. Maybe I’d park at Larchmont and cut through the woods myself. But when I found 17 Coverdale Lane, the gates to the Bayard estate stood open. I turned through the stone gateposts onto the carriageway. After winding about half a mile through old trees, I came to a four-story mansion, its stone facade aged to a golden gray. Like Larchmont, the Bayard grounds also held a series of outbuildings: garage, stable, greenhouses, a barn. The surrounding gardens and meadows fed into the woods.

In front of the house, the drive split in three, one fork leading to the garage, one to the other outbuildings, and the third along the left side of the house itself, where a discreet sign pointed to a tradesman’s entrance. The main entrance, where I pulled up, faced south; shallow steps led to a porticoed doorway.

I could hear voices from around the north side of the mansion, so I climbed out of the Mustang and followed the sign to the tradesman’s entrance. A van and a small truck were parked there. Three men were unloading supplies while a woman in blue jeans and a black turtleneck and blazer supervised.

In the near distance, someone was doing something with hay and a wagon. How bucolic. Almost justifying calling this spread “rural Illinois,” as Calvin Bayard had done in the testimony I’d watched last night. Out in his overalls at four in the morning like all the other Illinois farm boys who had forty-room palaces to protect from weasels.

“That’ll see you through the weekend, Ruth.” One of the men laughed loudly and handed a clipboard to the woman.

The woman in black signed, frowning at his familiarity, but he laughed again, clapping her on the shoulder, telling her he’d be back first thing Monday. He slammed the back panels of the van shut and jumped into the driver’s seat, whistling “Danny Boy” in a cheerful tuneless way. The back panels proclaimed “Home Body-For All Your Home Care Needs” in green cursive.

The other two men were unloading groceries from the truck. Ruth checked each item before letting it into the house.

“Miss Catherine doesn’t like this brand of yogurt. Why didn’t you bring the Bulgarian? And we specified teriyaki tofu; she won’t touch the Hawaiian.” This was the woman who’d answered the phone when I called pretending to be one of Calvin Bayard’s old interns; I hoped I’d been so much hoarser yesterday that she wouldn’t recognize my voice today.

The man explained that the Bulgarian yogurt was past its shelf date. Ruth told him sharply to bring some when he came back on Friday, even i? he had to go into Chicago for it.

If I’d thought about it, I would have guessed Catherine Bayard would be a vegetarian. She was rich; she could be a picky vegetarian.

Ruth scowled in my direction and told me she’d be with me in a minute. “You’re not with the media, are you? If you are, you’d better leave now: we have nothing to say to you.”