“Nash still seemed to be in a state of shock, but I shook his hand and elicited a wide-eyed and softly murmured statement that he would stay, and, not daring to take him in my arms, I headed up to my room to get three hundred dollars out of my bureau (I always had some money there) and to make certain that I had on the best suit of clothes I owned and the lucky Versace tie, which I had not worn to meet with our lawyer.

“As I came downstairs I felt something pull at me; I don’t mean it was the hand of Goblin so much as it was a feeling or a mass of feelings. I had gone without sleep a long long time. And what I thought of now was Rebecca. In fact, it seemed for a moment Rebecca was with me, and then she wasn’t.

Little redheaded bitch . . . black bitch!

“When I reached the side lawn I walked slowly over the flagstone terrace and through the new arrangement of wicker, and I had the feeling that Rebecca was very near. Rebecca was waiting for me to fall asleep. Rebecca was waiting to talk to me. Yes, I had been on this very couch with her, and she had sat on that chair, and the coffee had been on this table. A dizziness came and went as it had that day in the swamp, but I knew I had to fight it. A life for my life. A death for my death . . .

“ ‘What did you say?’ I asked. ‘A life for a life?’ Who was I talking to? I battled the dizziness. ‘Murderous ghost, get away from me!’ I whispered.

“What was I doing out here on the side lawn? So they had refurbished the wicker as I told them to do.

“I had to be gone. I headed for the shed.

“And within minutes I was rolling out in Sweetheart’s old Mercedes 450 sedan, the car I had always much admired, though I think it was as old as I was.

“I was on the highway in no time and flying towards Mona Mayfair. But there was time to swing by the florist on St. Charles and Third and buy Mona a beautiful bouquet of long-stemmed roses.

“Then I drove to my final destination: First and Chestnut, riverside downtown corner. Of course the house wasn’t near the river. The river was a world away. The expression was just a way of orienting oneself in New Orleans.

“The house was quietly fabulous. It didn’t have the arrogant splendor of Blackwood Manor. Rather it was a Greek Revival town house with a side-hall door, four columns up and down, its stucco walls painted a twilight lavender, and beyond to the far right a partially concealed side garden. The whole mansion was set about six steps off the ground and the steps were white marble.