“He didn’t tell me he was expecting anyone.”

“Well, ma’am, we like to make our inquiries unannounced. If people have too much time to think about them, their answers often seem forced.”

I took a card from my bag and handed it to her, moving forward a few steps. “V. I. Warshawski. Financial investigative services. Just tell the doctor I’m here. I won’t keep him more than half an hour.”

She didn’t invite me in, but grudgingly took the card and moved off into the interior of the house. I looked around at the blank-windowed houses next door and across the street. The third thing you notice in the suburbs is, you might as well be on the moon. In a city or small-town neighborhood, curtains would flutter as the neighbors tried to see what strange woman was visiting the Chigwells. Then telephone calls or exchanges in the Laundromat. Yes, their niece. You know, the one whose mother moved to Arizona all those years ago. Here, not a curtain stirred. No shrill voices betokened preschoolers recreating war and peace. I had an uneasy feeling that with all its noise and grime, I preferred city life.

Miss Chigwell rematerialized in the doorway. “Dr. Chigwell has gone out.”

“That’s very sudden, isn’t it? When do you expect him back?”

“I—he didn’t say. It will be a long while.”

“Then I’ll wait a long while,” I said peaceably. “Would you like to invite me inside, or would you prefer me to wait in my car?”

“You should leave,” she said, her frown deepening. “He doesn’t want to talk to you.”

“How can you know that, ma’am? If he’s away, you haven’t spoken to him about me.”

“I know who my brother does and does not wish to see. And he would have told me if he wanted to see you.” She shut the door as forcefully as she could, given both their ages and the thick carpeting underneath.

I returned to my car and moved it to where it was clearly visible from the front door. WNIV was playing a cycle of Hugo Wolf songs. I leaned back in the seat, my eyes half closed, listening to Kathleen Battle’s golden voice, wondering what there was about talking to an investigator that would fluster Curtis Chigwell.

In the half hour I waited I saw one person go down the street. I began feeling as though I were on a movie set, not part of a human community at all, when Miss Chigwell appeared on the flagstone walk. She moved determinedly to the car, her thin body as rigid as an umbrella frame, and as bony. I courteously got out.

“I must ask you to leave, young woman.”

I shook my head. “Public property, ma’am. There’s no law against my being here. I’m not playing loud music or selling dope or doing anything else that the law might construe as a nuisance.”

“If you don’t drive away now, I’m going to call the police as soon as I’m back inside.”