That particular Friday, when I met Mrs. Tyburn, was clear and not too cold, so there were lots of families out playing games or eating and chatting on blankets in the grass. My parents didn’t come, of course; I’d asked Lolly to invite them and she’d agreed, but later she said the two numbers they’d left—a cell and a landline—had both been disconnected. So I was walking by on my way to visit the Duchess and to get something for lunch from Rose’s shop, and Mrs. Tyburn was out with little clusters of people, directing a middle-aged couple and their pimply teenage son to pose with the sea in the background. It was a good picture—puffy clouds on a bright blue sky and a breeze wrapping the woman’s green dress around her shins. The woman’s beige coat and tan scarf were so neat and crisp they could have been made of origami.

“No, stay just like that,” Mrs. Tyburn urged them. “Don’t move, I’ll get it.”

“Oh, Mother, please,” said the woman.

Then the man said, “Let me have a look.”

“No, no, stay right where you are. It’s perfect, just like that. I’ll get the . . . I’ll get this . . . this . . . damned thing . . .”

As if she could feel me watching, Mrs. Tyburn turned and called me over. Obviously, she knew who I was, but in my first few weeks I’d managed to avoid her. “You young people know how to get these things working, don’t you? For the money I paid for it, it could at least do me the service of taking a simple snapshot, don’t you think?”

She had it set to video. Plus the lens cap was on.

Once she’d taken four or five shots of the family, they walked off, the woman huffing and mumbling to her husband. Mrs. Tyburn ignored them while I showed her how to see the photos she’d just taken and how to delete the ones she didn’t like. She complained that she couldn’t see the boy’s face well enough in one shot and I said that she could use a computer program to change the contrast and get rid of some of the shadow.

“My, youth today. Such technical expertise.” I wanted to walk away but I could tell she had something more to say, and I had to wait while she worked out exactly what. “You know, I have a veritable library of images that could use a touch-up like this, and my son-in-law says that all of my pictures really should go onto compact discs. My dear, your particular brand of savvy could be just what this old woman needs. I think five dollars an hour would be suitable. Yes.”

I started to accept before I realized it wasn’t actually a question.

* * *