“If it hadn’t been for me the whole place would have collapsed around her ears from the water damage. She couldn’t be bothered to call roofers. She can’t pick up the refuse people dump in the yard. I bet she hasn’t used a vacuum cleaner in eighty years. I think it’s time she went into a nursing home or some other facility where she’d be looked after.”

He was gasping for breath. I didn’t think this was the time to tell him most people hadn’t owned vacuum cleaners eighty years ago.

“And it doesn’t break my heart to hear those damned dogs are dead, either,” he went on. “She was always the same. When I was a boy I couldn’t bring anyone over to the house because of all the animals she had roaming around the place. It was more like living in a zoo than in a home, just because her dream was to be a vet and she had to work in a box factory instead.

“Well, we all have to give up our dreams—I wanted to be an architect but there wasn’t money for that kind of education so I became an accountant instead. I don’t go around filling my house with blueprints. I adjusted. Mother never learned that. She always thought rules applied to other people, never herself, and now she’s going to have to learn the hard way that it just isn’t so.”

I’d always wanted to play in the majors but had ended up in law school instead. And I won scholarships and worked nights and summers to make it happen. It was hard for me to snivel over Byron’s lost dreams, but I felt sad for Mrs. Frizell.

“Vet schools are hard to get into,” I said aloud, “and I bet sixty-five years ago it was nearly impossible for women.”

“And I don’t need some damned lecture on women’s rights either. Until women can look after their children properly, they don’t deserve any other rights. I can just imagine what she did to my father to drive him away. Who the hell are you, anyway, to come around lecturing me? What kind of work have you been doing for Mother? Bringing her veterinary medicine manuals?” he jeered savagely. “What kind of work do you do?”

“I’m a lawyer. And a private investigator.”

“If you’re a lawyer, what are you doing for Mother?”

“Trying to protect her assets, mister. She’s worried about them.”

“I haven’t seen—oh, yes. You claim to be doing pro bono work. Well, I’ll talk to Pichea about you and see what he has to say, Ms. Warinski.”

“It’s Warshawski,” I snapped. “And why don’t you take my number too. Put it side by side with his so that the next time an attack of filial piety overwhelms you, you can reach me.”