“I’m curious about this place,” said Gurney. “Willow Rest must have an interesting history.” It wasn’t a history he cared about. But he thought that getting her talking about something easy might provide a bridge to something more difficult.

For the next fifteen minutes she explained Emmerling Spalter’s philosophy, which struck Gurney as escapist nonsense, cannily packaged. Willow Rest was one’s final home, not a cemetery. Only the date of birth, not the date of death, was engraved on a marker, because once we are born we live forever. Willow Rest provided not gravesites but homesites, a piece of nature with grass and trees and flowers. Every property was scaled to accommodate a multigenerational family rather than an individual. The mailbox at each property was an encouragement to family members to leave cards and letters for their loved ones. (These were gathered once a week, burned in a little portable brazier at each site, and raked into the soil.) Paulette explained earnestly that Willow Rest was all about life, continuity, beauty, peace, and privacy. As far as Gurney could see, it was about everything except death. But he was not about to say that. He wanted her to keep talking.

Emmerling and Agnes Spalter had three children, two of whom died of pneumonia before they were out of their cribs. The survivor was Joseph. He married a woman named Mary Croake.

Joseph and Mary had two sons, Carl and Jonah.

The mention of these names, Gurney noticed, had an immediate effect on Paulette’s tone and expression, bringing back to her lips an almost imperceptible twitching.

“I’ve been told they were as different as two brothers could be,” he said encouragingly.

“Oh, yes! Black and white! Cain and Abel!” She fell silent, her eyes fixed in anger on some memory.

Gurney prompted her. “I imagine Carl could be a difficult person to work for.”

“Difficult?” A bitter one-syllable laugh erupted from her throat. She closed her eyes for a few seconds, seemed to reach a decision, and then the words came rushing out.

“Difficult? Let me explain something to you. Emmerling Spalter became a very wealthy man buying and selling large tracts of land in upstate New York. He passed his business, his money, and his talent for making it along to his son. Joe Spalter was a bigger, tougher version of his father. He wasn’t someone you’d want for an enemy. But he was rational. You could talk to him. In his hard-as-nails way, he was fair. Not nice, not generous. But fair. It was Joe who hired my husband as the Willow Rest resident manager. That was …” She looked lost for a moment or two. “Oh, my, time is becoming so difficult. That was fifteen years ago. Fifteen.” She looked at her coffee cup, seemed surprised that it was still in her hands, and laid it down carefully on the table.

“And Joe was Carl and Jonah’s father?” prompted Gurney.