“Sure, Bobo, sure. I understand. That’ll give us more time.”

Lila looked at me and smiled empathetically.

Inside the Home, the old people were moving into the cafeteria, a slow, waddling, silent crowd. Some of them looked at me suspiciously; others smiled nervously. I saw Leo Gutschenritter and Morris Mekel and Carl Gershon. They were sitting together, watching intently.

Sol was in the cafeteria, testing the sound system by tapping on the microphone with his finger. The dull, hollow thumping echoed in the room. He seemed relieved to see me.

“I think everything’s ready,” he told me.

“I hope you didn’t go to too much trouble. I didn’t even think about a sound system.”

“Just takes a minute to put it up,” he said. “We use it for formal occasions. The rest of the time we shout. Sometimes I wonder if they hear us either way.” He nodded to the back of the room where a young man with a crewcut stood with a television camera balanced on his shoulder, taping people as they entered. The harsh glare of the lights made the people turn their faces and raise their hands, like children warding off a blow. “Your friendly television commentator’s back there somewhere.”

“I’m glad it’s her,” I said.

“Me, too.” Sol gestured toward a chair behind the podium. “That’s for you. You want a glass of water?”

“I don’t think so. This won’t take long.”

I sat in the chair and opened Avrum’s book of poems and scanned “There Was a Child Went Forth” and wondered again who had left the book at the Home. I was sure he, or she, would be at the service, but I did not know if I would know them.

“How are you?”

I looked up to see Dee Richardson. She was dressed in a pale blue blouse and gray slacks, an outfit very much like the one she had worn two days earlier. Still, there was something different about her and my expression must have been a puzzled one.

She laughed. “It’s the hair. I had it cut.”

In the interview at Avrum’s bench, her hair—a rich, shimmering auburn color—had been shoulder length. Now it was cropped close to her head.

“Well it’s different,” I said, “but I like it.”

“Do you?”

“Yes. It looks very nice.”

“Does it make me look more professional?” she asked seriously.

I confessed that I did not know about such things, but assured her that I liked the cut. Then I said, “I’m sorry I missed the broadcast, but I’ve heard good things about it from as far away as Georgia.”

Dee Richardson smiled pleasantly. “We’ve had good response. The only complaint was about my hair, from some producer in Atlanta. That’s why I got it cut.”

“You’re in a strange profession,” I told her. “I always thought content mattered.”

“To some people, content is how you look, not what you say,” she countered. “And I don’t disagree with you about the profession. We do use a lot of smoke and mirrors.”