‘And your old dad is still living?’

‘Oh, yes. In a retirement home.’

‘But he got his way?’

‘Yes. It was a terrific story for Jay to tell. I didn’t want any part of it. Jay said, “I’ll do it just to stop the old guy from bugging me.” I objected, but my objection didn’t count, and finally Jay wrote my father a check and there was a legal transfer of title. Jay had no idea that my father would outlive him. A few years later we were separated, and then divorced –’

‘And your husband went downhill …,’ said Adletsky.

‘Gave up his law practice, lost his health. Fell back on the little estate inherited from his mother, which wasn’t much to begin with. While in the hospital, he asked to see me, and I went there. I spent time with him … What was his trouble?’ she said, responding to the question on Dame Siggy’s sharp uplifted face. ‘He had a cardiac insufficiency. His lungs filled up.’

‘So when he died …?’ Adletsky led Amy toward a conclusion.

The great polished concert-piano limousine had left the Drive. Through the tinted windows, nothing identifiable could be seen.

‘His children found the title to the grave in Jay’s bank box, and they buried him beside Mother.’

‘But you will need that space …?’

‘Shortly, I think.’

‘It can’t be left till after the fact,’ said Mrs Adletsky.

‘Do Wustrin’s children object to moving him?’

‘Not if it doesn’t cost them,’ said Amy. ‘They agreed to the move on that condition.’

‘Can your father recognize you when you come to visit?’

‘Not often. His mental pictures keep changing.’

Geometric scrawls of light, as on a TV screen.

Dame Siggy didn’t wish to dwell on the father. She was about to buy a new apartment and to furnish and redecorate. As if she were a bride. ‘What a sense of humor your late husband had,’ she said.

Jay did like to be publicly seen performing, entertaining, innovating. A stout man, dancing, he swung his broad backside, but his feet were very agile. Neat enough to be called deft. At school he used to do Dr Jekyll turning into Mr Hyde, shining a flashlight into his face. Just like the movies. John Barrymore, was it, or his brother, Lionel? Or Lon Chancy, the great contortionist who played Quasimodo in The Hunchback of Notre Dame.

‘Transferring a coffin to another grave all by your lonesome?’ said Dame Siggy. ‘Isn’t there anybody to go with you – a friend, or one of your children?’

‘One of my daughters is married, in New York. The younger is a student in Seattle, at the university.’

Adletsky agreed with his wife. ‘You should have a helping hand.’

The marquee of the Heisingers’ apartment was sheltered from the blasting wind by walls of canvas. They entered the regal elevator. The gilded ceiling suggested a Byzantine chapel; the walls were quilted leather. The Adletskys sat down together on a cushioned seat. A silent elevator man brought them to the sixteenth floor, and the brass gate, rows of diamond shapes, noiselessly came open. There Bodo Heisinger, compact and serious, stood waiting. He was dressed in a business suit. When he moved, you were surprised to see that he was wearing carpet slippers. He shook hands with the old people and nodded to Amy. There are trillionaires, and then there are supernumeraries, Amy silently observed.