‘You never laid eyes on this Tom?’

‘How should I? I don’t mix with people that hang out in bars. Cruising and picking up men in joints is not my kind of thing. I understand it happens a lot in ticket lines at the movies. You can judge the person standing in the queue by the kind of film it is. Or at the Art Institute, where guys on the make hang out – studs who pretend to love painting.’

She sharply resented any hint that she in any way resembled the woman whose screams were recorded by Jay’s divorce detectives and auditioned in chambers. The judge stuck in her throat. Judges without exception were on the take, she said, and you couldn’t build a prison big enough to hold all the Chicago judges who were eligible.

‘I wonder, since Madge was setting up a business relationship, whether she suggested a meeting. What’s this Tom supposed to be like?’

‘You may have seen him on TV during the trial … As a business idea it’s not unimaginative,’ said Amy.

I kept laughing at the absurdity of the whole plan. ‘Mrs Heisinger gets intricate ideas,’ I said. ‘If this is the way the murder was planned, no wonder Bodo took the gun away from Tom. Madge belongs to the Jay Wustrin school of real-life fantasy.’

‘You mean mapping out such elaborate brainstorm scenarios. He did love them, didn’t he. So tell me, Harry, what do you make of it all?’

The diggers would soon be waist deep. If Adletsky had not sent me here today, Amy would have been walking among the tombstones alone, studying the names, doing cemetery arithmetic. Subtract 1912 from 1987. The air, though faintly sunny, had a sharp edge.

Under all the influence of the day and the place, I took new readings on Amy, revising the life-long familiar ones. For instance, her eyes were as round as always, but there was now a childish sobriety about them. Odd, this child look appearing in middle age, especially since her cheeks were no longer perfectly smooth and much of her color was lost. But she was essentially still Amy. If you turned the little chiming crank and said, ‘Hello, Central,’ Amy at Central would answer.

She was waiting for my comments. When I moved, I saw my silhouette in the gray bosom of the limo TV – the black lank hair and the familiar desperately unwanted Chinese profile. Reflected on the screen, I was bulky. I was somewhere between a shadow and a shade of one of the departed. Having for years been a deliberate mystery to others, I find that I am unable now to say what the mystery was about or why mystification ever was necessary.

A considerable amount of soil had come out-dark-brown earth mixed with human qualities.

‘Here’s what I think …,’ I said.

‘Speak clearly. I need smart, definite advice.’

‘Okay, I’ll start by saying that I love to give advice. I only recently realized that I used to be reserved about it. But I love advising. A nice bit of advice can bring tears to my eyes. I’ll try not to mumble. People do who talk to themselves a lot.’