Maude looked away. “Everything needs to come from your mother.”

“Was he driving? Was he drinking?”

Maude arched a thin gray eyebrow, skin creasing above it, the big eye below suddenly smoother and younger and sarcastic. “Back to you, dear. Does Ned find your injury frustrating?”

Polly started laughing. “No, I’m the one who’s angry. Everyone watching me, everyone asking questions and not believing my answers. No one believes me.”

“Do you find that in grief your memory is even worse?”

“No,” said Polly. “Maybe it concentrates the mind. It all feels much closer. I have so many questions.”

Helen was watching them, and Fritz the mutt and the old poodle were watching, too. The new edge to Polly’s voice was like a special radio frequency. Maude looked as if she wanted to retrench but Polly didn’t give her a chance.

“Think of your own childhood,” she said. “What would your parents have not believed that you’d remember?”

“Tricky girl,” said Maude. “Probably them having sex in the pantry, when they didn’t think we knew. My father’s face, his voice, or being carried by my mother. And you?”

Polly started to speak but stopped herself.

Maude waited, leaning toward her. “What were you going to say?”

Polly thought of a lawyer’s problem: If you’re not sure you want to know the answer, don’t ask. And what was Maude searching for, here? “Dee told me something, and I wondered if you agreed. She said there were three kinds of dreams.”

“Ah!” said Maude. “She meant lasting dreams, the kind that return. I suppose it’s as true as any theory. Do you have the same now that you did as a child? What are they?”

“Boats,” said Polly. “Men in boats. And women in the water.”

They were quiet for several minutes. Helen went back to her mud creatures. She was covering their heads with flower petals, tiny bits of bachelor button and calendula. Maude was watching closely, fascinated, and said her mother had done this with her when she was a child. Polly didn’t admit that she knew this already. They watched Helen line up her figures, sing some gibberish, and blast them with a hose.

“Will you have a nap before dinner and visiting Harry?” asked Polly.

“I will,” said Maude. “Hans and I each had a gimlet or two.”