The worst part of my meditation is that I had to listen to myself whining.

As Howie had instructed, I met him at eight o’clock, in the parking lot of a twenty-four-hour CVS in Arlington. It was raining lightly. I’d told Jenny I was meeting a potential source, knowing she wouldn’t ask questions about that. I’m not really lying to her, I lied to myself. But I had given Howie my word. I was sitting in Van, the heater fogging the windows, singing along with Muddy Waters’s version of “Mannish Boy” from the Band’s Last Waltz, when Howie climbed into the passenger seat. He ran his hand through the last remaining strands of his hair to brush off the droplets. He was wearing the same ragged jeans and sports coat he’d been wearing earlier in the day. “So what’s this all about?” I asked.

Howie was as serious as I had ever seen him, and that covered a lot of ground. I’d been there when his second child had been born prematurely and had struggled to stay alive. He had the same type of grim look on his face. Rather than turning down the music, he turned up the volume, then leaned across the center console. “I need your word that you’re never going to talk about anything you see tonight.” He pursed his lips, took a considered breath, and added, “And that includes to Jenny.”

I felt like I had walked into a John le Carré story. “Wait now, what’s going on, Howe? What does Jenny have to do with this?”

Our faces were no more than eight inches apart. “Your word, Rol, or we’ll say good night and forget about this.”

Sure, walk away and spend the rest of my life wondering what this was all about. Walk away with the understanding that my relationship with Howie was changed forever. Some chance. He had grabbed hold of me right where he intended, right in my curiosity. “Okay, yeah.” I swiped my hand across my body like I was cleaning an invisible counter. “Nobody.”

He leaned back in his seat, turning down the music. “Okay, let’s go. Just follow what I tell you.”

“You want me to give Cher the address?”

“No, absolutely not. And turn your phone off too.”

“Cher, turn off your GPS, please.”

I followed Howie’s instructions through Arlington, got on and off the 495, and ended up in a residential neighborhood in Annandale. We parked on a quiet block of well-maintained brick-bottomed split-levels. We sat in the car for a few minutes as Howie checked the mirrors. I assumed he was confirming we weren’t followed. We definitely weren’t followed. “Let’s go,” he said.

The rain had mostly stopped, but the night was crisp. The sky was black and pocked with stars. We walked about four blocks through a lovely, quiet neighborhood. Each of the houses had the same bones, but upper floors and dormers, garages and porticoes, porches and decks, walks and landscaping had been added as the development settled. A couple of cars passed us; a woman was dutifully picking up her dog’s poop and two kids were riding their bicycles. Howie ignored them. “Where are we going?” I asked. I knew it was a stupid question, but I wanted the comfort of hearing my own voice.