“He gave you money?” She looked at me suspiciously.

“He saved my life. I had a rare disease.”

“What disease?”

“It was so rare, it didn’t have a name. Mr. Smile paid for my medicine. I never got a chance to thank him. And I thought, if I could at least see where he lived . . .”

That softened her. “I’ve got a key,” she said, taking it out of her pocket. “I was his neighbor for seven years and I used to look after the place for him when he was away. You seem like a nice boy, so I’ll let you in, just for a few minutes. This way . . .”

It seemed to take her forever to reach the door, but then, she was very old. At last we were in. Mrs. Lovely closed the door behind us and sat down to have a rest.

Smile’s apartment was small and ordinary. There was a living room, but it was so neat and impersonal that it was hard to believe anyone had done any living there at all. There was a three-piece sofa set, a coffee table, a few ornaments. The pictures on the wall were even less interesting than the walls they hung on. It was the same story in the other rooms. The apartment told us nothing about the person who had lived there. Even the fridge was empty.

“How often did you see Mr. Smile?” I asked.

“I never saw him,” Tim replied.

“I know, Tim. I’m asking Mrs. Lovely.”

“I hardly ever saw him,” Mrs. Lovely said. “He kept himself to himself, if you want the truth. Although I was here the night that he got run over.”

“Did you see what happened?”

“Not really, no.” She shook her head vigorously and then readjusted her hair and teeth. “But I did see him go out. There were two people with him, talking to him. They seemed to be helping him down the stairs.”

“Helping him?”

“One on each side of him. A man and a woman . . .”

That would have been Rodney Hoover and Fiona Lee.

“After they’d gone, I heard the most terrible noise. It was a sort of rumble and then a scrunching. At first I thought it was my indigestion, but then I looked out of the window. And there they were! The two of them and the driver—”

“Barry Krishner . . .”

“I don’t know his name, young man. But yes, the driver of the steamroller was there. He was looking as sick as a parrot. Hardly surprising!”

“What happened to the parrot?” Tim asked.

“There was no parrot!”

“You mean . . . it got so sick it died?”

“There was the driver, the two people I had seen on the stairs, and blood all over the road!” Mrs. Lovely sighed. “It was the worst thing I have ever seen, and I’ve lived through two world wars! Blood everywhere! Lots and lots and lots of blood—”