“My little book, as you put it, is eight hundred and twelve manuscript pages, and that is without the footnotes, acknowledgments, dedication, epigraph, or index. Clearly you are very upset by your loss. I misjudged the timing for my condolence call to you, for which I apologize. You are in an understandably sensitive mood. I can hear that.”

“Calling up a stranger to tell her you think her beloved grandmother who has just died was some kind of liar, and now you’re planning to stir the shit, is that your idea of a condolence call?”

“I will take that as a rhetorical question, just as I will overlook your unfortunate use of vulgar language, because I recognize that you are becoming very emotional, regrettably, owing to your grief. I am still planning on including you in my acknowledgments.”

“No, don’t assume it was rhetorical. It was a real question. What the hell do you want from me? Why are you really calling?”

“There is no need to get huffy and rude with me, Rebecca. I was merely informing you of the imminent publication of my book.”

“That’s it? That’s why you called?”

“Well, as I said, I have a list, some very important questions for you as I finish the last corrections on my manuscript as well as some final summarizing thoughts in the last section of the text, not to mention trying to respond to all my editor’s queries on the manuscript. You wouldn’t believe the number of Post-it notes! I believe that once you familiarize yourself with the transcripts I am mailing to your home, now that I am certain that you are the right Rebecca Gottesfeld—the Willow Street address is correct?—you will understand my concerns more sympathetically.”

“Even if I wanted to, how could I possibly answer your questions? I wasn’t there.”

“You were the closest person in Esther’s life. I am assuming you are the sole heir to her estate? She told you about things in her life. Surely, even when you were a little girl, you heard details of her experience in the fire to which outsiders may not have been privy. You have undoubtedly seen or may now possess certain priceless artifacts that may seem valueless to you, but the significance of which would be clear to me. I give you the example of the precious chambered nautilus I gifted to your grandmother when last we met, which you didn’t see as having the meaning it had for her and for me.”

“For you, we know.”

“Yes, well, my point is that what may seem like common knowledge to you could in fact be a unique piece of unrecorded data. And I have not ascertained the existence of anyone else closer, and she never married or seemed to have any significant gentleman callers, at least not so far as I can determine from any record—”

“Like that’s your business.”

“I am always seeking secondary sources, as any scholar does.”

“So I’m what you would call a secondary source.”