I was perfectly happy not to find out, though. I was happy to leave the story there, after thirty-odd pages, at the end of part one. I didn’t have much curiosity about how the murders would be solved. It never matters to me how a mystery ends. In fact, I have found that, after so many pages of so many twists and turns and other to-do, the ending is usually something of a letdown, and the bad guy being caught and ultimately brought to justice or destroyed is invariably the least exciting part of the plot.

I like the story of a nursing home resident who had one book, one whodunit, that she was able to read over and over as though it were new. By the time she finished it she would’ve forgotten everything that came before, and as she started reading again she would forget how it all turned out.

—

My host has hearing loss. She did not hear me come into the living room though I made no attempt to be quiet. It was the following morning, I was ready to leave, and I’d come to thank her and say goodbye. She did not see me because she was standing at the window, looking out. When I spoke she spun around with a gasp, hand on heart.

It happens to some women after a certain age that something babyish comes back into the face. The flesh has fattened and slackened at the same time, and you can see what the woman must have looked like as a toddler. So the woman looked to me just then: like a frightened toddler. I cannot say how much this impression was heightened by the fact that she was crying.

Of course she was all right, she said, tooting a laugh. There was nothing wrong, she said, nothing at all. I was just, well, you know. I was just thinking.

—