“Always,” I said, “make sure you hit record.” I meant it as a piece of grim practical advice, and the reporters laughed, and it became, in the coverage that followed, a kind of catchphrase, printed under my photograph in a dozen papers.

But underneath the wry surface of it was the most serious thing I knew, hard-won at the very edge of my own death: that the truth, preserved, is the one weapon the powerless will always have against the powerful, and that a person who makes certain the truth survives can never be fully erased, no matter what is done to her.

Hit record.

Keep the truth.