“Blue blazer, sixty or so, named Gerald Pruitt.

Land appraisal out of Greenwich.”

The typing halted.

“Where did you get that name?”

“From a card in a folder I wasn’t supposed to see.”

“Then I’ll find out who hired him.” He hung up first, which he always does.

By evening the house had gone quiet the way big houses do, one room after another.

I came downstairs for water and didn’t switch on the overhead light.