He set the plates down.

That is usually how evidence starts, he said, and then, seeing my face, sorry, bad joke.

It was not a bad joke, I told him, and I meant it, because he had put a word to the thing I was doing before I had let myself use it.

I was keeping evidence.

Not to take anyone to any court, there was no court for this, no statute that covers a grandfather who moves a child’s birthday because he has decided her branch of the family counts for less.

But evidence is not only for courts.