A photograph of Bennie Arceneaux’s journal entry, which she took herself on her own phone and emailed me, and then telephoned the Peoria police non-emergency line about, unprompted, because she said a declined notarisation with a pre-signed form is a thing she is supposed to report and she had not been sure, and had looked it up, and found that she was.

And three of the nine days I wasted.

I spent them trying to get Oscar to tell me the truth on the telephone.

Four calls.

About ninety minutes in total.

He said eleven different things and none of them was the truth and I have come to understand that it was not because he was being clever.

He genuinely did not know what the truth was.

He had not thought about any of it in a form that could be said out loud.