I reached into my cardigan pocket and pulled out my mobile phone.

My teenage granddaughter had taught me, only a few months earlier, how to take a clear photograph of a document, laughing kindly at how I held the phone too far away.

I had never imagined what I would use the skill for.

Now, with Shirley’s voice murmuring down the hallway, I steadied my old hands and photographed every single page of the power of attorney — the body of it, the signature lines, and most of all that impossible notary stamp with its impossible date.

And then I turned to the back of the folder, and found something that stopped my breath.