Do not give that up until you have a lawyer telling you exactly how to spend it.” I want to be clear that Patricia never told me how any of it was done, the mechanics of the shell company or the moving of the money, and I never asked, because it did not matter.

What mattered was that it had happened, that it could be proven, and that there was a lawful way to bring it into the light.

That was all I needed to know.

I have been asked, more than once, whether I was tempted to do something rasher with what Patricia and Leo had handed me, to confront Julian directly, to move money myself, to fight fire with fire.

I understand the impulse.