I said, “I think your mom would want us both to be happy.” And I kissed the top of her head and I went to go and deal with something about the sound system.

It was a good answer.

It was the answer any decent father gives.

It was also, I understand now, an answer to a question she had not asked, and she had chosen her words carefully, and what she had actually asked me — at twelve-thirty in the afternoon, on a stone wall, with two and a half hours left — was whether she was allowed to still belong to her mother after three o’clock.

At about one-fifteen, Pamela took her by the hand and said she wanted to show her something.

Four people saw that happen.