MY PARENTS TOLD GRANDMA THEY WERE TAKING HER TO LUNCH — THREE HOURS LATER A NURSING FACILITY CALLED ME, HER SUITCASE IN THEIR LOBBY AND MY PARENTS GONE

He wasn’t hiding me, Ivan.

He was disqualifying me.”

She pulled out her phone — a smartphone, which she used better than I did, another thing my father had conveniently forgotten — and she made a call.

“Margaret,” she said warmly. “It’s Eleanor. Yes, it’s been too long. Listen — I need my favorite attorney, and I need her today. It’s about Arthur.

Yes.

That kind of about Arthur.”

She hung up and looked at me.

“Thirty-one years at that firm,” she said, with the ghost of a smile. “You don’t think I made a few friends?”