"We have to get back to our ailing mother," Miranda said, "who will now at last have a decent roof over her head."
Joseph nodded. "Thank God," he said. "Thank God we finally worked out the details."
"Thank forensic accountancy," Miranda said, giving him her most defiant glare, a narrowed-eyed face he knew so well from her growing up.
How could they understand how relieved he was to have Betty properly cared for? But look at them, so fierce, so loyal to their mother, so strong.
"You're good girls," he said.
Silence.
"Your mother deserves this," he added. "She's a remarkable woman. A fine human being."
Miranda burst into tears, threw herself into Josie's arms, then snarled, "I hate you," and ran out the room.
"Well, bye," Annie said, following her sister, and the meeting was over.
They shook hands with Mr. Mole and thanked him.
"Oh, don't thank me," he said. "I would do anything for my old friend Roberts."
Roberts offered to drive them home, and as they walked to the car, Miranda stepped into a deli to get a bottle of water.
"Thank you," Annie said. "I don't know how to thank you for what you've done."
She took his hand and, without thinking, kissed it.
His face creased into a huge smile. Then, noticing his hand lingering by Annie's lips after she had let it go, he coughed, retracted it, straightened his tie, said it was all Mr. Mole, all thanks to the magical Mr. Mole.
"Mole is pretty much the best forensic accountant in the country," he continued as they pulled into the traffic of the West Side Highway.
"Well, he must have done a great job if he got Josie to change his mind," said Miranda.
"Oh, he didn't have do anything at all. It was just the possibility. Just the thought of having Mole go over your books--it gets people to reevaluate their positions, shall we say."
"Thank you again," Annie said. "Thank you for Mr. Mole."
Roberts colored a little. Annie could see the back of his neck grow pink.
"Thank you," Miranda repeated. "Thank you with all our family heart."
They rode in silence for a while. The sun was behind them. The trees glowed with the clear spring light and tender spring leaves.
"I guess we won't be neighbors anymore," Annie said after a while. "It's back to the city for the Weissmanns."
She saw both Roberts and Miranda start.
"Let's get Mom out of the hospital first," Miranda said after a while.
"Well, whenever this exodus occurs," Roberts said, "I will definitely miss you."
Annie caught his eye in the rearview mirror. She looked away.
"Yes," he said. "Yes, I will."
A few weeks earlier, Annie had found herself wondering idly what Roberts's first name was and had consulted a Westport-Weston phone book from 1993 that sat on a shelf in the kitchen. She had leafed through the thin gray pages until she reached the Rs. About halfway down the second page, she found it.
Mr. and Mrs. Phineas Roberts, the phone book entry read. She had smiled at the first name. No wonder. Mr. and Mrs. Phineas Roberts. Mr. and Mrs. A couple, an entity. She had not been able to get that listing out of her mind for days. She wondered if he ever had.
After visiting Betty in the hospital and telling her about the meeting, about Josie's bubble of self-regard, about Mr. Mole, who looked like Toad of Toad Hall, and then hearing from their mother, between coughs, about the way Roberts had quietly, quickly, and entirely on his own come up with and executed the plan of frightening Josie with Mr. Mole's prowess, Miranda dropped Annie off at home and drove to Charlotte Maybank's great pile on Beachside Avenue.
"Miranda!" said Leanne, when the maid led her into the living room. "I'm so happy to see you."
She didn't look happy at all, curled in the embrace of the sofa, a half-empty bottle of Johnnie Walker on the table beside her, a glass in her hand.
"How is your mother? She was asleep the whole time I was there. Henry's asleep, too, you know. I know that's why you're here--to see Henry. But he's asleep. Aunt Charlotte is asleep, too. I'm not asleep, though. So you're stuck with me, I guess."
She held her glass out.
Miranda could not tell if Leanne wanted her to take a sip from the glass or to pour more into it. She took it from her friend's hand and gently set it down beside the bottle. "I came to talk to you, Leanne, not Henry."