The letter came in February. Ed had been in London four months by then. The consulting work was steady—he had three regular clients now, and a reputation among the actuarial community that was growing in ways he did not entirely understand but was grateful for. He was living on Grena Road, paying his rent, eating Dorothy's cooking, walking to the pub on Friday evenings, seeing James on alternate weekends when the Cambridge train ran on schedule and the particular politics of their situation—the...