“I knew that story about the hat that absolutely had to be hidden from the police,” I said. “Myriam wrote it down for me when I was little, in the form of a fairy tale. She called it ‘The Tale of the Hat.’ But I didn’t know it was a real family story. I thought she’d made it up.” “Those slightly sad little stories your grandmother always wrote for you on your birthday—they were all episodes from her life. They’ve been real treasures for me, as I’ve tried to piece together certain events in her childhood.”
