Perhaps Hunter’s books really do not exist, and she somehow hornswoggled the world into believing that they did in some weird art prank. It might just about have been doable, a couple of decades ago. The Inspector would prefer this not be the case. The idea that the books might be themselves mythical alarms her: the intrusion of Hunter’s unreal histories into a world that should be more tangible. The notion that they might all be blank and contain no information, or maybe exist only as description, while Hunter’s mind apparently contains far more information than it should, raises the hairs on her neck.