There were lights on at the back of the house—Gray Ellen must still be awake. Probably, she had sat up for hours reading, fretting, wondering where he was. Guilt overcame him. He was drunk. He was a coward. Philadelphia, Chicago, Cuba—would he just keep on making the same mistakes over and over? He wasn’t getting better, stronger, or braver. He was just getting older. He took a deep breath, trying to clear his head of the whiskey.

But the things he had seen today, the way he had felt—it was more than a man could bear with a clear head. Watching, he had been a part of it all. It was like the day on the tugboat, watching the Gatling gun tear apart pumpkins and trees. Just being there, a witness, had made him guilty. Now, he had another reason to feel guilty. He stumbled up the front porch stairs. When he grabbed the rotten railing for support, it broke off in his hand.

He took another deep breath, turned the key in the front door, and went inside.

Gray Ellen heard him clomping along the corridor to the kitchen and turned. “My God, what happened to you?” she said. “Your eye, your cheek.”

“The wrath of God.” Sam laughed shortly. “I’m all right.” He was home.

She swept across the kitchen to the doorway and reached for him, then drew away. “I don’t believe it—you’re drunk!”

“Look, I can explain,” Sam said, moving into the kitchen. Then he saw Ivanhoe Grant. “The hell’s he doing here?”

“Calm down,” Gray Ellen said. “You’re a mess.”

Sam’s hand reached reflexively into his coat pocket and pulled out the little navy revolver. He wasn’t sure what he meant to do with it.

“Oh, for God’s sake,” Gray Ellen said, reaching for the pistol.

He pushed her away with the other hand. “I want to know what he’s doing in my house.” Sam was bewildered. What was a black man doing half-undressed in his kitchen, after midnight, alone with his wife? What was any man doing there?

“Take it easy,” Grant said, grinning. He strode forward casually, then picked up his coat off the back of the chair and folded it over his arm.

Sam stared at Grant. “What’s all that?” he said, meaning the scars, the bandage. Where was the man’s shirt?

Gray Ellen said, “Can’t you see he’s hurt?”

“I don’t need a woman talking for me,” Grant said. He turned on Sam. “You want to shoot me, you go right ahead.” He puffed out his chest, crosshatched with livid scars.

Sam held the pistol at arm’s length, watching it wobble as he took aim at Grant’s torso. Father Dennen’s penance came back to him: do no harm. Grant just stood there. What were all those scars? “Somebody whip you?”

“Are you going to shoot me or not?”