“Some kind of monster washed up on the shore here this summer,” Alma said. She’d been trailing behind, and now they stopped and turned to her. She pulled her cardigan close. “No one knows what it was. Some species of squid, maybe. It had tentacles, but it had rows of teeth too, like a shark. It was big. One of the Coast Guard boys told me about it. He said the smell was all over town.”

“Charming,” Max said.

Clara laughed. “Did you get that from H. P. Lovecraft?”

“No, like I said, it was one of the Coast Guard boys.”

“Well, it’s interesting,” Clara said. “Who knows what terrible things are out there.” She gave the sea a glance, turned and took Max’s arm, and they continued on. Alma fell behind again. Henry had gathered by now that she and Clara didn’t like each other, although for Max’s benefit Clara only spoke kindly of her, calling her “dear,” worrying for her safety, commenting on how pretty she was, or could be if she’d put the effort in. She was Max’s half sister, as it turned out. She’d grown up with their mother in Los Angeles, under squalid conditions, apparently. (Clara had told them this, while Max had been busy making omelets in the kitchen.) The mother had died not long ago, and now Max looked after her. They lived off the money, a generous sum of money, his father had left him. He was a Hewitt—as in Hewitt-Rowe, the shipping company.

“You mean he doesn’t have a job?” Effie had asked, and the disdain in her voice had pleased Henry. If there was one thing that turned Effie off, it was a man who was not gainfully employed.

“No, the poor soul,” Clara had said. “Aside from his writing. I feel for him deeply. You wouldn’t guess it to meet him, but he’s a lost child, really.”

“But—I mean—he can get a job,” Effie had said.

Back at Clara’s they made gin and tonics and warmed up the pot roast Mrs. Pavich had made on Saturday. They settled around the coffee table with their plates. Clara lit candles. All the doors and windows were open, and everything in the den was fluttering and alive. Leaves had begun to gather in the corners. A small bird—no, a bat, Effie cried—flitted in from the kitchen and turned sharply out to the patio.

Clara suggested they play a game of charades. There’d be no need to keep score, it was just for fun, but Effie didn’t see the point of a game if you didn’t keep score. She and Henry made one team, Clara and Max the other. Alma, who had built an unnecessary fire, sat on the rug near the hearth reading her book.