“We couldn’t find the candles,” Henry said.

“Why didn’t you come over? Don’t you love us anymore?”

Effie was standing at the foyer now, smiling broadly. “We didn’t want to—”

Max held up his hand. “I’ve been sent to collect you, and I’ve been told that no is not an acceptable answer. Clare’s gone stir-crazy and made a cassoulet—or what she’s calling a cassoulet. You should have seen her. She looked like she was holding a black Mass. I thought she would blow herself up trying to light the burners.”

Effie laughed. There was no question of refusing—they would come. Only, she wasn’t sure if they had an umbrella. It didn’t matter, Max said, it would be useless in the wind. So they found their shoes—one of Effie’s sandals had been hiding by the stairs—and followed Max out the door.

By the time they’d made it the short distance to Clara’s, through slashing rain and swift-running, ankle-deep streams of water in the street, they were soaked.

“Success,” Max called from the foyer, kicking off his shoes.

The den was aglow. A kerosene lamp stood on the end table by the sofa, candles of different kinds were arrayed here and there, a fire was going in the hearth, and in the wicker armchair beside it, like another source of light, Alma sat reading a magazine and bobbing her legs over the armrest. Her hair had reverted to its natural state, a messy pile atop her head, and she wore the same brown dress she’d been wearing for the past three days. Dripping there in the foyer, Henry smiled at her, and she smiled back at him.

“Darlings, there you are,” Clara cried, coming in from the kitchen, bearing a tray stacked with bowls and silverware. She set it down on the coffee table beside a large iron pot, which must have been the cassoulet, whatever that was. The air smelled deliciously of pork.

Max took a votive candle and Henry and Effie followed him up the stairs and across the balcony and down a dark hall, into a large bedroom that faced the back of the house. It was where Clara and Max were staying. Clothes—women’s clothes, mainly, dresses and stockings and underwear—were strewn all over the floor and the unmade bed. Henry recognized the white halter-top dress Clara had been wearing the first day, crumpled now by the nightstand. Max showed them a walk-in closet and told them to take whatever they wanted, though there wasn’t much—sweatpants, pajamas, robes, one dress shirt. He ducked into the attached bathroom and returned with towels, handed Henry the candle, and left them to it.