Caddie shook her head. “No,” she said.

“Me neither,” said Hudson. “I’ve always thought it would be fun, though.”

“You should have Ben teach you,” Angela suggested. “He’s a great instructor.”

“Really?” Hudson said, looking at Ben. “I’d love that. I mean, if it isn’t too much trouble. I don’t know how long it takes or anything.”

“Not long,” Ben told him. “A couple of sessions in the pool to teach you the skills, then the certification dives in the ocean. We could do it in a couple of days.”

“It would be fun,” said Angela. “Then we could all go diving together.”

Hudson looked at Caddie. “What about you?” he said. “Are you up for it?”

Caddie looked first at Angela, then at Ben. Ben could see her wrestling with something, coming to some kind of decision. For a moment he thought she was going to accept from Hudson the gift that she had refused from him. Then she shook her head. “I don’t think so,” she said. “I’m not really a water person.”

CHAPTER 25

CHAPTER 25

By his fourth visit to the Steinbeck Center, Hudson felt he was close to an answer. He’d combed through the journals, and while nothing in them could be called proof of his assertions, he felt certain that he was right. He just needed one concrete piece of proof, one solid connection that would stand against the protests he knew would confront his claim once he revealed it publicly.

The problem, of course, was that he wasn’t at all sure this evidence existed. Without it, he was left with unsupportable suppositions. While he believed himself correct, he was familiar enough with the world of academia to know that believing in yourself meant nothing if you didn’t have substantiating materials to back you up.

He pushed the journal he was looking at away and rested his head in his hands, rubbing his eyes. He was so close, yet he might as well be standing on the wrong side of an uncrossable chasm. What he wanted—what he needed—was just out of reach, hidden behind pages and pages of seemingly unrelated entries about one man’s life.

He brought the journal back in front of him and read.

Went with Ed to the tide pools last night to collect octopus. Wonderful little creatures, smart like dogs. In the bucket they reach out to one another with their arms. Asking or telling, I can’t say. Maybe they just want to know that they aren’t alone.