Mark had not known if he would recognize the Walkers’ house, but when he saw its red tile roofs and its walled flower garden set in the broad green lawn, he was at once stabbed by the poignant arrow of remembrance.

He took a long, curving stride out over Windy Hill, looking down at the property, instinctively measuring the angles of attack and the lines of defense.

In the street below, cars were stopping and people were jumping out and waving to him.

As he circled back, now just grazing the roof, he could see them out there with video cameras and smartphones, clicking away.

How do you be a celebrity? How do you do that? He needed privacy. He didn’t want this. Anyway, San Francisco had been severely damaged and thousands of people had died there. So who was the hero in that battle, exactly?

As the spreading trees rushed up at him, he broke his speed by arching backward until his face was touched by the sun. Then leaves whispered around him, then he was in among limbs. To control the fall, he grabbed one and swung, then dropped the last fifty feet to the ground. A cat ran away.

For the split of an instant, he crouched, absolutely still. Around him, he observed Abelia grandiflora, Nemesia caerulea, and numerous other species. Toward the back of the garden he saw the roses still flourishing, the Chinas and teas that he had enjoyed.

He moved down the path to the old back gate, and there it was, his own little backhouse, the wood gray and weathered, and beyond it the Alcea setosa and the Wisteria sinensis climbing the walls, and the roses along the path to the big house with its wide French doors and big windows, its warm Spanish grace.

Oh, what memories it brought back, this garden. This was a soldier’s home, orderly, carefully tended, and peaceful. He had run here as a boy. He had lain in the grass imagining that he could feel the earth turning beneath the blue of the afternoon sky, and the stars at night.

Wary, though, he looked carefully toward the big house, watching its windows. Standing well back from one of them was a man. In his hand he carried a silver object. As soon as he saw it, Mark remembered it from his childhood. He wished he did not remember it at all.

Such a feeling passed into his heart that he was almost unable to contain it. But he did contain it and looked solemnly back at the man and raised a careful hand, palm up.

The silver object was slipped into the man’s pocket.

Mark went up to the window. “Hey, Sarge.”

“Hey, Mark.”

“How you been?”

“Cookin’. I’m a general now.”

“Yes, sir!” Mark nodded toward the pocket. “Does it still work?”

General Walker laughed, but he did not say no.