The cold black water of the lake lapped gently at the muddy shore. The dead leaves that lined the bank were soft and fetid, and smelled of rot.

“Where are we going?” Archie asked.

“The one place the police know I’m not,” Gretchen said.

Archie gazed back up at the island. It was a hundred yards away, and he had a feeling they weren’t going to take the bridge. “Are we going to swim?” he asked.

She turned to him. The white of her nurse’s uniform seemed to glow faintly in the dark, making her look almost ghostly. She swung the penlight back into the woods and he followed her between the rough trunks until they came to a sort of clearing. Far above them, there was a shred of dark blue where the treetops didn’t entirely cloak the sky. Gretchen aimed the light near the toes of her white pumps.

“Here,” she said. “Clear it.”

Archie looked at the ground she was indicating with the penlight. He could see in the light that the bed of cedar needles had been disturbed. The older, darker needles were mixed in with the lighter, dryer ones. He dropped to his knees and started sweeping the pungent needles aside with his hands, piling them to one side. A few inches below the surface, his palms touched wood. Archie used the forearm of his corduroy blazer to brush the rest of the needles aside, and then he sat back on his heels. The wooden slab that he had revealed was three feet by four feet. The air smelled thickly of cedar. Splinters stung his hands.

“There are two tunnels in,” Gretchen said. “Jack Reynolds’s island? Look on a map, darling. It’s called Runner Island. The old man who built the house in the twenties was a bootlegger. Jack’s interest in the island went beyond an enthusiasm for Tudor architecture. The other tunnel is newer, reinforced, well lit. I assume it’s the one they use for their business. This one is a bit dodgy. I had to pry the door open from the inside. You’re not afraid of spiders, are you?”

Archie looked behind them, through the trees, toward the dark water. “It goes under the lake?” he asked. It had been ten months since he’d pulled Susan’s lifeless body from the floodwaters, but the dark water still gripped at something in his chest.

“You’re not going to drown, darling,” Gretchen said gently.

He believed her. She would not let him drown. He believed her because she had said it, and because he had long ago come to terms with the fact that when he did die, it would be on Gretchen Lowell’s terms. “So how is it going to happen?” he asked her.

She paused. The small circle of light thrown by the penlight in her hand remained at her feet, unmoving. “I haven’t decided yet.”