“I know you don’t want to talk about it,” she said quickly. “But I feel like we should. We have to, don’t we? I’m not sure I can go on if we don’t.”

He met her gaze but said nothing.

“I know sometimes it’s better to leave some things unsaid,” she went on. “And maybe this is one of those times. But I truly feel like something terrible is coming toward us.”

Tom closed his other hand over hers. “If you really want to talk about it, we can. But I think this is one of those times where it’s best to move forward, and not look back. Remember Lot’s wife.”

As Peggy gazed back at him across fifty years of experience, he knew that she understood him better than anyone ever had—better even than Viola, in most ways. Her hazel eyes moved across his face, missing nothing. Then she said, “I’m going to try to go back to sleep.”

He gave her an encouraging smile. “Everything’s going to be all right tomorrow. You’ll see.”

“You don’t think you should listen to Penn? About hiring Quentin?”

“There may come a time for that. But right now I think I’m better off following my own counsel.”

She patted the quilt over his thigh. “All right. Do you want to take one of my pills?”

“Better not. I’m fine, Peg. Go back to sleep.”

She stared sadly at him for a few moments, then patted his side and lay back down. Seconds later she began to snore again.

Tom thought of all the years that had passed since he’d given up Viola, years drifting down upon each other like leaves settling on a forest floor. Over time those leaves had hardened and begun to petrify. The young Tom Cage—the man who had loved Viola with soul-searing ardor—lay somewhere beneath those leaves, entombed in ash like an ember after a wildfire. And Viola … whatever had remained of her younger self was long gone. That person existed only as a memory that occasionally flickered to life in the minds of those she had treated decades ago. There were probably patients she’d touched similarly in Chicago, hundreds of them, but Tom knew nothing of those people, or those years. And he suspected that the Viola they had known was not quite the same enchanted spirit who had so blessed the people of Natchez.