So he asked and she answered. There was no delay in it. Nor did he fail to hear it, or mishear it or imagine he had. She stood from the table. He reached across to touch her cheek, her hair, then they went together to the stairs and up the stairs to her room where she sat on the bed telling him what to pack. For his own things he borrowed a bag out of Cornelius’s room, the initials O.T. painted on the side. (He decided not to inquire if Thorpe was an Osbert, an Oliver.) When both bags were ready they sat at the table downstairs and she dictated to him a letter for her brother and sister, which he wrote with pen and paper from Lovall’s writing case. It explained what there was time to explain, offered love, promised a return. At the bottom of the letter he added: For God’s sake do not dig in the small trench. Leave it be!

He then scratched five lines to his sister. He hoped she was well and the children and William. He might soon be in Ireland. He might be in Canada. He would write again when he could. She did not, he said, need to keep a lamp in the window any more.

He addressed the letter and left them both on the table in the big room, propped against a shape of grooved and bluish pottery, a fragment as beautiful as it was broken.

Since seeing the ship from the hill he reckoned a bare hour had passed, no more.

They went down to the boathouse. It was early afternoon, the day was mild and clear—though less mild and less clear than it had been. Lacroix carried the bags and his fiddle case. Emily clutched the sleeve of his green coat with one hand, carried her guittar with the other. At the boathouse he put down the bags and opened the door with a series of shoves. He had imagined something flying out—or running—but nothing came out and he looked through to where the boat floated on its bed of silky water. He left Emily sitting on one of the bags and went inside. Odd acoustics in there. He crouched to examine the interior of the boat. There was water, two inches or so over the keel-line. It could, he thought, be rainwater. He looked for something to bail with and found a wine glass sitting on its own on the wooden walkway by the bows. He sniffed at it. Dregs, ancient lees. Had someone poured a libation to the gods here? An offering in hope of a safe crossing, a successful fishing trip? Or did Cornelius sometimes come in here to hide from his sisters?