“That.” She inclined her head toward the deep, still pool that filled the broad hollow left years ago by the removal of the bluestone. Roughly round, it stretched from where they sat by the trail to a row of water-loving willow trees on the far side—a glassy expanse perhaps two hundred feet across that mirrored the weeping branches of the trees so precisely, the effect resembled trick photography.

“A tarn?”

“I was reading a wonderful book about hiking in the Scottish Highlands,” she said earnestly, “and the writer was forever coming upon ‘tarns.’ I got the impression that it was some kind of rocky pond.”

“Hmm.”

His nonresponse led to a long silence, broken finally by Madeleine. “See down there? That’s where I was thinking we should build the chicken coop, right by the asparagus patch.”

Gurney had been staring bleakly at the reflection of the willows. Now he followed her line of sight down a gentle slope through an opening in the woods formed by an abandoned logging road.

One reason that the boulder by the old quarry had become their habitual stopping place was that it was the only point on the trail from which their property was visible—the old farmhouse, the garden beds, the overgrown apple trees, the pond, the recently rebuilt barn, the surrounding hillside pastures (long untended and full this time of year with milkweed and black-eyed Susans), the part of the pasture by the house that they mowed and called a lawn, the swath up through the low pasture that they mowed and called a driveway. Madeleine, perched now on the boulder, always seemed pleased at this uniquely framed view of it all.

Gurney didn’t feel the same. Madeleine had discovered the spot herself shortly after they’d moved in, and from the first time she had shown it to him all he could think of was that it was the ideal location for a sniper to target someone entering or leaving their house. (He had the good sense not to mention this to her. She did work three days a week in the local psychiatric clinic, and he didn’t want her thinking he was in need of treatment for paranoia.)

The need to build a chicken coop, its projected size and appearance, and the site where it should be built had become daily topics of conversation—obviously exciting to her, mildly irritating to him. They had acquired four chickens in late May at Madeleine’s urging and had been housing them in the barn—but the idea of moving them up to new quarters by the house had taken hold.

“We could build a nice little coop with an enclosed run between the asparagus patch and the apple tree,” she said brightly, “so on hot days they’d have shade.”

“Right.” The word came out more wearily than he’d intended.