Now she rolled the stuffed squid around in a hot pan until the bundles browned and shrank and bulged, then let them bubble with wine and tomato before she sliced them into rounds, dressed the pasta, and arranged them on top. Edmund and Polly ate everything; they were not fussy. Disdain had cured them—Papa wouldn’t punish them for not eating, but he would ridicule their cowardice. Tonight he was in a good mood. He and Dee always drank wine, and Polly and Edmund were each given a shot glass while they heard about the color Dee would glaze a new bowl, the chapter Papa was writing on bird gods, the general stupidity of the world at large. During dinner, through the open window, they all watched the crows continue to taunt poor chained Lemon (Merle, in lieu of rent, was supposed to build a fence). Papa told the children that crows held funerals, but no weddings: They should put that in their hopper. He said they should use the squid ink to sketch out their map on the canvas upstairs. If Rita wanted to paint over the ink later, she could.

“Using what?” asked Dee, on her way to saying no. Dee did this often; she was the person who said no to him, and their arguments were rich and quiet and dense.

“Goose quills,” said Papa. He laughed at her face. “I suppose brushes and inkwells, though their fingertips would work best. The carpet’s already ruined, right?”

Dee planned it out—the door to her quarters at the far end would split the Pacific Ocean, so that Edmund would not have to face Southeast Asia every time he came out of his bedroom. Rita could paint over the lines later, or she could use them. It would be like a toast, good luck.

The children quickly gave up on the ink, and Dee used it to draw a perfect giant squid near the bathroom door. They sketched coastlines with charcoal pencils: it was night over their heads, a hot day in Asia, and the moon looked like the one Dee clutched in her hand while she fell. Edmund tried the Nile and did a good job: It looked like a snake or a lock of hair, but the mountains on either side looked like tents until Dee suggested he turn them into volcanoes.

“Add some beasts,” said Papa. “What’s a world without a monster?”

“It’s a world where children can make it down the hall without being terrified,” said Dee.

“They’re already having nightmares,” said Papa. “Drawing the teeth might help.”

Polly and Edmund managed the outline of a sailfish, a single bird over the ocean, and a horse in what was supposed to be the American West. Then they scrubbed the different kinds of black off their fingers and went to bed, all of them sliding easily away into the dark.