No . . . Women like her didn’t build—they didn’t need to. You don’t need to build when you are given everything.

As we continued on along the path, soon the landscape opened up. And there, between the trees, we saw it. A belt of mud, almost dried out.

“A river?”

“A canal,” Marguerite said. “Canal de Garonne. It continues on to Canal du Midi. At one time they divided France in two.”

“In two?” Lou said.

“The canals divided France, but connected the oceans, the Atlantic and the Mediterranean.”

“Where is the water now?”

“The canal has dried up. But it will be filled up again if it starts raining.”

“When it starts raining,” I said.

“What?”

“The canal will fill up again when it starts raining.”

Marguerite looked at me and was going to say something.

I stared back at her, hard. She would have to understand this, thank you very much. We couldn’t talk like that around Lou.

She corrected herself. “When it starts to rain,” she said to Lou, “the canal will fill up again. All we need is a little rain.”

We walked home together, Lou in the middle between us. I suddenly expected her to reach out her hands, one hand for each of us. That she would get us to hoist her into the air. Jump. That way she used to, with Anna and me.

But she walked without taking either of our hands. And that was good. Because she shouldn’t hold hands like that, not with Marguerite.

We passed a tractor. It was parked on the side of the road. Abandoned. Somebody had vandalized it, cut up the leather seat with a knife; the foam rubber was spilling out.

Marguerite looked at me, above Lou’s head. Was it safe, she was thinking, maybe, to walk along these roads alone?

We walked faster, hurrying back to the camp.

“Thank you,” Marguerite said when we arrived. “For letting me see the boat.”

“Yes . . .”

“You’re welcome,” Lou said.

“Good night,” Marguerite said. “See you.”

“You can come with us tomorrow too,” Lou said.

“I’m sure she doesn’t want to do that,” I said.

“Don’t you want to?” Lou asked.

“I would like that very much,” Marguerite replied.

But she didn’t wait until the next morning. She came back that very same night. She was there with her body. The rippling tautness beneath my fingers. The bony softness.

You’re here, I thought. You’re here, under me, over me. And I can’t stop myself. See no reason to hold back. I am incapable of thinking about why I should refrain.

Anna was a hole in my head. August and Anna a black hole into which everything disappeared. But Marguerite filled me up again. A little.