"I've been up all night trying to figure this out. Why are you leaving now? Why?" She was on the edge of hysteria. "Something's going on. Something with the government. Is that why you're here? You're going to leave us all, let us die!"

Arthur's heart sank. She might be close enough to the truth. All his excitement seemed to drain.

"We're going into the city today," he said. "I have business there, and Marty and Francine have to come with me."

"Can we come along?" Danielle asked. "All of us. We're family. I would feel a lot better if we all came along."

Francine looked at him, eyes filled with tears. Marty's lower lip was quivering, and Becky stood beside her mother, one arm around her, confused into silence.

"No," Grant said. Danielle jerked her head around.

"What?"

"No. We will not panic. Arthur has work to do. If it's work for the government, fine. But we will not panic in this house if I have anything to say about it."

"They're going someplace" Danielle said softly.

Grant agreed to that with a brief nod. "Maybe so. But we have no business horning in."

"That's goddamned reasonable of you," Danielle said. "We're your goddamned family. What are you doing for us?”

Grant searched Arthur's face, and Arthur sensed his confusion and fear and determination not to let things get out of control. "I'm keeping us in our house," he said, "and I'm keeping us civil, and dignified."

"Dignity," Danielle said. She upended her cup of coffee on the floor and rushed out of the kitchen. Becky stood by the spill and sobbed silently, painfully.

"Daddy," she said between tight spasms.

"We're just arguing," Grant told her. He kneeled beside her and wrapped an arm around her shoulder. "We'll be okay."

Arthur, feeling like an automaton, gathered their things from the bathroom and spare bedroom. Francine sought her sister in the master bedroom and tried to soothe her.

Grant confronted Arthur in the driveway. Morning fog was thick over the hills, and the sun was a promise of yellow warmth behind the mist. A few mourning doves sang their sweet, nostalgic stupid song behind the hedges. "Are you still working for the government?" he asked.

"No," Arthur said.

"They're not taking you all into Cheyenne Mountain or something like that? Putting you aboard a space shuttle?"

"No," Arthur said, feeling a twinge. What do you hope is going to happen ... ? Something not too far from what Grant is hypothesizing?

"Are you coming back here this evening? Just going into town, and then . . . corning back?"

Arthur shook his head. "I don't think so," he said.

"You're going to drive, wander until ... it happens?"

"I don't know," Arthur said.

Grant grimaced and shook his head. "I've wondered how long we could keep it all together. We are all going to die, aren't we, and we can't do anything?"

Arthur felt as if he were breathing shards of glass.