“I’m sorry, Nate. If I don’t find anything that’ll work soon, we’ll just go ahead and order the shingles you want from the home center.”

Nate nodded, still frowning at the mantel.

“Nate, can’t we just bring the mantel in, put it against the wall, and see how it looks?” she asked. “Please?”

“Fine,” he said, and she got that little ping of satisfaction she got when she’d won a round.

Nate had agreed it did look great in the house, done some figuring, and decided they could put the stovepipe behind the stove, go straight into the wall, and then run the chimney up through the pantry so the mantel would not be obscured. They’d laid the mantel out on a tarp and Helen had cleaned it up, used some lemon polish on it, rubbed at the scuffed and scratched places, trying to imagine all the mantel must have seen: the years of Christmases, birthdays, celebrations; the coming of television; the decline of the farm; the fights; the murder and suicide.

. . .

Now, tonight, the mantel seemed to shine, to almost glow, in the dark of the empty house.

But the house was not empty. Helen understood that.

She held perfectly still and waited, listening. She heard footsteps on the plywood subfloor, felt the air grow colder around her. Her skin prickled. Keeping her eyes fixed on the mantel, she stared without blinking until her eyes teared, until a figure moved into view, came to stand beside her. Helen raised her eyes slowly.

The woman was wearing jeans; her dark hair was cut in a bouncy bob, the front of her pink sweater soaked with dark red bloodstains. Helen could smell gunpowder and the rich iron scent of fresh blood.

This isn’t real, Helen thought. I’m dreaming it.

She closed her eyes tight, then opened them wide, and the woman was still there. Helen could see the box of nails Nate had left on the floor beside the mantel. And there was his hammer. There was an unused roll of fiberglass insulation.

This was no dream.

“Where are the children?” the woman asked, looking around, eyes frantic. She seemed to be speaking loudly, shouting even, yet Helen could barely hear her; her words came out like a cicada buzz. Then she looked down at her front, reached a hand up to touch the bullet hole, and started to scream. It was the most anguished, high-pitched keening sound Helen had ever heard.

“Please,” Helen said, trying to raise her head but finding it too heavy. “It’s all right.”

But as soon as she spoke, the woman faded like a gust of smoke being blown by a sharp wind.

She was gone.

But the sound remained.

Outside, the screaming went on and on.

It was the same sound Helen had heard that first night. The sound Nate had insisted was a fisher or a fox.