“It looks more like a person than a deer,” Helen said, squinting at the image, trying to make sense of the blurry white form. Were those ears? Or was that hair?

Nate jerked the camera away, looked at the image himself, puzzling over it.

“No,” he said, thrusting the camera at her again. “Look, it’s obviously a deer.” He forwarded to the next picture, this one even blurrier. In it, a white figure (or maybe just a flash of reflected light?) seemed to be darting behind a tree. Again, it was tall and narrow—not a deerlike shape at all.

“I believe you,” Helen said. “I believe you saw it.”

“I’m not asking you to take me at my word, Helen! I’m asking you to acknowledge the fucking proof right in front of your eyes!”

His voice had an edge she wasn’t used to. The sound of a man at the end of his rope. Was this how Ann’s husband had sounded that last day?

Helen took a long swig of her beer and said nothing.

Nate let out a slow breath and said quietly, “Do you or do you not see a deer in this picture?”

She thought of lying, of saying, Yes, of course I see it. But that’s not what she said. “I see something. But really, Nate, it doesn’t look much like a deer to me.”

He hung the camera back around his neck and stomped down to the trailer, went in, and slammed the door hard behind him.

Riley stopped by not long after and Helen showed her the ax. Nate hadn’t come out of the trailer and Helen wasn’t about to go down.

“It was a gift from Olive. She found it with her metal detector out in the bog. We think it might have been Hattie’s.”

“Wow,” Riley said, picking up the ax, touching it almost reverently. “Hattie’s ax! What an incredible find!”

“Took me all day and a dozen YouTube videos to get it cleaned up and in working order, but it didn’t turn out half bad.”

“It’s beautiful,” Riley said, handing the ax back to Helen.

Helen nodded, asked, “Want to walk down to the bog?”

“Sure.”

Helen left the refurbished ax in the house, leaning against the wall under the beam between the living room and kitchen: her latest gift for Hattie.