“That makes it all right? And this?” says Edie. She rummages in her bag again and passes a card across the table. “What cryptic mischief is this?”

It is a postcard of a William Blake watercolor, a shepherd and his sheep, an image from Songs of Innocence and of Experience, he thinks. He smiles as he turns it. The reverse reads: Didn’t I tell you that I’d be useful to you? Your mystery ceiling is in Ypres. Ask for the Blue Angel.

“Does it make sense to you?”

“Not in the slightest. Cassie’s husband works for the war graves people. He’s making some enquiries for me. I have to call him at the end of the month.”

Edie nods, but looks unconvinced. “That’s very kind.”

They eat steak and fried potatoes. She prods at the meat with her fork and accuses it of being horse. The waiter brings them an unlabeled bottle of white wine, serving madame and then monsieur with no compromising of ceremony, and they drink it even though it tastes strangely sour. When she shivers he gives her his jacket. The café has a corrugated-iron awning and looks very temporary. It calls itself the Grand Hôtel and it is evident that it has grand plans—or a sense of humor. The shape of the cathedral looms ghostly behind Edie. Jackdaws croak from the tops of the ruins.

“I never expected that he’d come back,” she says quite suddenly with her fork in her hand. “I didn’t have doubts. It never nagged at me. But it all changed when that envelope came. Now, whenever there’s a knock at the door, I start. Whenever the telephone rings, I’m waiting to hear his voice. When the train came into the station here, I expected to see his face on the platform. Well, don’t you? Didn’t you? I can no longer quite believe that he isn’t here, that everything that Francis was can just have been snuffed out. Nullified. Neutralized. Nil. I mean, it can’t, can it?”

“I’m sorry.”

“He isn’t here? He won’t come back?”

Harry shakes his head. “I can’t see how.”

“I want to go to the place where he was wounded and to Tyne Cot Cemetery. Fingers keep pointing there. People keep telling me that if he’s buried anywhere, that’s likely to be the place.”

“I’ve been told that too. And I’ve gone through all the burial registers already. He isn’t there. His name isn’t on the list.”

“But you said that there are so many nameless burials. If I go there, I might know if he is one of those. I might feel it.”

“You honestly think so?”

“Don’t look at me like I’m foolish.”

“I’m not. I’m truly not.”