“Came all the way here from a big city up north, with great buildings and churches with stained glass and a bell tower you could hear clanging for miles and miles. I remember what it was like there, the way people spoke, the bright, pretty clothes they wore. I remember so much of where I left. Of course, that’s when my Leroy came and swooped me away. Said he heard of a magic game—a card game—folks down toward the Swamplands were playing. Said he had to go there himself to play, that the cards didn’t work the further from the Swamplands you moved, that they revolted against the holder, they became nothing but paper. Said if I went down there with him, we’d find our fortune.

“I agreed right away. I didn’t hardly know what a swamp was, but I loved old Leroy, and I loved adventure. I wanted to see the world, I did. I wanted to know all that lay beyond the city. I wanted to see mountains and forests, I wanted to float down rivers, I wanted to see the ocean. And I did, I saw all of it, and it was beautiful. And my Leroy was with me through every hill and mountain and river and countryside. Until we came to Gentlesburg, my new home. But then poor Leroy had to go on and get in over his head. Then poor Leroy had to make a wager no one could pay up.”

“Why do you stay here?” I said, my voice just a scratchy whisper against all my tiredness. “Why don’t you up and leave?”

“Oh honey,” she said. “But this is Leroy’s pier. He said when he bought it, don’t you worry, one day our ship will come in. And old Leroy was a lot of things, but he wasn’t a liar. So I’ll be here waiting until it does.”

The way she sat there, in the shadows, like she was crouching away from the light . . . I don’t know, something about it scared me. What loneliness could look like, what it could do to a person. All that time alone, waiting for something that was never going to come. Later I would think maybe I dreamed it, that all this was just a melancholy notion that drifted right into my noggin and swirled around, and through that magic became a dream. I don’t know, but I think it was real. I drifted myself right back to sleep.

When I woke up the sky was dark and clear and the moon was bright and wild out the window. I’d slept through the whole durn day. No telling where my daddy was now. The old lady had a plate sat out with some salted fish for me and another scrap of bread. She sat there and watched me, a little grin on her face. I wondered if this was all she had. I wondered what else she would eat.

I sat up and realized something was missing. Pop’s knapsack. I must have looked panicked because the old lady said, “Don’t you worry now. I just set your things out to dry. Turns out I needn’t have bothered.”