As though she found the digression at the very best irrelevant Julia said “What were the places like?”

“What would you two say?”

“Maybe you had to be her,” Roy said, “to see what she saw.”

“Or you can let them speak to you,” Bella said.

An uneasy memory of Halfway Halt prompted me to ask “What did you hear?”

“They speak like her paintings, Patrick. Speak to your soul.”

“I’m afraid they don’t speak to mine,” Julia said.

Roy’s look might have been implying she had none. Not least for fear that he would voice the thought, I said “Magister Stellarum.”

Everybody turned to me, and Bella’s eyes were widest. As though he’d expected someone else to speak, Roy said “What was that supposed to be?”

“Didn’t you hear it at Halfway Halt?”

“Just heard the trees, and it was cold even though there wasn’t any wind.”

“If there wasn’t a wind, how did you hear the trees?”

“There must have been one up where they were. How about you, Bell?”

“Don’t mind me,” Julia said, “but I’m afraid I’m feeling uninformed again.”

Roy and Bella gazed at me as if I was responsible for deciding how much to reveal. “All the places Thelma wrote down have to do with magic,” I said. “Maybe there are people buried there who did.”

“What makes you think that?” Bella said.

“I found a map of them.”

I was tired of withholding the truth from Julia – in fact, I’d begun to feel I might welcome her support. I brought up the atlas on my phone, and Roy peered at it while Bella gave it just a lingering blink. “May I see as well?” Julia said.

Roy passed the phone across the table occupied by soft drinks and wine depleted by respectful sips. Julia used a finger and thumb to expand details on the map, a process that enlarged her frown as well. Eventually she said to nobody specific “Well, I hope you won’t be doing this much longer.”

“There aren’t too many, are there, Patrick? Just the ones Thelma had to visit.”

“Did you notice Third Mile Wood is on that map?”

“Maybe that’s why she bought her house there,” Roy said.

“She wasn’t online then.”

“Maybe she didn’t need the map to feel the magic.”

I thought Julia might object, but she appeared to think she’d made her point. “It’s where Diana Arborum is meant to be buried,” I told her. “Don’t ask me where.”

“I wasn’t about to. I shouldn’t think anyone cares.”