She liked herself as he seemed to see her—strong, capable, independent. Not part of the undifferentiated mass of Janethomasgerald as she’d feared, but part of a loving, healthy family. Which wasn’t so far from the truth. She liked his belief in her, his faith that she could help see him through whatever block he was having with this book. She wanted to live up to his image of her.

Later, as they were making their way down the staircase to the lobby, he said to her, hesitantly, “So, Jane, was there a reason you wanted to get together? Something you wanted to tell me?”

She’d wanted forty-five minutes of companionship, wanted to be around someone with whom she had a relationship uncomplicated by fabrications and omissions. Someone who approved of her, even if, in truth, he didn’t know her all that well. She stopped on the staircase and let him get a few steps ahead of her. “Can you believe I almost forgot?” she said. “We’re going to get the money! I haven’t had the official word, but I’ve had the unofficial official word we’re getting a green light. And not only that, it seems nearly certain we’ll be getting more than the ten grand I thought we’d end up getting.”

He bounded up the stairs and put his arms around her. “You’re brilliant, Jane.”

This was what she’d come for, and standing on the stairs with the harpist above plucking out something silvery and melancholy—Debussy? The Beatles?—she believed him for almost a full minute.

Eleven

Home Alone

1.

Desmond was gazing out the window of his office at the still surface of the lake in the middle of Deerforth’s campus. It was the period of Pauline Anderton’s life after her husband died that he found so puzzling. All indications were that her husband had tolerated her singing career while belittling her talent with backhanded compliments. (“For people with talent,” he once wrote to her, “singing’s no big deal. For someone like you, it takes courage. To hell with the critics.”) Desmond didn’t understand why she’d abandoned her singing after his death. If she hadn’t turned down every offer to perform or record, she might have become a more confident and polished artist.

“Ahmthina turrin mamuth inna crag ed.”