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found her nephew in the family room in front of the television. She doubted that he had been paying attention to it, for the sound was muted and he was staring at the sliding door when she entered. That was the doorway where his father’s body had been discovered.
    She sat down in a chair near him. “Are you all right?” she asked.
    â€œYeah, sure,” Travis said.
    He was wearing jeans and an old T-shirt. His feet were bare, and suddenly he was the kid she had always known, not the strange young man in a uniform who had attended the funeral.
    She told him her plan to go to Portland, collect a few things, make some arrangements there and return later. “I’ll stay down here and help Chloe out for the next few weeks,” she said.
    He nodded. “That’s good. I wish I could stay. The army makes decisions for me these days.” He sounded bitter.
    She stared at him, taken aback. “I thought you liked it.”
    â€œDad made the arrangements, you know, pulled some strings, whatever it took, and then told me. I wanted to go to medical school, but I was headed for West Point.”
    â€œCan you get out of it?”
    â€œSure. In six more years. I talked to a lawyer, that’s what he told me. They don’t let go once you’ve signed that piece of paper.” He laughed, but it sounded suspiciously like a sob. “I’m government property.”

    Time was doing a strange dance of speeding up incredibly fast, or stopping altogether, Amy thought, driving to Portland. This was Sunday, and a week ago, on Monday morning David Etheridge had called her and told her that Robert had been shot dead. It seemed like only hours ago, yet a lifetime ago. Simultaneously instant and distant. A disconnect in her brain. She had thrown on clothes, put a few things in a backpack and left within minutes of the call. She had returned to her own apartment for a very brief time only to pick up something suitable for a funeral, a few clothes to get her through the week.
    Thank God she had not seen Robert’s body, she had thought many times that week. By the time she arrived at the house, the police were there and a screen had been put up around the end of the deck. Chloe had been in a state of shock, white-faced, eyes wide with horror, and she kept mumbling about ants. Sitting at the kitchen table with coffee at hand, suddenly she had screamed and jumped up, rubbing her arms, shaking her hair, screaming that ants were all over her. Amy had put her to bed and called her doctor. It was a nightmare scenario, the shocked garden worker shaking on the deck with one of the men holding her hand, Chloe screaming in the kitchen, police everywhere.
    David had called Lucy to tell her, afraid she would hear it on a newscast. He had not called Travis—he hadn’t known there was a Travis—and Amy made the call when she arrived. Henry Elders had been hovering, making coffee, trying to be useful. He went to the airport to pick up Lucy later in the day, and again to pick up Travis. She had felt both grateful for his help, and at the same time a thought had persisted that he was just a nosy, interfering old man with nothing to do except get in the way.
    Resolutely, she focused on what she had to do at her apartment—pick up more clothes, her laptop, the job she was working on. She would clean out the refrigerator, stop the newspaper delivery, put a hold on mail, call a friend or two.

    It was after eleven when she pulled into the driveway in Eugene again. It looked as if every light in the house was on and she didn’t want to talk to anyone, not right now. She had stopped for a coffee, and carried it and her purse inside with her, leaving everything else for later. She was very tired, she had realized driving back down on I-5. Emotional fatigue, she thought, dredging up the phrase from a long-ago class in psychology. As enervating as strenuous physical activity. More, she decided. She