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said, the mutual assessment over in a heartbeat. “I had to leave him in Houghton with Christina and Ally—my housemates.”
    “Ah. Yes.” The woman spread her skirt around her in a golden circle and sat gracefully on the step. Anna noticed her sandals matched her dress and hair—exactly. They had been dyed the same shade. “We left Pointer in a kennel in Duluth. Carrie writes him once a week. If any dog can learn to read, it’ll be Pointer. He’s a Lhasa Apso. ‘No Domestic Animals on the Island.’ As if the comforts here weren’t few enough.”
    An employee. Anna felt she should be able to place the woman, but her brain was in no mood to be racked for once-seen faces, half-heard names. “I know I’m Anna Pigeon, North Shore Ranger, but I don’t know who you are. Should I?” The sentence construction was a little tipsy but Anna thought the sentiment sounded reasonable enough.
    “At least you know who you are,” the woman said and laughed. “That’s more than most of the people here know. These Upper Peninsula types aren’t given much to introspection. I’m Patience Bittner. I manage the lodge. When I’ve been guffawed on, jostled, or growled at one too many times, I escape out here to regain my equilibrium.”
    Anna nodded, took a sip of her drink, turned her mind free again to glide out over the water. She must have made a face, because Patience said: “You’re drinking the Beaujolais.”
    “Yes,” Anna said neutrally.
    “It’s the last of it, I promise. It was ordered without my approval and it seemed a shame to pour it out. It’s such an ordeal getting anything good shipped out here back of beyond. I’ve got quite a decent California red coming in on the Ranger Three. Glen Ellen has a nice cabernet sauvignon. Young but nice.”
    “Nosy without being precocious?” Anna teased, thinking of Molly and her neurotic gourmet.
    Patience smiled. “Do I sound pretentious? Habit. I used to manage a winery outside Napa.”
    “Vodka and beer are the booze ordinaire in this part of the country. Not many people will notice your hard work.”
    “You will, I expect.”
    “Only on the first glass,” Anna said truthfully, and the woman laughed again, a brittle sound but not unpleasant.
    “If I get in anything special, I’ll get you in on the first glass.” She looked at her watch, a delicate gold band. “Party time. Pleased to meet you, Anna. I hope you’ll come by and sit on my deck again sometime soon.”
    The innkeeper left, trailing a faint scent of perfume. “Privileged,” Anna thought, or “Passion.” Expensive scents, but neither could compete with the mind-clearing draft that was carried over the water from the ground hemlock and fir on Raspberry Island.
    With the fading of the light the guardians of the island began to reclaim her shores. A persistent whining burned in Anna’s ear. A stinging itch cut through the thin fabric of her shirt. Again she missed the desert. There, if something bit, one usually died of it. She hated this nickel and diming to death, one bloody sip at a time.
    She stood and knocked back the last of her wine. Denny Castle’s wedding reception: it would be rude not to make an appearance. And she needed to wheedle an invitation to sleep on someone’s floor. Failing that, she’d bed down in the Lorelei, the boat belonging to the District Ranger, Ralph Pilcher. More damp sleeping bags and pit toilets.
     
     
     
    I nspired—or intimidated—by Patience Bittner’s easy elegance, Anna made a stop in the ladies’ room. Hair hanging in two gray-streaked braids gave her an aging Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm look. She wrapped the plaits around her head and secured them in place with pins from her daypack. Too sunburned to wash her face with the harsh industrial soap in the washroom, she limited her toilette to the new coiffure.
    The main dining room at the Rock Harbor Lodge made an attempt at being picturesque. The walls were paneled in light-colored wood, the ceiling