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herself into spending a couple of weeks on foreign soil and she’d be able to talk him into it, too. At least one trip before Emily left the nest in another four or five years.
    First things first, though. Make an offer on this cabin, and establish themselves here. The rest would take care of itself in due course. There was plenty of time (knock wood again).
    Bill was still asleep when she got up. Good for him; he didn’t get enough sleep at home. Even when he wasn’t working, he was up early and rattling around looking for something to occupy his time. Definite Type A when she first met him; that and the long hours and job stress and his less-than-sensible eating habits had made him a heart attack or stroke candidate. He’d slowed down some in recent years, after Emily had come into their lives and then her long struggle with the breast cancer, but she still worried about him. Another reason, the main one, for owning a place like this.
    Thinking about Bill’s health led her to start worrying again about Cybil’s. Her mother was in her late eighties, still mentally sharp, at least most of the time, but frail and too stubborn and independent to move into an assisted living facililty. Redwood Village, the retirement community in Larkspur, was her home now she said, and she fully intended to live there until she died. She had close neighbors, including one in the other half of her duplex, and they all watched out for each other. That was fine in theory. So was the fact that Redwood Village had a small clinic with a physician and nurse on twenty-four-hour call. But she’d had two falls in the past five months, and on the second, she’d banged her head on a table leg, blacked out, and lain on the floor for God knew how long—Cybil wouldn’t say—before coming around. Cybil made light of the episode because that was her way, but the fact remained that she could have hurt herself a lot more seriously than she had. Could have died there on her living room floor.
    Kerry had called her Thursday night to tell her about the trip to Green Valley, and she’d been all right then. A little vague in her responses, though, as if what she was hearing didn’t fully compute. Call her again this morning? Two things Cybil didn’t like (well, two among several): being a burden to anyone and being checked up on. Any more than one call a week, unless she was the one who initiated it, fell into the checking-up category. But under the circumstances …
    When she finished making coffee, Kerry took a cup and her cell phone out onto the front deck. Another glorious morning, already very warm. Too warm to sit in the sun, she moved her chair over into a patch of shade. Her excuse for calling, she thought, would be to report that their second home search was finally over. It wasn’t strictly true yet, but a little while lie was better than incurring her mother’s wrath by saying, “I just called to see how you’re doing.”
    She made the call, waited through six, seven, eight rings. No answer. That didn’t have to mean anything ominous—Cybil might be out shopping or for a walk with a friend, or puttering in her small garden—but it was a little nervous-making just the same. Kerry let the line buzz emptily four more times before she disconnected, telling herself not to worry, if anything had happened, she would have had emergency notification. But she couldn’t help thinking about those two falls, Cybil lying unconscious on the floor …
    Bill was up; she could hear him singing inside. Singing … my God, it sounded more like a rooster being strangled. He was a wonderful man in most ways and he genuinely loved music, especially jazz, but he couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket.
    She finished her coffee and tried Cybil’s number again. Still no answer. She had numbers for two of her mother’s neighbors; maybe she should call one of them—No, that was a panic reaction. Cybil was all right, just out somewhere. She’d be furious if