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he really says?
And the letter was a shape in his pocket, yearning to be read once again.
    The doorbell rang. Scott jumped, but Helen was on her feet before him. He followed her into the hallway, and the instant he left the living room dread clasped hold of him.
Don’t answer
, he thought.
Don’t go, don’t go
. He was trying to speak those words, but something had happened to his mouth. He clasped the wineglass in his right hand and heard a
tink
as it cracked.
    Helen unlocked the front door and drew it open.
    There was no one there. Day was slipping toward dusk, and trees and bushes made familiar shadows across their front garden. The Astra sat on the drive, glinting with a few diamond spots of rain.
    There was no one there, but Scott was so desperate for Helen not to move over the threshold that he stepped forward and grasped her arm.
    â€œOuch!” She pulled away, catching sight of the cracked wineglass spilling wine onto his right sleeve. “What have you done?”
    â€œGlass broke.” Scott was staring out into the garden, trying to use the failing daylight to discern just what was wrong out there.
Or is it all in here?
he thought, not sure whether he meant the house or somewhere even deeper.
    He could feel the letter creased against his buttock.
    â€œGet to the kitchen; you’ll stain the carpet!” Helen was already trying to steer him inside, and for that he was glad. She swung the door closed behind her.
    â€œLock it,” he said.
    â€œScott—”
    He backed along the hall, holding his arm up so that his sleeve soaked up most of the spilling wine. “Lock it, please.”
    She locked the door, and Scott turned and hurried into the kitchen. By the time Helen stood beside him at the sink, he’d put down the glass and was dabbing at his shirt with a damp cloth. He took it off, Helen soaked it beneath the tap, and then he heard the sound of something scoring across a pane of glass.
    â€œI fucking
hate
that!” Helen said, wincing.
    â€œThe living room.”
    â€œThat bloody rosebush of yours.”
    Scott turned and went back into the living room, still topless. His belly swung over his belt, handles bulging at his hips. He hated being naked, even if it was only Helen who saw. He could have been so much better.
There’s so much more to see
, Papa had said.
This world’s just a veil
.
    â€œDamn it, Papa!” Something waved beyond the window, vanishing from view as if being drawn away.
    â€œWhat?” Helen called from the kitchen.
    â€œNothing.” Scott’s heart was pummeling at his chest. He pulled out the letter, opened it, and read it again, and it mentioned the Chord of Souls, and he felt a sense of doom closing in around him, as though reading the letter was inviting in the same fate that had consumed Papa in the end. Murder and suicide. Perhaps the old man really had been mad after all.
    Scott wondered whether insanity was hereditary.
    Helen came in and surprised him by hugging him tight. “That was weird,” she said. “Maybe we need more wine?”
    Scott nodded. “Maybe we do.”
    Helen went back to the kitchen to choose a new bottle, leaving him alone in the living room. He approached the window. The silhouette of a bud-heavy stem of the rosebush rose and fell in the strengthening breeze, whispering across the glass. Whispering, not scoring.
Not the rosebush
, he thought.
    He cupped his hands to the glass to cut out reflection from the living room light, held his breath, and pressed his face close.
    He remembered Papa sitting on that fallen tree, the whisper of wood ants hanging on his every word.
    A car passed beyond their garden, and Scott grasped at the normalcy of the scene. Mrs. Hacker from along the street was walking her dog. She was a beautiful woman who thought herself ugly, and Scott had always perceived a sense of tragedy about her.
    Papa staring into the distance before lowering his head,