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was not unpleasant. Gulls wheeled out over the cannery pier and boat slips, shrieking hungrily. A few men moved around out there; a late-arriving trawler was just putting into one of the berths. Across the road, on a flattish strip of raised land, two yelling boys chased each other among six or seven dilapidated trailers—a sort of makeshift trailer park, Alix thought. Otherwise, there was no activity anywhere in the vicinity.
    She unlatched the rear door and helped Jan carry the empty propane cylinders into A-1 Marine. A taciturn man in overalls traded them full tanks, charged them what Jan grumbled was too much, and didn’t offer to help them take the full tanks out to the car. Friendly natives, she thought, and the thought depressed her. The whole village depressed her in a vague sort of way. Or maybe she was just reacting—overreacting?—to Jan’s moodiness.
    They left the Ford where it was and walked down past the Seafood Grotto to the general store. Its interior was cavernous; opaque globes suspended from long metal conduit cast dim light over the rows of shelves, old-fashioned meat case, dark wood checkout counter, and the partitioned-off cubicle adjacent to it, near the door, that contained a barred window and a sign reading U.S. Post Office, Hilliard, OR . The look and smell of the place caused a bittersweet wave of nostalgia to wash over Alix. Her corner deli in New York’s Greenwich Village had had the same black-and-white linoleum squares, the same aromas. Now, thousands of miles and over a dozen years away, she could still conjure up the warmth and coziness that had made Greenberg’s a haven for the twenty-three-year-old artist who had been so eager to take on life in the big city. Eager, yet secretly so afraid....
    “Help you, folks?”
    The gruff, mannish voice came from a woman sitting on a stool behind the grocery counter. Her hair was short and gray, in a style that Alix automatically labeled “home chop job,” and she wore a heavy red-plaid flannel workshirt. The expression on her seamed, weathered face was neither welcoming nor unfriendly.
    Alix rummaged in her purse for the list she’d made the night before. “Thanks, we have quite a few things to pick up. We’re the Ryersons, the new caretakers out at the lighthouse—”
    “Take your time. When you fill a basket, bring it up and leave it on the counter.”
    There was a stack of vari-colored plastic baskets on the floor next to the produce section; Alix picked one up. Jan had already wandered off toward a far comer of the store that appeared to be stocked with hardware and household goods. The woman behind the counter had picked up a magazine and was leafing through it; her disinterest struck Alix as odd. She didn’t seem to care what sort of people had moved into the vicinity, had chosen to live in isolation on Cape Despair. Well, maybe she was a friend of Seth Bonner’s. That might explain it. Or maybe she was just plain disinterested—the exact opposite of the stereotypical small-town busybody.
    With her list in one hand and the basket in the other, Alix went down the first aisle to the left. That was where the bottled water was; she loaded the basket with that and took it up to the counter. The older woman didn’t even glance up from her magazine. Alix was surprised, and mildly amused, to see that it was Sunset, a publication whose offices were located in Menlo Park, Palo Alto’s neighbor to the north, and for which she occasionally did freelance illustrating. Sunset was a glossy paean to the refinements of living in the western U.S.—such refinements including an indulgence in gourmet food and wine, redwood decking and hot tubs in the backyard, and spacious homes with lots of cutely concealed storage space. The magazine’s presence in this backwater store was a contradiction that pleased Alix, as life’s inconsistencies often did.
    She was loading a second basket with meat and poultry when the bell above the door jingled. Alix