Ezra Pickens, it would read. His Truth Travels with Him.

I stood there for a long time, but mostly I looked at the place where my mother lay. Would she thank me for putting him there? Or would she rather have been left alone? Again, I’d done the best I could. What I thought she would want. By his side, she had lived, uncomplaining; so be it in death. But in my heart I was angry, and knew that I would always question the wisdom of this choice. What I’d told Barbara was true: Life gets messy, and death, it seemed, was no exception.

When I heard a distant engine, I paid it no attention. I probably should have known better, so that when Vanessa appeared beside me, I would have had a smile to greet her; but all I saw was fresh-turned earth and the hard edges of my mother’s graven name, until she spoke and touched me on the shoulder. I faced her then, and she took my hand. I said her name and she took all of me. Her arms were slim and strong, and she smelled like the river. I leaned into her, and her hand moved on the back of my neck. When I pulled away, I did so for a reason. I wanted to see her eyes, to see if there was cause to hope. And there was, for there was clarity there, too; and I knew, before I even spoke, that we would be okay.

Yet the words had to be said, although not in the shadow of Ezra’s mounded earth. So I took her farm-worn hand and led her slowly up the hill to the shady place I’d found. I told her first that I loved her, and she looked away, down to the rows of chiseled stone. When she looked back, she tried to speak, but I stopped her with a finger. I thought back to the day we met, the day we jumped for Jimmy. It’s where it started, where everything changed, and where our future almost ended. If we were to have a chance together, she needed to hear about that day, as I needed to tell her; so I said what I had to say, and truer words have never been spoken.

EPILOGUE

Many months have passed, and the pain has lessened to an occasional throb. I still have trouble sleeping at night, but I don’t mind; my thoughts are not unpleasant. I keep Vanessa’s letter in the drawer of my bedside table, and I read it from time to time, usually at night. It reminds me of how close I came, and that life is not a given. It keeps me honest, and maintains what I’ve come to call “this precious clarity.”

The clock reads just after five, and although my days start early now, there is no hurry; and the dream is still fresh upon me. So I swing my feet onto the cool floor and walk from the room. In the hallway, there is light from the moon, and I follow it to the window. I look down on still fields, then to my right and to the river. It winds into the distance, a silver thread, and I think of currents and of time, of things that have been swept away.

The courts ruled that the cash and jewels from my father’s safe were part of his estate. They would go to the foundation. But the buildings sold quickly, and for a better price than I’d hoped. In the end, I sent over $800,000 to Jean, and she used it to purchase a cabin on the wooded shores of Lake Champlain. I’ve not visited yet. Still too soon, Jean told me, the world still too entirely theirs. But we are talking about Christmas.

Maybe.

As for my share of the money, I used it as best I could. I restored the aging farmhouse, bought a decent tractor, and acquired the adjacent two-hundred-acre parcel. It is good land, with rich soil and a bold stream. I also have my eye on eighty acres that borders to the south, but the sellers know my ambitions and their price is still too high. But I can be patient.

I hear the door swing open behind me and smile in spite of myself. She only wakes when I find my way to this window. It’s as if she knows I’m here and rises to join me in looking down on this garden we’ve made. Her arms slip warm across my chest, and I see her face in the window-Vanessa, my wife.

“What are you thinking about?” she asks.

“I had the dream again.”

“The same one?”

“Yes.”

“Come back to bed,” she says.

“In a minute.”

She kisses me and returns to bed.

My hands find the windowsill and I feel the cold draft coming through. I think of what I’ve learned and of those things I have yet to discover. Farming is a tough life, replete with uncertainty, and much of it is new to me. Yet I’ve grown lean and welcome the long hours that have made my hands so hard. It suits me, this life. There is no rush, neither to judgment nor to action; and that, perhaps, has led to the greatest change of all, for I have yet to face a single regret.

Yet I remain my father’s son, and it is not possible to escape fully the reprehensible choices he made. I know that I can never forgive him. But fate, which can be so wayward, is not without a sense of justice. Ezra played his games with Barbara, manipulated her for his own twisted ends. At her insistence, he changed his will, inserted a clause providing that any child of mine would inherit the fifteen million dollars in the event of my death. It was Barbara’s idea, her safety valve, and I am quite certain that my father planned to change it once he was through with her. But she killed him before he could sign the new documents. Maybe that’s why she shot him. I’ll never know. But I realized, when I finally read through his will, that there was no time limit involved. So I did the research, and what I learned was this: When I die, whenever that might occur, my child will inherit a large part of Ezra’s millions. I filed a caveat on the matter, seeking declaratory judgment. Hambly fought it, of course, and the loss still embitters him. But the will was specific, and the law favored my interpretation.

After awhile, I retrace my steps and slip under the covers. She’s warm, on her side, and I flatten myself against her. The dream seems more real each time, and each time takes longer to leave me. We walk over green grass, the three of us.

Tell me the story, Daddy.

Which one?

My favorite.

I reach for Vanessa, my hand finding her belly. She sinks deeper under the covers and nestles back against me.

“I hope it’s a girl,” I whisper.

“It is,” she says, and settles her hand upon my own.

I can’t say if she knows this or simply feels it. For me, it is enough. I hear her voice from the dream-my little girl-and I contemplate the vast fortune that will one day be hers. I think for the last time of my father, and of his feelings about women and money. There is poetry in this, an irony that completes the circle, and I wonder if he is restless in that dark and forever grave.

I stay in bed for a few more minutes, but the day beckons and I am restless. I pull on jeans and a sweater, and Bone follows me downstairs. It is cold outside, and I stand on the porch in the predawn light. I take a breath that fills me up and look out across the silent fields. There is a low mist in the hollow places, and the hilltops rise to meet the coming sun.