“Wow,” Mary said, meaning it.

“Wonderful, isn’t it?” The cashier went to the end of one of the gray accordions, pulled a sheaf of papers from the last one, and handed them to Mary. “This may help you. It’s an index made by a volunteer named Dale.”

“Thanks.” Mary flipped through to a page in the middle, which read: P. 2001.048.223 – Photograph, Internees, Italian – Woods camp; P. 2001.048.224 – Photograph, Internees, Italians – Woods camp. Next to each catalog number was a description of the internees engaged in all sorts of activities: “doing forest work,” “bathing at camp,” “firing the furnace,” “working in laundry,” “raising chickens,” “feeding cats,” and “meeting with priest.” The index would save Mary tons of time. “Thanks so much, and God bless the Dales of the world.”

“I agree.” The cashier headed for the door with a little wave. “Good luck,” she said, and Mary got busy.

An hour later, the door reopened, and the cashier stood in the threshold, bearing a light jacket and her handbag, but it was an excited Mary who greeted her.

“Look what I found!” she said, putting the last of the accordions away. In her hand were two photos.

“Let’s see. I have a minute.”

“Great.” Mary set the two photos down on the top of the nearest box, and the cashier bent over them with her. They were two cracked group photos taken at different times; one was in the beet field on a sunny day, with eight Italian internees posed like a graduating class, four in front and four in back. Amadeo stood on the far right of the front row, recognizable from the alien registration photo. Mary pointed at him, delighted. “That’s the man I’ve been looking for!”

“Mr. Brandolini.” The cashier grinned. “Good for you! I guess these photos weren’t displayed downstairs because of the cracking.”

“I guess so.” Mary set out the next photo proudly, as if it were a trump card. It was another group photo, but of only five internees including Amadeo standing in a loose ring, leaning on hoes in the beet field. “Look at the first photo and the second. Notice anything similar about them, even though they were taken at different places and times?”

“Yes.” The cashier pointed. “Your man, Brandolini, always stands in the front row, far right. He was short.”

“True. That’s half of it.” Mary moved her fingernail past Amadeo’s head and one up, to the top row, where a tall man wearing a cap stood. “Also, in both photos, the man in the cap stands behind him.”

“He’s tall.”

Ouch. “Okay, but he also has his hands on Amadeo’s shoulders in both photos.”

“Interesting.” The cashier looked over, intrigued behind her glasses. “And?”

“It suggests they were friends, doesn’t it?”

“Yes.”

“I’m wondering if this is the friend who was with Amadeo in the beet field, the day he died. Do you know how I can find out who this man is? Are there any camp records here? Any list of internees?”

“No records other than these.” The cashier gestured at the boxes, but Mary had looked through everything and still had finished before menopause.

“Would Mr. Milton know?”

“Probably not. He worked in the motor pool.”

Mary remembered. She’d double-check later. “Anyone else alive? Any of the other internees?”

“No. Some of the internees settled here, but they’re gone now.” The cashier shook her head, deep in thought. “There is the one internee, Bert, everyone knows him, but he’s out of the country now.”

Mary remembered that Mr. Milton had mentioned him. “What about any of the Japanese or German internees?”

“They didn’t mix, from what I understand.”

Mary had read as much. “What about anyone else from the camp staff? Mr. Milton can’t be the only one alive. Is there a listing of the staff, a directory I can use to track them down?”

“Hold on.” The cashier cocked her head, her steely hair catching the overhead light. “There was someone, the camp adjutant actually, who lives in Butte. He worked closely with the men, I understand. Maybe he would know.”

“What’s his name?”

“Aaron Nyquist.”

“Is Butte far?”

“Just down the road,” the cashier said, and Mary translated. In Montanaspeak, that meant two hours.

But the evening was young.

Nineteen

The Montana sky deepened from cobalt blue to a rich, grapey purple, until blackness fell like a bolt of felt in a photographer’s darkroom. Mary drove a very flat two hours into the pitch dark, leaving behind all the colors. A moonless nightfall obliterated the horizon and obscured even the peaks of Bitterroots. The only illumination on the empty highway was two jittery cones of light from her headlights, faint owing to the underpowered rental, and she flicked on the high beams for company. She thought she saw a herd of bighorn sheep running alongside the highway, but it could just as easily have been a group of Hell’s Angels in weird helmets. She hit the accelerator.

The Nyquist home was a small farmhouse of white clapboard with sharply peaked gables, typical of the Victorian houses Mary had seen out here. She pulled up in front and cut the ignition, looking over. Adrenaline had powered her drive, but it was ebbing away at the sight of the dark house. All the windows on the front floor were black, and the only light shone through the curtains on a second-floor window. The FOR SALE sign on the lawn told her she was just in time, but the lights upstairs told her that it was past Mr. Nyquist’s bedtime. She sat in the car, wrestling with her conscience. Was she really going to wake up the whole family, just to get the answers she wanted?

Go, girl. If it was Amadeo talking, he was cranky from the drive. And his English was better than everybody thought.

Mary got out of the car into the darkness, but the lamp from the second-floor window cast almost enough light to illuminate the front walk. She headed up the walk, her gaze on the window, and the crunching underfoot told her it was made of pebbles, an oddly suburban touch. The house was silent, and she slowed her step. Maybe she should come back in the morning. She was about to turn around when she spotted it. A light, around the back of the house, shining down the gravel driveway. She walked toward the light and saw the outline of a small barn behind the house, on the right. It had a three-peaked roof, like the cut-off top of a star, which was barely visible against the night sky. Its bay doors hung open, and light poured from within. There were no animals inside; it was a barn converted to a garage, and under a bright panel of fluorescent lights sat a vintage pickup truck.

Mary walked toward it and got a closer look. The bed of the truck had shiny sides of varnished wood, and its green back door read HARVESTER in gleaming yellow paint. A large blue machine sat next to the truck, which looked like a compressor or something equally foreign, and the walls of the tiny garage were blanketed with white Peg-Board, displaying tools hung in graduated order. Mary reached the doorway and stood there a minute, not seeing anyone around the truck.

“Hello? Mr. Nyquist?” she called out, but there was no answer. She stepped inside the garage, which smelled of grease but was cleaner than her apartment. Plywood workbenches built into both walls on either side of the garage looked like they’d been wiped down, and even the cloth rags hanging on the handles of the homemade base cabinets underneath were white and fluffy. “Mr. Nyquist?” she said, louder.

“Wha?” came a voice from underneath the truck, and Mary peered around the front. A pair of wrinkled jeans stuck out from under the chassis, ending in a scuffed pair of Nikes. The Nikes walked themselves out on their thick rubbery heels, and the bottom half of a man in jeans was lying on his back on a dolly. The face hadn’t emerged, but a voice from underneath said, “Grandma?”