Chapter 7: One Bed

On Friday afternoon we drove east along the shore in Eli's truck, and halfway there I asked again.

"What did Preston mean? What did you cash?"

Eli kept his eyes on the road.

"My mother had MS," he said. "She needed round-the-clock care I couldn't pay for. Eldon paid it. Six years."

"Why would he?"

"Because I signed something. And I took one check, in the beginning, to cover the first bills."

"What did you sign?"

"I can't tell you that yet."

"Yet."

"Yet." He glanced at me, and his face was tired. "It's the truth. I know it's not enough."

I looked out at the water, flat and gray, and decided it was more than I'd had yesterday.

"Is your mother..."

"She died in April."

"I'm sorry."

"So am I."

He didn't say anything else. His hands on the wheel were very still.

The Ward lake house stood alone on a point, three stories of cedar and glass.

A long dock reached out from it into Lake Erie.

Behind it, across a stretch of dead grass, was a big gray barn with a padlocked door.

Eli parked with his back to the barn. He did not look at it once.

Eldon was waiting on the porch with a glass in his hand.

"Elijah. Maia." He was almost warm. "I've put you in the blue room. Married couples."

"We'd like two rooms," I said.

"There are no spare rooms. The Gouverneurs are in the guest wing." He smiled. "You'll manage."

The blue room had a wide window over the water, and one bed.

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