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By Root 1198 0

and pulled off. When the rain eased, I got out of the car and walked to the guardrail to look down the length of the lake, which stretched for miles, slate blue and rough with waves, amid the curve of hills. A partial rainbow had formed in the dazzling, water-struck air, the spectrum of color clear but transparent behind the dark trees. It was breathtaking, a wild beauty emerging out of nothing, and it filled me with a powerful nostalgia for a past I hadn’t even known. And why was that, I wondered? There was such force and beauty in the windows, such unsettled sadness in what little I knew of Rose’s life, all her longing, her distance from her daughter. Just knowing she had existed opened new and uneasy possibilities within my understanding of the story I’d always thought I’d known by heart. And I felt responsible, too. Whoever Rose had been, she was gone, unable to speak for herself, fading into the past as surely as these rainy colors were diffusing, even now.

It was late evening by the time I got back, the sun half behind the opposite shore, the west side of the house cast in reddish gold. I found my mother sitting on the patio, glass of wine on the table, the bottle in a silver ice bucket on the floor, in easy reach. She had been reading a novel, and when I came in she put the paperback facedown on the arm of her chair; I glimpsed an ethereal baby dress against a background of black and thought of Iris. My mother was wearing a white T-shirt and chunky silver and turquoise jewelry that looked beautiful with her hair.

“Good book?”

“I just started, but it’s compelling so far. Andy gave me a copy of that new book Cell, but I just couldn’t get into it.”

“The kind of book you want to throw across the room?”

“Not even that. I couldn’t work up any interest at all.” She leaned down to the bucket where another glass stood on the patio and handed it to me. “Before I forget, Keegan called. Something about the windows, he asked you to call him back. He’s doing very well, isn’t he?”

“He is. It’s great. Do you know his son, Max?”

She smiled. “Sometimes Keegan brings him into the bank. Sweet boy. Lively, like his dad. He’s a good father.”

“I thought so, too. You sound very fond of Keegan these days.”

“I always liked Keegan. I just thought you were too young. You were.”

“I was.”

“And now?” she asked, giving me an assessing look.

“Now I’m waiting for Yoshi to come,” I said, not wanting to go any closer to the complex feelings that seeing Keegan again had evoked.

She handed me the wine and I poured myself a glass—a Chardonnay, from local grapes. It tasted faintly of pear and raspberries.

“Very nice.”

“Isn’t it? Andy brought it by. He should be back any second—I sent him out fix the slats in the fence by the shed. He made the mistake of volunteering, poor guy.”

“Really? He’s here?”

“You sound disappointed. I thought you wanted to meet him?”

“I did. I do. I’ve had a very exciting day, that’s all.”

“Rose Jarrett?”

“Yes. Rose, here and there and everywhere.” Quickly, I sketched out my day, my trip to the Westrum House in Rochester. I’d just begun to tell her about the woman in the window on the landing and my drink with Oliver Parrott when she smiled past me and waved. I turned to see Andy, a tall man, broad but lean, dressed just as I’d imagined he would be, in jeans and a cotton sweatshirt, coming up the lawn from the lake. His hair was cut short, glinting silver-gray in the late afternoon light. He was carrying a hammer and a sack of nails. I stood as my mother introduced us. He had a firm grip, a quick, engaging smile, and he asked about Japan with genuine interest. I had no reason to dislike him, yet I found myself feeling cautious, wary, reserved.

“Let me get another glass,” my mother said.

“I’ll get it,” I told her, realizing suddenly that I was the intruder in the evening. The glass she’d had waiting by the wine hadn’t been for me at all.

I sat with them for half an hour or so. My mother kept telling me and Andy things about each other—my work in hydrology, his pilot’s license, my travels, his travels—to keep