In the tenth year, in the spring, on a morning when the estate was doing everything gardens do when a decade has been spent on them, when the oak had put out its tenth set of leaves in our time and the east garden was in its full and slightly wild bloom and the kitchen smelled like coffee and Mrs. Aldren’s presence and the particular quality of a house that is fully itself, I went to the library.
I opened the drawer.
The journal. The letter to Rose. The letter to Thomas. The letter to Damien. The manuscript of The Choosing. The manuscript of The Distance Things Travel. The manuscript of What Truth Does.
The letters from people in other countries.
The printed essays in Damien’s handwriting.
The photograph of a woman and a small boy on a beach.
The card that said Happy Everything.
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