EIGHT
Dear Mercy.
Alden consulted the slim volume of obscure Edwardian poetry he found propping up a coal scuttle in what used to be a maid’s room on the uppermost floor of the house. I saw this, and thought of you.
I sit and watch the shadows pass,
Grey shadows on a grey water.
None comes ever to my door,
Or stirs the rushes on my floor.
Only memory with me stays.
Alden eyed the words, frowning. He decided that he was too ambiguous, and added, When I say “thought of you,” I meant that the words applied to me, and how I feel around you. Not that they applied to you.
Was that making it less clear? He was unsure, but decided to slide the note under her bedroom door and hope that she understood what it was he was trying to say. After all, she’d had a pretty good sense about his thoug
