"I can't stop you," I said, and kept walking.
He walked next to me, hurrying a little to keep up with my strides, down the street to the end of the asphalt and then onto the fields. It was a pretty day out, but I wasn't paying much attention. I walked up to the kitchen door of The Pines, pulled it open without knocking, and went inside.
The kitchen had always been sterile, but there was an added emptiness now. I pulled the cupboards open one by one – there was a water stain where one of the leaks had been before he fixed the roof, but the dishes were neatly stacked. There was no food in the pantry. The refrigerator was empty too.
I walked through the open living room door and found it was similar: the furniture was in place, the floor swept clean, most of the boxes gone and the remaining ones empty. Not a trace, not a sign of the workshop Lucas had kept there.
I looked up. The burn-mark on the ceiling was still there, but it was the only sign anyone had done anything in the cottage. I didn't even bother looking in the bedroom, just sat down on the couch and bowed my head. After a second, I saw the boy's shoes next to mine, facing the couch as he sat on the coffee table opposite me. There was a rustle from nearby, and a book was thrust into my line of vision.
"This was on the table," the boy said, offering it to me. I took it from him with my good hand, thumb rubbing the edge of the cover. A small blue book, hardbound, imprint 1944, still smelling slightly of cigarettes. Ancient Games.
I opened it, holding the pages down with my left hand, and checked the flyleaf. There was a price scrawled in the upper right-hand corner, leftover from its time in the second-hand store in Chicago, and a single word in Lucas's tidy handwriting. Christopher.
I closed the book and held it, pressed against my chest. After a while, I looked up at the boy.
"I don't even know what this means," I said, only half-conscious I was talking. "I – does he – is he coming back?"
"Probably not today," he said pointedly. I looked around at the clean, empty living room and nodded. I didn't want to stay there. It wasn't Lucas's home anymore.
The boy led the way through to the kitchen and out the door, but I stopped on the threshold and looked back. My hand tightened around the book until the edges of the cover bit into my palm. Quiet Lucas, with his hidden world and his missing piece, had filled the rooms with color and light. Without him it was pretty empty.
When I turned back, the boy was gone. There was a soft flutter of wings, though, and the little Waxwing who had spent the winter in the holly bushes by the door was perched there now. He regarded me with small sharp eyes, his yellow, black-banded head tilted slightly. He warbled at me.
"How is this supposed to help?" I asked him, but he hopped along the branch, spread his wings, bobbed once or twice and then took off, straight up into the air. I followed his flight until he disappeared in the distance.
Easing my way down the hill to the field, I could see the fresh tire tracks, and a few muddy footprints – yes, the Friendly had been here, a truck with a camper. Perhaps the boy had fetched them, too. They'd come and taken Lucas away. If I was lucky, I'd see him again the next winter.
Perhaps he'd be married to a Friendly woman by then. Who knew?
I put the book in my jacket pocket and walked back to the village, tripping a little on the ridge of asphalt when the road became Low Ferry's again. I took a side-alley to the back of my shop, let myself in, left my shoes by the back door and went upstairs.
From the window I could see people coming and going, see Ron emerge from the cafe to have a smoke on the front bench. Beyond them, Leon was poking around in the scrap-metal bins in front of the hardware store. A couple of schoolchildren ran past, down to my front door, and stopped at the bottom of the steps when they saw the sign. Their faces all turned upwards to my window, and they waved.
I set the book down carefully and opened the window.
"Hey Mr. Dusk," one of them yelled. "You got new comic books in?"
"Yeah," I said, surprised at how steady I sounded. "Go on in, I'll be down in a second. Bags by the counter!" I added, as they flocked onto the porch and momentarily out of sight.
Downstairs they were already engaged in a debate over who would buy what, but they fell respectfully silent when I appeared. Their eyes, as one, tracked down to my left hand.
"Is it true you got attacked by a dog?" one of them asked.
"Just a bite," I said.
"My mom said you went to Chicago to get it fixed."
"That's right," I answered, willing them to find their comics and go.
"What's Chicago like?" a girl asked. I looked down at my hand.
"Big," I said. "Old. And very far away."
***
I called Marjorie that night, after I'd closed the shop and gone back upstairs to the troubling sight of the book on my bedside table. She was still at her store, and she answered on the first ring.
"Eighth Rare Books, Marjorie speaking," she said.
"Marj, it's Christopher," I said.
"Christopher, how are you?" she asked warmly. "How's the hand?"
I held up my left hand, studying it. "It's fine. Healing, I guess. Hurts a little."
"I'm glad you're on the mend. And your history scholar?" she asked. I glanced at the book on the table. "Christopher? Still there?"
"I..." I wasn't even sure what to say.
"Oh, god, did he try to – "
"No!" I interrupted, understanding what she must have assumed. "No, he – I don't know how he is. He disappeared yesterday."
"Disappeared?" she demanded. "How do you mean?"
"His place is empty. He cleaned out and left. Probably with the Friendly. They're – nomads, they pass through every once in a while."
"Nomads? This isn't the desert, Christopher."
"They're just Travelers, they wander. They...must have taken him with them," I said lamely. "He didn't say goodbye. They never do."
"Are you all right?" she asked.
"No, Marj, I don't think I am," I said softly.
"Sweetheart, I know your heart is broken in a couple of ways, but this kind does heal," she said. "And maybe he'll be back. He's young, he might just need to find himself a little. He didn't seem very happy in his own skin."