Ivy has noticed Jane’s arrival. She comes to her, pulling the daffodil from her hair and grinning. Ravi is still yelling at his father.
“Hi Janie,” she says, taking in the loony dog, then the open umbrella. Next she glances at Jane’s other hand, which is when Jane realizes she’s carrying Winnie-the-Pooh, which she doesn’t remember picking up.
“Look,” says Ivy, holding out the slightly crushed daffodil. “They’ve decorated the suits of armor with jonquils for the gala. Eight letters, with a j and a q.”
“What?” says Jane, confused.
“Jonquils?” says Ivy. “It’s a kind of yellow daffodil.”
“Okay,” says Jane. “Thanks, but my hands are full. Why are Ravi and Octavian yelling?”
Ivy looks a little deflated. “There’s a marble sculpture of a fish,” she says, “mounted on a wooden pedestal. It’s by a famous sculptor named Brancusi and it sits on a table in the receiving hall. Ravi just found the empty pedestal. The fish is gone. Someone broke the fish off the pedestal and took it away and Ravi doesn’t think his father’s upset enough about it.”
“Oh,” Jane says, still not understanding.
Now Ivy’s trying to get a closer look at the umbrella behind Jane. She squeezes past Jane into the corridor and Jane holds it out to her. She needs to know what Ivy sees when she looks at it.
“Wait,” Ivy says. “Is that Lucy St. George on that umbrella?”
“You think it looks like her?”
“In jail?” Ivy says. “Did you draw a picture of Lucy in jail, using glitter?”
“My fingers slipped.”
“It’s an amazing glitter drawing,” Ivy says, wonder in her voice. “I mean, it’s extraordinary. But why did you draw her in jail?”
“I don’t know,” Jane says. “I didn’t mean to.”
Ivy’s peering into her face. “Janie, are you okay?” she says. “You seem kind of . . . disoriented.”
Because Ivy has asked it, Jane realizes it’s true. “You know,” she says, “I’ve felt disoriented all day. Sort of like gnats are flitting around in front of my eyes.”
Ivy reaches out and wraps a hand around Jane’s upper arm, on the jellyfish tentacles there. At Ivy’s touch, the corridor comes into sharp focus and the endless pressure in Jane’s ears drops away. Ivy smells like chlorine. Her hand is warm, her smile soft. “Oh,” Jane says, wondering how strange it would be to give Ivy a full-on hug. “Thank you. Jonquils. I get it. I’m sorry. This has been a really weird day.”
Not letting go of her arm, Ivy tucks the daffodil behind Jane’s ear. It tickles. Jane flushes.
“Do you think maybe you’re working too hard?” Ivy says.
“I don’t know,” Jane says. “There’s something in the air today.”
“Well, be careful. Lucy’s in there,” Ivy says. “You don’t want her to see that umbrella.”
“No,” Jane says, certain. “I didn’t mean it to turn out this way. I’m going to have to erase it somehow.”
“Oh, man, do you have to?” Ivy says. “Because it’s an amazing umbrella. It’s just kind of . . . maybe not so nice to Lucy. I mean, do you think of her as a criminal?”
“Of course not!”
“Isn’t she even a private art investigator? Like, she puts people in jail herself?”
“I feel awful about it,” Jane says.
“Don’t. But maybe you should go put it back in your rooms before she sees it. Here, give it to me,” Ivy says, reaching for the handle of the umbrella.
The moment Ivy lets go of Jane’s arm, confusion washes over her again.
“Lucy’s coming,” Ivy says quietly. She tugs at the umbrella. “Here, give it to me. I’ll put it in your morning room.” She has to pry the umbrella from Jane’s fingers. With one more puzzled glance, she carries the umbrella away, down the corridor toward Jane’s rooms.
Lucy St. George speaks behind Jane. “Excuse me.”
“Sorry,” Jane says, moving out of the way.
Lucy bumps against Jane as she passes into the corridor, her face blank and panicked.
“What’s wrong?” asks Jane.
“Nothing,” Lucy responds, rushing away.
“Do you feel weird today?” Jane calls to her back. “I feel weird today.”
Lucy halts her mad rush. She turns back to Jane with an expression of great and pale strain. Like Jane, she’s clutching her book in one hand.
“Did you ever love someone,” Lucy says, “and know they love you, and you’re attracted to them, and you know they’re attracted to you, and so many things are exactly right, but it doesn’t matter, because the few things that are wrong are completely, totally fucked?”
“Are you talking about Ravi?” Jane says.
“I’ve made some unfortunate decisions,” Lucy says, then clutches her temples. “My head feels like it’s splitting open. Does yours?”
“What do you mean, unfortunate decisions? Like Ravi?”
“Oh,” Lucy says, “like a hundred things. Ravi is impossible. I can’t believe I’m talking to you about it. Never mind.”
“Have you made criminal decisions?” Jane says, thinking about the umbrella.
Lucy’s eyes widen. “Why on earth would you ask me that?”
“Sorry,” Jane says, confused. “I don’t know where that came from. I just feel really weird today.”
At that moment, Ravi pushes out of Octavian’s bedroom, putting a hot hand on either side of Jane’s waist and shifting her out of his way, not gently. He strides on down the hall toward his rooms at the corridor’s end, his face wet with tears. He doesn’t even glance at Lucy, who watches him go, folding the hard angles of herself up inside a disappointment she can’t hide.
Lucy’s phone starts ringing, but she doesn’t react. She’s still staring after Ravi.
“Your phone is ringing,” Jane says.
“What? Oh,” Lucy says, patting her front pockets, her back pockets, then producing a phone. She walks away, toward the house’s center, saying, “Yeah, what is it, Dad?”
Jane is left alone in Octavian’s doorway with the world’s most agitated dog. He’s gone back to head-butting Jane, as if he’s trying to knock himself unconscious against her shin.
Inside the bedroom, Octavian and Kiran are having a stare-down.
“Is this what it takes for you to visit your old dad?” says Octavian, passing a weary hand across his eyes. “Someone steals a sculpture?”
“You haven’t exactly come looking for me, either, Dad,” says Kiran. “You know I’ve been home.”
“Why would I push myself on you when I’m unwanted?”
“If Charlotte came home after all this time away,” Kiran says, “you wouldn’t sit back waiting for her to come to you.”
“That’s different,” says Octavian. “Charlotte left without any warning. I have no idea where she went, or why.”
“If I left without any warning,” says Kiran, “you’d accuse me of being selfish and immature. When Charlotte does it, you mope, and smoke too much, and stop taking showers, and oversleep. You knew I was coming yesterday and you didn’t even stay awake.”
“Kiran,” says Octavian. “Are you suggesting that I love my wife more than I love my daughter? That I wouldn’t be distraught with worry if you disappeared? Do you really believe that?”
“I’m saying you need to snap out of it,” says Kiran, suddenly angry. “Since when do you sleep all day, or not care if a major piece of art is missing?”
“So,” says Octavian, his voice rising too, “you’re mad at me because I’m depressed? Should I be mad at you because you’re depressed?”
“Yes!” Kiran cries. “You should! You should be subjecting me to long, boring talks about how I need a job, and how you think I’ve chosen the wrong man and I’m ruining my life!”
“You have chosen the wrong man!” says Octavian, almost shouting now. “You are ruining your life!”
“Then tell me so!” Kiran cries. “Don’t just shuffle around in your slippers mooning after Charlotte and acting indifferent to everything else!”
“I’m not indifferent!” says Octavian. “I’m just . . .” He stops, passing another hand over his eyes. “I’m tired.”
“So go for a walk!” says Kiran. “Go for a swim! Go to New York and buy a painting! Of course you’re tired! You never do anything!”
“I haven’t been able to think clearly,” Octavian says. “Not since Charlotte left.”