The ride home was uneventful and Lance let his mind drift over the events of the morning as he drove. He had left John’s house with his thoughts muddled, the sincerity of the other man’s words battling with his own convictions, and ended up at the same café in which he ate lunch on his first day in town. The coffee, toast, and egg-white omelet had cleared some of the convoluted thoughts from his head but the feeling of vulnerability hadn’t departed by the time the check was paid and the sleepy-eyed waitress tipped. A means for defense had entered his mind, and the gun store at the far end of town seemed the most logical at the time. As he drove away from Stub’s gun shop (he couldn’t think of it as Endor’s any longer, no matter how hard he tried), his eyes found the front of Mary’s bookstore, and he felt himself preparing to park in front of the building. Her pretty face floated before him and he longed to listen to her voice—for her to talk about the weather would even be a calming exercise—and he had to physically stop himself from turning into an empty parking spot. Instead, he pushed the gas pedal farther to the floor, breaking the speed limit as he exited the town’s main street.
The sun hung straight overhead, chasing the last remnants of the previous night’s clouds from the sky, when Lance pulled to a stop in front of the house. The engine’s clock-like ticking was the only sound above the distant rasp of waves washing upon the shore below the hill. His mind had already turned to the afternoon’s work when he noticed the note attached to the front door with a single strip of transparent tape. Scrawling script that would have been more at home on any doctor’s prescription pad adorned the paper. The note finally became clear only after Lance read it twice.
Lance, sorry for getting off on the wrong foot. Please come for dinner this evening around six.
—John
Lance stood on the front stoop re-reading the note for several minutes. He tried to imagine different scenarios in which John could possibly be luring him away from the house for a reason, but none seemed to have any merit. Without fully committing to the invitation, he unlocked the door and entered the coolness of the house.
As he walked to the kitchen, he mentally checked that everything was still in its place and hadn’t been tampered with while he was gone. The kitchen yielded a turkey sandwich and a few slices of apple before he made his way to the alcove and the waiting computer within.
The silence of the house gave him much-needed solitude over the next few hours, and the only sound that disturbed the quiet was the rustling tap of the keyboard’s letters forming words. The lake outside the windows reflected the blue of the late-summer sky, and soft breaths of wind began to frost its middle with whitecaps. The day faded into evening without the notice of the house’s lone occupant, and it was only when the sun began to dip behind the tall curtain of trees in the west that Lance looked up from the computer screen.
He sat back and rested, in slight awe of the work before him. The sense of accomplishment was so satisfying that he could have sighed with the pleasure of it. Another fifteen pages had been added to the last tally when he checked, his vision of the words being finally released from a pent-up dam within him solidifying into fact.
Lance stood from the chair after saving the file, and walked to the kitchen. The clock on the stove read 5:20—just enough time for him to shower, dress, and arrive at John’s home. Indecision tossed within him. The temptation to completely ignore the caretaker’s request appealed to him just on principle, but on the other hand, if the old man wasn’t responsible for the night visitations, he might possibly have an idea about who was.
After deliberating for over five minutes, he decided he needed a shower, regardless of his destination afterward, and headed to the bathroom upstairs. The hot water washed away the grime of the past twenty-four hours, and with it, his reservations.
As he dressed in a comfortable pair of jeans and a light T-shirt, he resolved that he would hear what John had to say and glean as much information as he could from the elderly man. He reminded himself that hardly anything was ever what it seemed, as he pulled a bottle of wine from the fridge and slammed the door. He needed only to think of the rough-looking gun-store owner he had met today to verify that intrinsic truth.
The ride to John’s house was quick and lacked the vengeance of his prior visit. As he pulled the Land Rover down the long drive, he noticed how truly beautiful the setting was. The afternoon sun threw shafts of golden light through the thick layers of surrounding forest. Several small birds flitted between branches, recovering bits of food from leaves while keeping an ever-watchful eye on the black vehicle that glided below them.