The county detective, Arthur Palmer, arrived just before nine in a plain brown sedan. He did not join the searchers in the field, but walked straight up to our porch, his movements slow and deliberate. He clicked his ballpoint pen twice, then looked down at his yellow legal pad.
“Mrs. Rhodes,” Detective Palmer said, his voice dropping into a flat, legal cadence. “I need you to tell me exactly what your daughter was wearing when she left the house at four.”
“The blue denim skirt,” I said, my voice trembling as I struggled to keep it steady. “And the gold piano-key earrings her father made for her.”
Palmer wrote the words down, his pen scratching against the paper. “Your husband tells me she usually takes the shortcut through the old orchard.”
“She never goes that way,” I said, looking over at Rick, who was now talking to Denise near the patrol car. “I told her to stay on the main sidewalk. She always obeys me.”
Palmer looked up from his pad, his gaze moving from me to Rick, then back again. “We will clear the orchard first, just to be thorough.”
By eleven, the bright lights of the police station felt harsh and exposing. The room smelled of old paper and floor wax, and the small desk in Detective Palmer’s office was piled with manila folders that had yellowed at the edges.
“We’ve completed the preliminary sweep of the three-mile radius,” Palmer said, setting his pen down on the desk. “The canine units lost the scent near the intersection of Elm and Fourth.”
“That’s only two blocks from Mrs. Gable’s house,” I said, my fingers gripping the edge of the wooden chair.
“Yes,” Palmer said, his expression remaining perfectly blank. “Which suggests she may have entered a vehicle at that corner.”
Rick sat in the chair beside me, his shoulders hunched forward as he stared at the linoleum floor. “There must be something else you can do. You can’t just stop looking because it’s dark.”
“We aren’t stopping, Mr. Rhodes,” Palmer said, his voice dropping to a low, quiet clip. “But without a license plate or a witness, the trail has gone cold on the very first night.”
The silence in the small office was heavy, broken only by the distant sound of a typewriter in the outer hallway. Rick did not reach out to comfort me, his eyes locked on his own reflection in the dark windowpane.
I looked down at my lap, where the spare sweater lay folded. The empty sidewalk outside the station window stretched into the shadows, offering no answers to the quiet dark.
Denise Vance, my neighbor, set her blue stoneware mug on the side table. It was exactly ten years since the canine units had gone home, but Denise still brought over chamomile tea on Tuesdays. She reached into her knit cardigan pocket and pulled out a folded green pamphlet.
“The woman who runs this group lost her nephew in ninety-eight,” Denise said, her voice dropping into that rapid, tentative rhythm she used when she was worried. “She lives over in Greenfield, Marlene. It is only a twenty-minute drive.”
I did not touch the paper on the table. My left ring finger felt dry, and I rubbed the spot where the gold band sat.
“I am not ready for Greenfield, Denise,” I said, pausing slightly after the words.
“She does individual sessions too,” Denise said, leaning forward to clasp her mug with both hands. “Just to talk. Without the pressure of a circle.”
I picked up the pamphlet and looked at the bold black letters on the cover: *Pathways Through Prolonged Grief*. A telephone number with a local area code was written across the bottom in blue ink.
“Rick thinks we should clear out her closet this weekend,” I said, looking past Denise toward the hallway.
“Maybe Rick is trying to find his own way through,” Denise whispered.
I set the pamphlet back down, lining it up with the edge of the coaster.
The scent of toasted cinnamon bread filled the kitchen later that afternoon, though neither of us had touched the plate on the counter. Rick stood by the mantelpiece in the adjoining dining room, his work boots leaving dusty tracks on the small rug. He had a cardboard grocery box between his feet.
