“I was to deliver the letter after the f/u/neral, give you the key, and accompany you to the cabin if you wished.”
“And if I don’t go?”
“Then I’m required to wait.”
“For how long?”
“As long as necessary.”
Something in his answer made me study him more closely. He was perhaps sixty, with silver hair, an immaculate charcoal suit, and tired eyes that suggested he had carried other people’s secrets for too many years.
“What is your name?”
“Daniel Mercer.”
“Were you Carl’s friend?”
A shadow crossed his face.
“For thirty-two years.”
The number struck me.
“You knew him before he knew me?”
“Yes.”
“Then you know what’s in the chest.”
Daniel looked toward the envelope in my hand.
“I know part of it.”
“And the rest?”
“Only Carl knew.”
I wanted to demand answers. I wanted to shout that Carl had no right to turn my life into a trail of clues after his d/e/@/th. Yet beneath the anger was something else—a desperate need to understand.
