Sam said good bye to Madeline early the next morning, feeling he’d made a good friend and assuring her he’d keep her informed about his search for Sarah. John flew him to Regina, and helped him find his way to the Air Canada desk.

On the flight home, Sam debated whether or not to tell his children what he’d learned from Madeline. He decided not to, because he didn’t know how. Or, to be more exact, he didn’t know how to tell them in a way that wouldn’t create the same furor as the last time they’d talked. It would be enough just letting them know he was buying an old home in western Massachusetts and moving there as soon as possible. During the stopover in Chicago, he called Russ, telling him he was on his way home.

It was nine-ten when he pulled into his driveway, half an hour later than he’d told Russ. Dorothy Schraft’s car was parked in front of his house.

“Ah! Mr. Langley. I’ve been waiting for you. We’ve got a contract.”

“Hello Dorothy. Hi Russ. I’ll be with you in a minute.” He dropped his bag in the bedroom, went to the bathroom, then dragged himself into the living room. He was exhausted. Sighing, he asked her to tell him about the offer.

“The good news is, their offer is only two thousand below the asking price and they want to settle within thirty days. The bad news is, it’s contingent on a new roof and repairing the driveway.” Sam didn’t want to hear that. He just wanted to sell the house and be done with it. He turned to his son.

“How much are we talking about, Russ?”

“I’d say about four thousand. Six tops.”

Sam then asked Dorothy, “What do you think?”

“The market’s dropped off some. I’d take it, unless you want to wait longer. Other offers will come, but they may not be any better than this one.”

“Okay.” Sam said, “Where do I sign?” She laid out the contract and gave him her pen.

Thrilled, Dorothy said, “I’ll be by tomorrow. There’re two new condos on the market. We’ve got to find you a home.”

“No thanks,” Sam said. “I’ve already found a place and it’s not in Marblehead.”

“Oh, but I thought . .” Dorothy said, crestfallen.

“Sorry, Dorothy. Just make sure this sale goes through.”

She stammered a few more times, then picked up the contract and left.

Russ shut the door behind her and flopped down in a chair facing his dad. “Thank God it’s sold,” he said. “Now I don’t have to keep it straightened up.” Sam had brought his feet up onto the sofa and was stretched out with his eyes closed. “So you decided on Beverly Arms,” Russ said.

Sam’s eye popped open. “That’s not the only place in world.” He closed them again. “I’m buying a house in western Massachusetts, if the one I want is still on the market.”

“Hey, great,” Russ said. Sam opened his eyes again and looked at his son. What’s come over this guy? he wondered. He’s actually a pleasure to have around. His son asked, “Can I see it?”

“Sure, sometime. But tomorrow I’m going to visit Annie and rest up from my trip.”

“Are you going to buy the house?”

“I’m going to try,” Sam said.

“Then I think I’d better go with you. I know house construction and I know what problems to look for. Might even save you some money.” Sam knew Russ was right, but he’d pictured being alone with Annie, telling her what he’d discovered. His son went on, “Tomorrow morning I’ll call some of the contractors I know and get estimates for the roof and the driveway. Then we can take off.”

Sam thought about the age of the house he wanted to buy, almost two hundred years old. If he had physical ailments at seventy, the house must have them too. “Okay,” he said, “but take your truck so you can come home. I’m staying on.”

“Good decision,” Russ said confidently, “and I’ll take Jimmy, too. We’re due to have a whole day together.”

Sam’s first reaction was to say no, as he used to do when his children were young and asked for something. Then he remembered how much fun he’d had with Jimmy at Annie’s house. “Well, all right,” he said. “He can come too.”

But Russ wasn’t done. “You know Dad, Kathleen and Cynthia will really be pissed if you cut them out of the decision.”

“Dammit!” Sam exclaimed, sitting up from the sofa. “The decision’s mine. If I want to buy that house, I’m buying it.”

Russ, taken aback, said, “I didn’t mean it wasn’t your decision. I just thought you’d appreciate their ideas.”

“I already know Cynthia’s ideas. She’ll do everything she can to squelch the deal.”

“Well don’t ask her then. We’ll just ask Kathleen.”

Sam was at the end of his rope. He was dead tired and wanted to end the conversation. “All right,” he moaned, “I’ll ask her and I’ll bet you ten dollars she won’t come.”

“Ten dollars?” Russ said smiling. “You’re on.”

When Kathleen arrived at the house, Russ looked at his dad and rubbed his thumb over the fingers of his right hand. Sam shrugged and took out his wallet. Kathleen got into Sam’s car and they followed Russ and Jimmy in the truck toward 128. Before long, the pickup was out of sight.

Kathleen sat as far as she could from her father and didn’t utter a word. As a child she’d occasionally mope about the house waiting for her parents to ask what’s wrong. When one of them did, she’d snap, “Whadayou care?” Sam wasn’t about to fall for that, so he let her stew. Forty minutes later, as they were turning onto the Mass Pike, Kathleen said abruptly, “I suppose you know why I came.”

“Well, I hoped you wanted to meet Annie and look at the house I’m thinking of buying.”

“You’re half right,” she said. “I want to meet Annie and I want to see the house, but only because I want to make sure you don’t do some damn fool thing you’ll regret later.”

Sam’s anger flared. “That’s great. Today ought to be a lot of fun.”

“I didn’t come to have fun,” she said, then withdrew behind a wall of silence.

How did I get into this? Sam asked himself. Why’d I let them come. Russ’s all right, but Kathleen — Jesus, I don’t know what’s got into her.

“I knew Russ’d be no help,” she said as if reading his mind. “He even sounded excited that you were buying an old house.” Sam stared straight ahead, too annoyed to respond. Then she turned and faced him. “I don’t get it, Dad. If you think Mom’s still alive, why are you buying a house and marrying this Annie woman? Or are you just going to live together?”

Her statement was so preposterous Sam laughed.

“Well, are you?” she repeated.

“As I’ve said a hundred times before, Annie’s a good friend. Wait till you meet her. You’ll see.” He glanced over at his daughter. She wasn’t buying it so he went on. “I’m getting the house for me. Annie’s not going to live with me and we’re not getting married.” He waited for a response. When none came, he said, “I’m buying it because I want to start over, leave behind the same old problems, the same old views out the same old windows, the same old streets.”

“The same old children?” Kathleen asked sarcastically.

“Yeah. I’m tired of Cynthia hovering over me. I’m tired of Russ hanging on to me like a kid.”

“And what about me? What am I doing to make your life miserable?”

“Well right now, you’re bugging the hell outta me. You got a certain picture of me and you’re mad ‘cause I’m changing it.”

She huffed as if he were a hopeless case, and turned away. A minute later she said, “Look, this isn’t getting us anywhere.” Her reasonableness made Sam feel even more contrary. “You’re seventy. You’re too old for a mid-life crisis. Selling a house at age seventy and moving to God-knows-where is ludicrous.”

“Just watch me,” he blurted and then felt sorry for having said it. But he was damned if he was going to take it back.

“Shit!” she moaned, and wrapping herself in her arms, slouched into the seat.

Twenty miles later they had calmed down. Kathleen slowly unwrapped herself, sat up and looked out the window. As they passed the exit for Worcester, she said, “I talked to Naomi last night.”

Sam accepted her implied offer to make up. “How did it go?”

“Not good. I never should’ve called her.” Sam waited for her to go on. “I’ve got this offer to head up a project.” Had she changed the subject, Sam wondered, or was this still a part of her call to Naomi? “We won the contract to monitor the cleanup of Rapid River. I’ll be in charge.”

“Congratulations!”

“Yeah!” she said, unable to restrain a slight smile. “It’s a promotion. I’ll be a Project Manager. I even get a raise.”

“Rapid River?” He knew the name but couldn’t place it. “Where is it?”

“It runs through the Berkshires. National Trans — they make transformers — dumped PCBs in it for over forty years until PCBs were outlawed in the seventies. Now they’ve got to clean it up.”

“And you’ll make sure they do?”

“Not really. I monitor what they do, but I don’t make them do it. That’s up to the EPA. I start next month. I’ll have to get a place in Pittsfield.”

“That’s further west than the house I’m looking at. Will you keep your apartment in Marblehead?”

“Can’t. This job could last five years. I’ll have to move.”

Sam decided to take a chance. “Is that why you called Naomi, to tell her about your promotion?”

Kathleen didn’t answer right away. When she did her voice was sad. “Yeah. I told her I was moving away from Marblehead, away from family. At first she sounded interested. She said we should get together and talk. Then she asked where I’d be moving. I told her Pittsfield.”

When she didn’t go on, Sam said, “And?”

“She just laughed. ‘Have a good time,’ she said.”

Sam looked over at his daughter. “I’m sorry.”

Kathleen sighed. “I asked myself if the promotion was worth it?” She glanced at her dad. “I could make a lateral move to the Boston Harbor Project — we got that contract too.” Sam caught her eye for a moment, but said nothing. “I thought about it for maybe two seconds, and decided I’ve made too damned many lateral moves to accommodate others. Anyway, Rapid River’s a certainty. Naomi’s not.”

Without taking his eyes off the road, Sam said, “I’m proud of you, Kathleen.”

She glanced his way. “So am I,” she replied, smiling.

They were quiet for several minutes. She fiddled with the radio until she found an Amherst station playing Brahms's Violin Concerto. They exited off the Mass Pike at Interstate 91 and turned north. At one point the trees parted, affording them a panoramic view of the Connecticut River Valley. Church steeples, marking numerous villages, rose out of the trees. Meadows recently cut for hay were green as golf courses. Further on, near Northampton, Mt. Tom stood like a mighty citadel with cell phone towers instead of flags. As they neared Deerfield they left the interstate, taking a series of smaller and smaller roads. In his excitement to see Annie, Sam hadn’t noticed his daughter growing tense.

“This was a bad idea,” she said. “I shouldn’t have come.”

Surprised, Sam reassured her. “It’s okay. You’ll see.”

A mailbox with HAAS written on it marked the entrance to her house. Turning onto a dirt lane that led first through a grove of trees and then across an open field, they stopped at the garden next to the dog’s play yard.

“Russ’s not here yet,” Sam said. “Hope he didn’t get lost.”

Kathleen, sitting low in the seat, surveyed the scene through the bottom of the windshield. In the middle of the dog yard stood Annie waving to them with a pooper-scooper. The tail of her blue work shirt hung out over her jeans and a bandana kept her hair from her face. She was surrounded by six puppies and Molly and Maggie. When Sam got out the two big dogs barked basso profundo hellos and ran to the gate. The puppies, delighted with whatever it was that was happening, tumbled, hopped and raced after them. Sam hurried toward the gate while Kathleen got out and stood by the car.

“You’re just in time to pick up dog poop,” Annie announced. “Careful opening the gate. They’ll get past you in a second.”

Sam lifted the latch and squeezed through an opening no larger than his own body. Once inside, he was besieged by dancing balls of black fur from which needle sharp teeth tried to catch hold of his pant legs and tug him down to the ground. The big dogs arrived rumbling parental growls that scattered the puppies. Molly pushed at his legs with her huge head while Maggie stood on her hind legs, putting her front paws on his shoulders. Annie leaned over them and kissed Sam’s cheek. He could feel his daughter’s eyes on him as he returned the kiss.

He called to Kathleen who remained by the side of the car. “Come’ere. I want you to meet Annie.” As she started toward the gate Russ’s pickup, in a swirl of dust, charged down the lane. The instant he stopped, Jimmy was out the door and running to the gate. Annie opened it for him and quickly shut it again. The boy knelt and was engulfed in puppies.

“Watch their teeth,” Annie warned. “They love to grab onto things and pull, and that includes fingers.” Jimmy, laughing, was on his back with puppies crawling over him.

Russ joined his sister at the gate but didn’t attempt to open it. Sam called to his son over the hubbub of the dogs’ greetings. “Did you get lost?”

“Nope. Good directions,” he answered. “We stopped once for gas and a snack.”

“Annie,” Sam said, “meet Kathleen and Russ.”

“Hi!” Annie said. They waved back and said hello. “I’ll herd this crew into their kennel so you won’t get eaten alive.”

“I don’t mind,” Kathleen said, and slipped through the gate to join Jimmy on the ground with the puppies. Russ followed, closing the gate behind him.

“Help me Sam,” Annie said. “We’ll put them in there.” She pointed at a chain link fenced area next to a shed. “Jimmy, you can help too.” The boy stood and backing toward the kennel, lured the puppies with a toy bone. “He’s a natural,” Annie said. “Oughta be a dog trainer.”

One puppy, smaller than the rest, sat watching her brothers and sisters frolic toward the pen. Kathleen picked her up and cradled her in her arms. Snuggling her face into the puppies soft fur, she carried her to the pen.

Chapter Twenty-Two