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Not unexpectedly, Macy wasn’t pleased to hear Sabine Drew’s name mentioned.

“That woman is a fraud,” she said. “I don’t even want to begin calculating the number of hours wasted on her wild-goose chase for a child who was already dead while we were searching woodland halfway across the state.”

“Is that what bothers you,” I said, “the wasted hours?”

“You know damn well it isn’t. Drew gave false hope to Edie Brook’s parents, all for her own self-aggrandizement, but she wasn’t the one who had to tell them that their daughter’s remains had been found in the Scarborough marshes, half-eaten by crabs. We had to do that.”

“Drew told me she tried to speak with the parents, but they didn’t want to see her.”

“Do you blame them?”

“Not in the slightest.”

Macy gave me the full force of her glare.

“I’m waiting for the ‘but,’?” she said.

“But I’m not sure I blame Sabine either. She was acting in good faith. I think she really believed she heard Edie calling to her.”

“I’m sorry, but her delusions don’t excuse the harm she did. She was a sad spinster who discovered how to become the focus of favorable attention and liked it.”

“She admitted in my presence to overconfidence,” I said. “She’s also convinced that something deliberately misdirected her during the search for Edie.”

“Something?”

“Something that liked children and didn’t want her interfering.”

“Did you eat or drink anything in her company?” asked Macy. “Because I think she may have spiked you. Listen to what you’re saying.”

I realized that I’d barely touched my wine. It tasted too sharp, but it was not the fault of the pour. Maybe I needed to be tested for COVID; that, or the poison of the Clark case was seeping into every aspect of my life.

“I know what I’m saying,” I replied. “There are only three or four people in the world with whom I’d be willing to share this, because I’m aware of how it sounds. You’re one of them, because you were on Sanctuary. You fought for your life on that island, and not just against Moloch and his people.”

At the turn of this century, an escaped criminal named Edward Moloch had led a band of mercenaries onto Dutch Island, at the eastern edge of Casco Bay, to hunt down his ex-wife and recover the money she had stolen from him. Dutch Island was better known as Sanctuary, because at one time a group of early settlers had retreated there to escape the depredations of the native population. The plan didn’t work, leading to their slaughter. Three centuries later, Moloch’s assault on the island represented an uncanny repetition of history, one that had again ended in bloodshed. Macy had been a rookie patrol officer, assigned to Sanctuary to assist its resident policeman, Joe Dupree. She’d been blooded on the island, and also exposed to the peculiarity of the place. There had long been stories about Sanctuary and what might haunt it. In the end, Moloch and his killers were made privy to the truth of them. So, too, was Sharon Macy. Maine was old terrain with a long memory, a recollection that preceded even the arrival of men. Strangeness was endemic to it. It was why Stephen King couldn’t have come from anywhere else.

“I should never have told you about that night,” she said.

“Some of it I already knew.”

“I’m not even sure about what happened on the island anymore. By now, I’m convinced I imagined more than I ever saw.”

“Have you ever returned?”

Macy actually shivered.

“Not since the last of the funerals.”

“Well, there you are.”

Her face softened.

“I’ve never discussed it with anyone who wasn’t there, except for you, and you never once doubted me. I’d have known. I’d have seen it in your eyes, no matter what you might have said to the contrary.”

“No, I never had any doubts.”

“Because you’ve seen things, too.”

“And I wasn’t lying about those either.”

“The only difference is you’ve never shared with me what it is that you’ve seen, or what you still see.”

Oh, Macy: I was either dating absolutely the wrong person or absolutely the right one. I wasn’t sure what I wanted. I think I wanted to walk away, but if I did, that would be the end for us. I cared for her. I was tired of being alone. And so, as with Sabine Drew at the Great Lost Bear, I found myself forced to reveal more of myself than I might have wished.

“I see my dead daughter.”

SEATED BY A LAKESHORE,seemingly somnolent, a dead child opened her eyes. Before her, the ranks of the dead immersed themselves in dark waters, to be lost from sight in the Great Sea. Jennifer Parker listened to her father’s words. Her eyes went black.

“No,” she said.