Lindquist shrugs. “It seemed like the logical thing to do at the time. And we were happy. George took care of all the details and salesmanship I hated. He was considerate and faithful. You might say he was the ideal partner for me.”

I climb from my chair—not altogether steady, you understand, on account of the bourbon—and walk right up to her. “You know something? I don’t believe you. I don’t believe for one moment you were in love with Morrow.”

Lindquist glances at her watch. “I’m going to put the children to bed now. We’ll discuss all this in the morning.”

She starts up the stairs in smooth, elastic movements. Even for dinner, she doesn’t wear dresses, just these long, flowing, wide-legged trousers made of silk or sometimes crepe de Chine, set off by some delicate blouse or another. She’s got style, Irene Lindquist, even if she pretends to be above such things.

I call up after her. “One more thing?”

She sighs and turns, one hand on the railing.

“Was it true? Did the daughter find her like that?”

Lindquist stares at her hand. The lamplight slants across the scar that blooms from underneath her blouse and over her neck.

“Yes,” she says softly. “Poor thing. They say she was hysterical.”

“How awful. How awful for her.”

Lindquist turns and continues up the stairs. “It was awful for everybody,” she calls down behind her.

Sometimes I think about what might have happened if some German antiaircraft gun hadn’t got the better of Velázquez in the winter of 1945. The war was nearly over, after all, and he might well have survived those last few months of it.

By May, I was in the Obersalzberg, photographing the advance to Hitler’s mountain retreat. Velázquez was right about one thing; I had not been faithful, either to him or to his memory. Even before his death, I had picked up a lover or two, as the occasion presented itself. I had also struck up a friendship with a certain American general—four stars and married, another breach of the rules, but this fellow was an incorrigible philanderer so I felt I was not corrupting anybody, and anyway the wife had made her bargain long ago. This energetic and purely physical affair proved fruitful for my career. No longer was I given stupid assignments to photograph the revival of the Paris fashion houses in the wake of liberation; here I was on top of the world, the very front lines of the front lines as American troops liberated all the wine in Hitler’s cellar, to say nothing of the silver. I don’t know, maybe you’ve seen a few of those snaps yourself. One of them won the Pulitzer a year back.

Anyway, as I said, I was in the mountains of southern Germany when news of victory reached me. The Fascists had been defeated at last! Japan remained, of course, but everybody knew that was only a matter of time and blood. I took some dutiful shots of the jubilation among the GIs, and then I requisitioned a Jeep and drove into Berchtesgaden and drank myself senseless on the cheap local liquor.

By the end of the evening, I was addressing the empty bottle, which had become Velázquez in my mind. I told him I was awfully sorry about the general and the UPI reporter after Dachau and that sweet, virile, ecstatic GI from St. Louis in the back hallway of the tavern just now, and I assured him that he, Velázquez, had been a better lover than all three of them together (although that idea was also tempting). I said we’ve done it, we’ve beat the Fascists, we’ve got your revenge on Hitler for Guernica and Madrid and your parents and your sister and the girl you should have married. You would feel so vindicated! You would maybe wrangle a pass in the next month or so and come to visit me, and we would not leave our room for two days, and maybe, in the joy of that moment, victory and reunion and postcoital gratitude, when you sometimes confuse the intense, satisfied lust you’re feeling for true love, I might have made the mistake of saying yes, yes, I will marry you, Velázquez, I will become your wife and have your children and live a quiet little life with you in some quiet little house in some quiet little village in the country. I would have promised you this and maybe I would have done it too. Or maybe not. We’ll never know for certain.

I don’t remember how I spent that night. In disrepute, probably. In the morning, I drove the Jeep back to the quartermaster and went on with my work, because what else can you do? You cannot call back those you have lost, however much your bones ache with missing them, however giant and mysterious the holes they leave behind.

Lindquist disappears around the corner at the top of the stairs, to put her children to bed for the three thousandth time or so. The voices and thumps drift downward, Leo and his little siblings, joined by Lindquist. I head for the library and Olle’s liquor cabinet to add another splash of bourbon to the dregs of my cocoa. When I’m on the outside of that, I help Lani clean up in the kitchen, and at last I step outside, where the air is dark and fresh and smells of blossoms. I think how lovely it is to smell blossoms in October. They mingle with the bourbon fumes to produce something new and alluring that I believe I shall always associate with Hawai’i and Coolibah, after I’ve left this place and moved on to the next.

I haven’t taken more than five steps across the lawn before somebody calls my name. I consider pretending I don’t hear, but then I find myself craving some company. So I stop and turn.

“O captain, my captain. What brings you outside on a night like this?”

“Do you have a moment?”

“I’ve got a whole lifetime of moments. The question’s whether I should spend any more of them with you.”

He smiles through the darkness. “Would you? Please?”

“I should warn you,” I say, wagging my finger, “I’m a little the worse for bourbon.”

“I guess I’ve handled a drunk or two in my time. Come along. Find somewhere to sit down.”

“I think that would be wise.”

He laughs in reply and starts walking in the direction of the sea. He doesn’t touch me, doesn’t seek my hand or my arm or anything. The moon has risen, three quarters of a clean white pie, just enough light to see by. By and by we come to some kind of gazebo, all by itself, surrounded by nothing but bushes bursting with flowers. You can’t tell what color they are because it’s too dark, but you can see their petals reflect the moonlight, and you can smell their perfume. I follow Leo up the steps into the shelter of the gazebo and lie down on a bench. He sits nearby, gripping the edge with his hands, and stares at me.

“I just wanted to apologize,” he says.

“You brought me all the way over here to say sorry?”

“Wanted some neutral territory, I guess, in case you were going to throw something at me. I was kind of a bozo the other night.”

“You had a stepmother to defend. I admired you for it, I really did. No hard feelings, as someone once said to me.”

“All right, I was sore. I admit it. I thought you liked me.”

“Oh, I do like you, Leo. I like you very much. I am deeply, deeply attracted to you. That tip you gave me was just the icing on an awfully delicious cake.”

“I see,” he says, husky.

“It’s funny, you’re not a bit like him, though.”

“Like who?”

“Like this fellow I knew during the war. Velázquez. He was gruff and short and hairy and plain, and I can’t ever seem to stop thinking about him.”

“Where is he now?”

“He’s dead, Leo. He died in the winter of ’45, in a bombing raid over Cologne.”

“I’m sorry.”

“So am I.” I raise my head. “Have you said everything you wanted? Because I’d like to go to bed now.”

He rises and helps me to my feet. I keep hold of his hand, because we’re friends again. We walk to the cottage through the flowery air. The moon glows above us. When we reach the door, I stop and turn to face him, and the air just expires from my lungs. Having watched his face all evening, contorted into all kinds of expressions, I’ve forgotten how simply alluring he is, how alluringly simple.

“Tell me something. How did your father meet your stepmother?”

“It was the airline. She advertised for pilots, and he’d done a little crop-dusting, so he applied. She trained all the pilots herself.”

“And nobody knew who she was?”

“You have to understand, we don’t care much about the outside world around Hanalei.”

I nod. “That’s why she landed here.”

“I guess so. I think she hated all the fuss.”

“And how did you feel? Getting a new mother after all those years? And then your brother and sister coming along.”

I observe him carefully. I am not so drunk that I can’t pay attention. I note his hesitation, the brief furrow of his brow as he gives his answer some thought.

“I was just happy for Dad,” he says. “And I was happy for her. For Irene. I thought she’d had a rough time, and now she had someone to take care of her, for a change.”

“Everyone needs that, I guess.”

“Everyone but you. Isn’t that right, Janey?”

I put my hand on the doorknob. “Good night, Leo. Pleasant dreams.”