She moved the wooden board until the carved letters sat level against the gray cedar siding.

“Is that straight now?” she asked.

“That’s just right,” I said.

She set the first brass nail in the top corner and drove it in with three careful blows.

The sound of the hammer rang out clean across the open water.

She put the second nail in the opposite corner and tapped it flush with the wood.

“It looks like it was always supposed to be there,” Sophie said, stepping down off the low stool.

I went up to the doorway and ran my fingers along the raised grain of the pine.