A hull stove in on one side did not sit easily with a simple swamping, and there had been quiet talk, never resolved, of the boat striking something, or being struck.

At the time it was folded into the general theory and forgotten.

Only years later, knowing what I knew, did I let myself wonder what a small boat does in a sudden violent squall when it has turned back and lingered in open water to pull two people out of the waves — and I made myself stop wondering, because some images a mother cannot carry and still get up in the morning.

I was not there when they found it.