He was gone from the house for the rest of that day.

He returned late that night, and he did not return alone.

Dr.

Wallace came with him, and the two of them shut themselves inside the private office and stayed there, talking in low voices, for nearly two full hours.

The moment they finally left, I climbed the stairs to Raymond’s room and told him everything I had seen and heard, every word of it, and I watched him listen with a growing, focused intensity, as though each detail I gave him were confirming something he had already begun to suspect.

I did not understand, that night, why the news of the frantic lab result and the late secret meeting lit such a fierce and focused light in Raymond’s eyes.