—
On Thursday, everything changed, or at least just slightly, in the evening; Clay sat with him voluntarily.
It was in the lounge room, and Michael said nothing, he just gave him a careful glance, and Clay on the floor, near the window. At first he’d been reading the last of her books—the generous Claudia Kirkby—but now he was onto a bridge almanac; the one he had read most often. The title wasn’t too inspired, but the book itself he loved. The Greatest Bridges of Them All.
For a while it was hard to concentrate, but after a good half hour, the first smile came to his face, when he saw his favorite bridge.
Le Pont du Gard.
Great wasn’t a great enough word to explain that bridge, which also served as an aqueduct.
Built by the Romans.
Or the devil, if you believed it.
As he looked at its arches—the half dozen huge ones at the bottom, eleven on its midlevel, and thirty-five across the top—he smiled, then felt it broaden.
When he caught himself, he check
ed.
Close one.
The Murderer nearly saw.
* * *
—
On Sunday evening, Michael found Clay in the riverbed, where the road, each side, was cut off. He stood a way back and spoke. “I have to go, for ten days.”
He did have a job.
In the mines.
Another six hours west, out past the old town, Featherton.
As he spoke, the setting sun looked lazy at first, far away. Trees were in lengthening shade.
“You can either go home for those ten days, or you can stay.”
Clay stood and faced the horizon.
The sky now hard-fought, leaking blood.
“Clay?”
The boy turned and gave him his first inkling of camaraderie then, or a piece of himself; he told a truth. “I can’t go home.” It was still far too early to attempt it. “I can’t go back—not yet.”
Michael’s reaction was to pull something from his pocket.
It was a real estate pamphlet, with photos of the land, the house, and a bridge. “Go on,” he said. “Take a look.”
The bridge had been a handsome one. A simple trestle, of railway sleepers and wooden beams, once spanning the space they were standing in.
“It was here?”
He nodded. “What do you think of it?”