Chapter 93: The Father's Betrayal, Part 5, Twenty-Six Years Ago, Tourists

KLEMPNER

"Ready to go?"

Mitch smiles happily. "Absolutely."

I offer her my arm, and after a moment's hesitation, she takes it, leaning into me as we walk together. "Where are we going?"

"Just for a stroll, I thought. See what's to be seen. That okay for you?"

She tightens her grip on my arm. "Ah-ha."

The day is crystalline with cold, the sun dazzling on the snow. The sky is clear, untouched by any trace of cloud, the only blemish being high above where aircraft draw white rafters across the blue.

A two-minute walk brings us the shore, or what would be the shore were it not that the sea-edge has moved several miles outward with the winter ice.

As I step out, she hangs back. "On the ice? Is it safe?"

"It's a foot thick and more this time of year. It's perfectly safe." I point out to the distance to where, half a mile out, a lone figure sits.

She scrunches up her eyes, trying to make out the figure against the dazzle. "What's he doing?"

"Fishing."