himself, half behind Edward on the porch, habitually phobic of open spaces. Alan took his hand and then embraced him. He smelled of Edward’s clammy guts and of sweat.

“Are you two hungry?” Alan asked.

Edward grimaced. “Of course we’re hungry, but without George there’s nothing we can do about it, is there?”

Alan shook his head. “How long has he been gone?”

“Three weeks,” Edward whispered. “I’m so hungry, Alan.”

“How did it happen?”

Frederick wobbled on his feet, then leaned heavily on Edward. “I need to sit down,” he said.

Alan fumbled for his keys and let them into the house, where they settled into the corners of his old overstuffed horsehide sofa. He dialed up the wall sconces to a dim, homey lighting, solicitous of Frederick’s sensitive eyes. He took an Apollo 8 Jim Beam decanter full of stunning Irish whiskey off the sideboard and poured himself a finger of it, not offering any to his brothers.

“Now, how did it happen?”

“He wanted to speak to Dad,” Frederick said. “He climbed out of me and wandered down through the tunnels into the spring pool. The goblin told us that he took off his clothes and waded in and started whispering.” Like most of the boys, George had believed that their father was most aware in his very middle, where he could direct the echoes of the water’s rippling, shape them into words and phrases in the hollow of the great cavern.

“So the goblin saw it happen?”

“No,” Frederick said, and Edward began to cry again. “No. George asked him for some privacy, and so he went a little way up the tunnel. He waited and waited, but George didn’t come back. He called out, but George didn’t answer. When he went to look for him, he was gone. His clothes were gone. All that he could find was this.” He scrabbled to fit his chubby hand into his jacket’s pocket, then fished out a little black pebble. Alan took it and saw that it wasn’t a pebble, it was a rotted-out and dried-up fingertip, pierced with unbent paperclip wire.

“It’s Dave’s, isn’t it?” Edward said.

“I think so,” Alan said. Dave used to spend hours wiring his dropped-off parts back onto his body, gluing his teeth back into his head. “Jesus.”

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