My father tapped the edge of his fork against the plate, three neat beats that matched the loud tick of the kitchen clock. The toast on his side of the table had gone cold, the butter sitting in yellow patches on the dry crust. He had not taken a single bite of his eggs.
“I had it on the counter by the bread box on Friday night,” he said. His voice had the formal, hesitant cadence he used when he was trying to hide a tremor in his chin.
He was looking for his blue ledger, the one with the stiff cardboard cover where he recorded every check he wrote. It was not in the cupboard with the spices or behind the metal toaster.
“We will find it, Dad,” I said.
I reached for my coffee. The two-dollar mug was chipped at the rim, a tiny white scar on the dark blue stoneware. My father adjusted his glasses, sliding them down his nose to polish the lenses with the hem of his plaid shirt. On his left hand, the silver wedding ring hung loose against his knuckle, worn thin from forty years of marriage.
“Your brother was here on Saturday morning,” he said. He did not look up from his empty plate. “He helped me carry the empty boxes to the garage.”
I rubbed my thumb against my index finger, tracing the small ridge of skin. Julian had not mentioned going to the house when we spoke on Friday.
“Did he go near the desk?” I asked.
“He was only in the kitchen and the hallway,” my father said. “He wanted to check the pipes under the sink.”
The drawer of the telephone table was open an inch. Inside, the vinyl folder that held three years of bank statements sat crookedly on top of the old phone books. I had spent the previous evening looking at the property tax assessment of ninety-eight thousand dollars, wondering how the county had arrived at that number for a two-bedroom bungalow with a cracked driveway.
My father set his glasses back on his nose, the metal frames slightly crooked. He looked at the empty counter by the bread box again.
