CHAPTER TEN N: THE MISSING EVENING
Daniel met Nora outside the diner after her shift with an apology already prepared.
He said that he had discovered a gap in his father’s account of the day Walter disappeared.
Nora asked whether Walter was safe.
Daniel assured her that he was at home with a visiting nurse.
He explained that Walter had left the medical appointment on Wednesday morning, but the diner visit had occurred on Friday.
The family had assumed he spent the intervening nights walking the harbor.
A pharmacist had now remembered seeing him at a small guesthouse on Thursday.
Daniel had visited the guesthouse and learned that Walter had paid for two nights.
Nora wondered why the information troubled him.
Daniel said that his father had deliberately concealed the stay.
He feared that Walter had been meeting someone connected to the redevelopment company.
Nora asked whether he had confronted Walter.
Daniel admitted that he had not.
He had come to Nora because his father listened to her when he ignored his own family.
Nora stopped walking.
She told Daniel that she would not become a convenient substitute for an uncomfortable conversation between father and son.
Daniel flushed and apologized again.
He said that he had spent years managing Walter’s health, finances, and public reputation.
He had begun treating every unexplained choice as a problem he needed to solve before anyone else noticed.
Nora asked what Walter had actually said about the missing days.
Daniel answered that he had said he needed to remember something in peace.
Nora suggested that Daniel ask him what peace meant rather than assume it concealed a conspiracy.
The following afternoon, Daniel called to say that he had spoken with Walter.
Walter had gone to the guesthouse because the harbor room at home was filled with photographs of the old theater.
He could not think there without seeing faces of people he believed he had failed.
At the guesthouse, he had tried to write an apology to Peter.
He had torn up several drafts and finally left without delivering one.
Daniel said that his father had shown him the remaining pages.
Nora asked whether Walter had invited Daniel to read them.
Daniel said that he had.
The pages contained no dramatic confession or hidden bargain.
They contained awkward sentences from a proud man struggling to admit that he had protected his own authority when he should have listened to a technician.
Daniel had asked why Walter never sent the apology.
Walter said that a letter might make him feel better without doing anything useful for Peter.
Nora told Daniel that his father had at least recognized the danger of asking an injured man to comfort him.
Daniel said that Walter had decided to speak plainly at the hearing instead.
He sounded frightened by the prospect.
Nora reminded him that fear did not mean a decision was wrong.
