spot where South Main and Cedar met the Blue. At its heart was a war memorial initially built for the Green Mountain Boys who died in the Revolutionary War. It was an obelisk whose stone was updated too often for comfort, most recently to mark the death of a local Marine in Afghanistan. I hadn’t known him; he left town before I arrived. That made it easier for me to focus on the river birch, which was finally—exciting!—looking more alive at the obelisk’s shoulder. Maybe it was my imagination, born of a need for spring, but the curl of its bark was looser, the tiny buds on its branches fuller, and while it would be a while yet before leaves appeared, these signs said they would. There were times in the dead of winter when that was in doubt.
Ah, and there was Officer Gill, parked as always in his black-and-white SUV at the spot where the three roads met. When I first came to town, I was convinced my probation officer had sent him to monitor me. In time, I realized he was watching everyone. Well, not always watching. He was usually playing Solitaire on his phone, but he didn’t need his eyes to know who was out and about. For Officer Gill, it was all about sound. Keeping a window cracked, he listened. He could recognize the locals by ear. Once he had come to know the sound of my truck, he raised a hand in greeting without bothering to look.
In hindsight, perhaps he should have. Perhaps he should have wondered about those people in parkas and jeans who were wandering a little too casually around town with neither partners nor kids. Officer Gill knew that someone was hacking into school computers. The whole department did. But they had no clue how far the problem had spread until an hour before the Feds went public with it—though, in fairness, those agents walking our streets made no sounds that Officer Gill would hear.
Should I have noticed them? For all my usual vigilance, either I was too focused that morning on transitioning from clay to makeup, or I had grown complacent, in which case I was as guilty as Officer Gill. Not that either of us could have done anything had we known. When it came to the media, we were powerless.
I rolled to a stop at the crosswalk, mirrored his wave, and drove on. Once the stores fell behind, houses were increasingly spread out. They were large homes, a mix of Colonials and Federals owned by people who had either lived here forever or more recently moved up from the city with money to spare. These houses didn’t go cheap. They were set deeply back on large front lawns whose landscaping ranged from a few aged trees to the designs of a high-end landscaper. All was tasteful, even understated. And while those of us in town knew who owned what, tourists wouldn’t recognize names even if they had been printed on mailboxes, which they were not. Celebrities didn’t live on the main drag. Actors, financiers, retired politicians, bestselling authors—we had our share, but those with big names avoided the spotlight. Drawn to Devon for its promise of anonymity, they lived for the most part in smaller homes on the country roads that undulated through forest tracts.
There. Ahhhhh. I could smell the Spa. It was in my mind, of course; I was still a quarter mile from the entrance, but thoughts of lemon verbena were triggered simply by the road sign announcing the turnoff ahead. It was a calming scent. From my first visit, my first interview, I knew I had to work here. The smell wrapped me in the kind of comfort I desperately needed.
The road curved, and broad stone pillars appeared on the right. Beside them, elegant in its simplicity, was THE DEVON INN AND SPA, carved into Vermont granite and edged in the same gold as the signs in town had been. This sign was larger and had a quiet dignity to it. This one had come first.
Turning in, I had barely passed under the covered bridge that crossed the river when the Inn took shape through the trees. Clad in stone, it sprawled over the hillside, defying the river much as it had when built in the late 1800s by a New York financier. It had been a grand summer home then, and while later owners tweaked its size and shape, the original stone structure had been