July 27, 1932, around 400 p.m.

Someone was running inside Morning House. That wasn't something that often happened. Running. Knocking.

Benjamin opened his eyes to find his sister Unity standing over him, shaking him awake.

"No one can find Max," she said. "We have to go look for him."

It took Benjamin a moment to get his thoughts together. Why had he been sleeping? And for how long?

"Huh?"

"Max," she repeated. "Is gone. We need to help find him."

Benjamin had no desire to move. His body weighed so much. His limbs were bags of sand. But he was a Ralston, and he could force himself to move, to get to the business at hand, no matter how confused and tired he was.

"We should look in the playhouse," Unity said. "He's always curious about it."

Benjamin nodded, though he was still not quite processing what was going on. Something, something, Max. Max was always up to something. Benjamin would have been completely content to let him remain unfound all day.

They were coming down the stairs as Clara came through the front door, Max in her arms, wet and still. Victory was behind her, visibly shaking.

"I found him," Clara said simply. "In the water."

Reality shifted for Benjamin. He knew how to look at things, at poses, at people. He knew that the angle that Max was at was not one that living humans usually fell into. It was too straight, too still. And his color was a strange blue white. There was a shock of wet blond hair sticking to his head. He was not screaming, not having a tantrum. He made no noise, no movement.

Dead. He was looking at his dead brother. He shook his head, trying to stimulate the blood, thoughts. He had been asleep a few minutes ago and now Clara was holding a dead Max.

Faye tore along the third-floor landing. She looked down and saw what Clara was holding and let out a scream that could have caused the glass dome above them to shatter. She was a professional singer, after all. It looked for a moment like she might hurl herself over the rail to get downstairs faster, but her maid was behind her and guided her to the steps. They ran, feet pounding down. Father, meanwhile, emerged from the direction of his office and stood frozen for a moment. He and Clara locked glances. Father snapped out of his momentary shock and rushed forward, taking Max from Clara. He carried Max into the breakfast room, setting him gently on the table. He bent over Max, opening his little shirt, listening to his chest, feeling his skin. There was a dreamlike quality to everything.

Aunt Dagmar came from somewhere and pushed her body between them and the door, closing it.

"No," she said. "No. Turn around. All of you. Come with me, come with me now..."

She took Benjamin and Unity, each under one of her arms, and escorted them toward the front door.

The air was so thick it felt like if Benjamin tried to let himself fall, the humidity would hold him up. The butterflies on the flowers flapped their wings lazily. They were taken to the playhouse, where they were soon joined by William, Edward, and Victory. No one seemed to know where Clara had gone. She simply vanished after handing over Max.

Unity and Benjamin briefly conveyed to William and Edward what they had seen in the breakfast room. Victory said nothing. She sat in her favorite rocking chair, gaze set into the middle distance, and rocked back and forth relentlessly. Edward vanished. Benjamin began taking all the books down, shelf by shelf, and putting them all back again. A pointless exercise, but something that kept him moving. Upstairs, William began to play frenetic scales and arpeggios—the ideal music for the madness taking over the house.

Unity stepped outside and picked some flowers. She assembled these into a vase that sat on the windowsill. This seemed like something you should do when someone has died.

Elisa and some of the kitchen staff brought over trays of food along with pitchers of milk and ginger water. There were blackberries and strawberries, piles of the grim nut cutlet sandwiches on hard grain bread that featured in so many of their lunches. There was what passed for comfort food or sweets—junket with stewed strawberries and plain graham bread. Due to the gravity of the situation, Elisa added some items she knew the children might want: sliced ham on buttered soft bread, cold fried chicken, lemon cake, oatmeal cookies, sweet lemonade, and fudge. The forbidden items that they usually craved and treasured. They sat untouched, attracting flies, until William came downstairs, sweating from the effort of playing and the close heat of the studio. Edward followed, holding an unmarked bottle. He held it out, but there were no takers.

"Well," he said, breaking the silence. "He tried to swim after all."

"He must have fallen in," Benjamin said.

"I wonder if Faye is all right," Unity added.

Victory stopped rocking.

"No," she said firmly. "He didn't fall. He was much too far out for that."

"He tried to swim," Edward said again. "Dad was always on him about that, making Clara teach him."

"No," Victory said again. Her fury seemed to calm her. "He didn't fall, and he wouldn't go swimming on his own. He'd never do that. You've all seen how he is with the water."

"Then what happened?" Benjamin said.

"I don't know." Victory got up and circled the room. "None of this makes sense. I was sleeping. Were you sleeping? Any of you?"

"I was," Unity said.

Edward nodded. William did as well.

"Why were we all sleeping?" she said. "What is going on?"

No answer at first.

"The heat," Edward said. "We were asleep, and he was hot."

"We've been here loads of times when it's hot. We never all fell asleep for an entire afternoon. Never. Our falling asleep. Max going to the water by himself."

"What are you suggesting?" Benjamin asked.

"I don't know. I only know that this makes no sense."

"But you have to be suggesting something."

"I'm suggesting that two things that never, ever happen have both happened at the same time. Everyone was asleep. Why would that happen?"

Her voice had taken on a manic edge. Benjamin got up to put a hand on her shoulder, but she brushed it away.

"Clara went right to the water," Victory went on, almost to herself. "She knew right where to look."

"What?" William said.

"She went right to the lagoon."

"We were told to go look for him. Clara looked in the water."

"But right to the very place he was found. Not any other part of the shore. I followed her all the way out of the house. She ran right from the front door to the lagoon, never looked anywhere else. She dove in, went underwater. She found him within five or ten minutes. Out of all the shoreline, all the water around us."

"Victory...," William said in a warning tone.

"That's where he knows to swim," Edward said, trying to get his theory back into the conversation. "He went to the place he knows. He tried to do it himself..."

He ran out of energy and slumped down on the floor in between the piles of books. Victory and William faced off, both their chests rising up.

"I'm going to find Clara," William said, storming out of the playhouse.

An uneasy quiet fell in his wake, broken only by Faye's screaming sobs that carried across the lawn and into the room.

"We'll have to be very good to them," Unity said. "To Father and Faye."

A lost butterfly floated in through the open door and flapped around for a moment. Benjamin watched it with fascination. None of this felt very real. Maybe Max had become a butterfly.

The boy who could not swim could fly.