Relentless

shrieked into the sullen sky, but were silenced by altitude, and as I returned to the house, a single black feather floated down past my face.
    Stepping through the front door, I smelled a thin but repulsive metallic odor. In the hallway, the odor swelled into a stink. In the kitchen, it was a stench.
    The Advantium oven was set on SPEED COOK at the highest power level. Tendrils of gray smoke slithered from the vent holes on the bottom of the unit.
    I stooped down, switched it off, and peered through the view window. Within a cowl of pale smoke, fire flickered.
    Deprived of oxygen, the flames quickly died out. I opened the door, waving away the fumes that plumed into my face.
    In the oven, a silver frame held a five-by-seven photograph. The fabric-covered backing board had caught fire. The glass was cracked, and the photo under it was slightly discolored.
    The frame should have been on the desk in my study. The photo was of Penny, Milo, Lassie, and me.
    In the men’s room at the restaurant, Waxx had said the word
doom
without punctuation. This business with the photo seemed to add an exclamation point.

   After walking the house to lock every window and door, after setting the security alarm, I felt safe enough to leave Milo in his room with Lassie, while Penny and I huddled at the kitchen table, at the center of which stood the damaged photo in the silver frame.
    “So you knew Waxx would be there for lunch,” she said. “But you didn’t tell me. Why didn’t you tell me?”
    “I wondered about that at the time.”
    “Are you still wondering about it?”
    “No, I’ve figured it out.”
    “Share with me.”
    “I didn’t want you to talk me out of going.”
    “You knew better than to confront him.”
    She wasn’t angry, just disappointed in me.
    I wished that she would get angry instead.
    “I didn’t confront him,” I assured her.
    “Seems like
something
must have happened.”
    “I just wanted to get a look at him. He’s so reclusive.”
    Her blue gaze is as direct as the aim of an experienced bird hunter in his blind, her double-barreled eyes tracking the truth. My determination always to meet her extraordinary gaze has made a better man of me over the years.
    “So what does he look like?” she asked.
    “Like a walking slab of concrete with white hair and a bow tie.”
    “What did you say to him?”
    “I didn’t approach him. I watched him from a distance. But then at the end of lunch, after I paid the check, Milo needed to pee.”
    “Is the pee germane to the story, or are you vamping to delay telling me about the confrontation with Waxx?”
    “It’s germane.” I told her the rest of the tale.
    Frowning, she said, “And Milo didn’t sprinkle him?”
    “No. Not even a drop.”
    “Waxx said ‘Doom’? What do you think he meant by it?”
    “At first I thought he meant he’ll rip my next book even worse.”
    Indicating the framed photo that I had rescued from the oven, she said, “Now what do you think?”
    “I don’t know. This is crazy.”
    For a moment we sat in silence.
    Night had fallen. Evidently, Penny distrusted the darkness at the windows as much as I did. She got up to shut the pleated shades.
    I almost told her that she should stand to the side of the window when she pulled the cord. Backlit, she made an easy target.
    Instead, I got up and dropped two of the shades.
    She said, “I need a cookie.”
    “Before dinner? What if Milo sees you?”
    “He already knows I’m a hypocrite when it comes to the cookie rules. He loves me anyway. You want one?”
    “All right. I’ll pour the milk.”
    In times of trouble, in times of stress, in times of doubt, in times when even a vague sense of misgiving overcomes her, Penny turns to the same mood elevator: cookies. I don’t know why she doesn’t weigh five hundred pounds.
    She once said just being married to me burns up seven thousand calories a day. I pretended to believe she meant I was a total stud. I love to make her laugh.
    At the table once more, with glasses of cold milk and chocolate-chip-pecan cookies as big as saucers, we restored our confidence.
    “Most critics are principled,” she said. “They love books. They have standards. They tend to be gentle people.”
    “This guy isn’t one of them.”
    “Even the biased and mean ones—they don’t generally wind up in prison for violent crimes. Words are their only weapons.”
    I said, “Remember Josh McGintry and the magazine?”
    Josh is a friend and