Chapter 44

His uncle was in the center of the room working on a scaled-down carving of a bear. In front of him on an easel was the photograph from which Robert was working. It showed a black bear on a rock in the middle of a river. Fish were jumping up the rapids all around it. In one paw a captured fish struggled against its captor.

Robert looked up at the sound of the door closing. “Morgan!” he exclaimed, his voice showing his excitement.

“Uh…Uncle Robert,” Morgan returned the greeting, unsure if this was the proper way to address him.

The man rose and crossed the room and hugged his nephew. His uncle’s enthusiastic welcome contrasted sharply with that which James had given him.

“When did you get here? Have you eaten?” Robert asked.

“I’ve been here about two hours. I had lunch with James.”

Something in the way Morgan said it, or because of that uncanny sixth sense that Robert so often demonstrated, must have made the older man suspect something. “Is everything all right?”