Past the Last Pine

The last pine stood outside the fog, road dust on its roots. Kenzo came out and checked his pockets. The map was still blank. The pencil had returned to the pack like a thief who respected the house.

At the real inn, the one that existed on other maps, the keeper set down a lamp without being asked. “Did you finish it?”

“No. I crossed it. There’s a bridge of forty steps and an inn you shouldn’t name. Don’t write that down.”

The keeper moved his hand off the travelers’ book, grateful and a little disappointed. Kenzo paid for the supper he had left in advance, ordered another, and in the margin of the map drew nothing at all. The chronicle ends. The valley keeps its blank. That is the whole kindness, and it holds.