Harp Oletsky narrates from his farm, unsettled by unnaturally clear skies, soaring April heat, and wheat that grows impossibly fast and tall. The previous night, his niece Asphodel did not return from her game, and when he knocked at 2:00 a.m. he found her bed empty, leaving him alone in the farmhouse when a strange light returned to his land.

Standing at his bedroom window, Harp describes a radiant, indescribable color rising from his fallowland, stretching from soil to moon. He gropes for comparisons—snakeskin, mother-of-pearl, blood, wings—and lists what it is not, unable to name it. Shadows move behind the trembling sheet of light, almost forming recognizable shapes before dissolving.

Harp prays for clear sight, fearing he may be hallucinating, suffering heatstroke, or witnessing a sign from God. He has watched this phenomenon every night for seven nights, beginning the night after the Black Sunday roller. The light lingers in his mind even by daylight, while the air around his farm remains sweet despite dust to the west.

He resolves to ask Otto to keep vigil with him, then loses his nerve. Doubting his own sanity and recalling Otto's suggestion that he simply cannot handle good fortune, Harp considers staying silent. He concludes that perhaps a secret has chosen him to keep it, and decides not to tell Otto or Dell.