Palindrome

AUTHOR'S NOTE

Cumberland Island is a real place, as are Greyfield Inn, Plum Orchard, and the old slave quarters. Dungeness was real, but the house burned many years before it did in this book. However, its ruins, the outbuildings, and the old cemetery are still there. Stafford Beach Cottage is a figment of my imagination. Real people live on the island, and none of the characters in this book is meant to resemble any of them in the slightest. Cumberland has been designated a National Seashore, and most of the island is under the control of the National Parks Service. The photograph on the cover hangs in the living room of Greyfield Inn, as described in the book. It is of Robert Weeks Ferguson, now deceased; it was taken on the island in the nineteen thirties and was the inspiration for this novel.