Found on the desk inside the station, weighted down with a stone. The paper had gone soft with damp. The handwriting stays level until the last line.
The path in begins where the road gives up. For the first mile it is only fog and the sound of water somewhere off to the left, and the fog does not thin so much as move aside and close again behind.
I reached the ranger station a little before dusk. One room. A stove with cold ash. A chair turned to face the window, as though someone had been watching the treeline for a long time and had only stepped out. No sign of anyone leaving in a hurry. No sign of anyone leaving at all.
The fog withholds more than it hides.
Beyond the station the path continues for perhaps a hundred paces and then stops. A trunk has come down across it, old enough that ferns have taken the top. I walked the length of it twice. There is no way around. There did not seem to be one when the path was open, either.
I keep the map folded in my coat. It shows the station, and the path, and a second path that leaves the station on the other side. I have stood on the other side. I did not find a second path.
The fog came down while I was writing. I can no longer see the treeline, or the window, or my own hand at the edge of the lamp. I am not sure how long I have been here. I am not sure the chair was facing the window when I arrived.
The record ends here.