“They’re gone. They’re dust.” Roz tried to shout, but could barely choke out the words. “Am I what’s left?”
The storm stopped as abruptly as it began, and the Amelia who stood in the calm was one who sang lullabies to children. Sad and pale in her gray dress.
Then Roz was alone, standing on the springy grass at the edge of the woods with what she’d built spread out below her.
SHE WENT BACKto work because work steadied her. The only way she could wrap her mind around what happened at the edge of the woods was to do something familiar, something that kept her hands occupied while her brain sorted through the wonder of it.
She kept to herself because solitude soothed her.
Through the afternoon she divided more stock plants, rooted cuttings. Watered, fed, labeled.
When she was done, she walked home through the woods and raided her personal greenhouse. She planted cannas in a spot she wanted to dramatize, larkspur and primroses where she wanted more charm. In the shade, she added some ladybells and cranesbill for serenity.
Her serenity, she thought, could always be found here, in the gardens, in the soil, in the shadow of Harper House. Under that fresh blue sky she knelt on the ground, and studied what was hers.
So lovely with its soft yellow stone, its sparkling glass, its bridal white trim.
What secrets were trapped in those rooms, in those walls? What was buried in this soil she worked, season after season, with her own hands?
She had grown up here, as her father had, and his father, and those who’d come before. Generation after generation of shared blood and history. She had raised her children here, and had worked to preserve this legacy so that the children of her children would call this home.
Whatever had been done to pass all of this to her, she would have to know. And then accept.
Settled again, she replaced her tools, then went into the house to shower off the day.
She found Mitch working in the library.
“Sorry to interrupt. There’s something I need to talk to you about.”
“Good, I need to talk to you, too.” He swiveled away from his laptop, found a file in the piles on the desk.
“You go first,” she told him.
“Hmm? Oh, fine.” He scooped a hand through his hair, took off his glasses. Gestures she knew now meant he was organizing his thoughts.
“I’ve done just about all I can do here,” he began. “I could spend months more on your family history, filling in details, moving back generations. In fact, I plan to do just that. But regarding the purpose for which you hired me, I’m at an impasse. She wasn’t family, Roz. Not a Harper,” he amended. “Not by birth, not through marriage. Absolutely none of the data—names, dates, births, marriages, deaths—nothing I have places a woman named Amelia in this house, or in the Harper family. No woman of her approximate age died in this house during the time period we’ve pinpointed.”
“I see.” She sat, wishing vaguely she’d thought to get coffee.
“Now, if Stella is mistaken regarding the name—”
“She isn’t.” Roz shook her head. “It’s Amelia.”
“I agree. But there’s no Amelia Harper, by birth, by marriage, in any record. Oddly enough, considering the length of time this house has stood here, there’s no record of any female in her twenties or thirties who died here. In the house. Older or younger, yes, a few.”
He set the file on top of a pile. “Ah, one of the most entertaining deaths to occur here was back in 1859, one of your male ancestors, a Beauregard Harper, who broke his neck, and several other bones, falling off the second floor terrace. From the letters I’ve read describing the event, Beau was up there with a woman not his wife engaged in a sexual romp that got a little overenthusiastic. He went over the rail, taking his date with him. He was dead when members of the household reached him, but being a portly fellow, he broke the fall of the female houseguest, who landed on top of him and only suffered a broken leg.”
“And terminal embarrassment, I imagine.”
“Must have. I have the names of the women, the Harper women, who died here listed for you. I have some records on female servants who died here, but none fit the parameters. I got some information from the Chicago lawyer I told you about.”
He began to dig for another file. “The descendant of the housekeeper during Reginald Harper’s time. She actually discovered she had three ancestors who worked here—the housekeeper, the housekeeper’s uncle who was a groundsman, and a young cousin who served as a kitchen maid. From this, I’ve been able to get you a detailed history of that family as well. While none of it applies, I thought you’d like to have it.”
“Yes, I would.”
“The lawyer’s still looking for data when she has time, she’s entrenched now. We could get lucky.”
“You’ve done considerable work.”
“You’ll be able to look at the charts and locate your great-great-uncle’s second cousin on his mother’s side, and get a good sense of his life. But that doesn’t help you.”
“You’re wrong.” She studied the mountain of files, and the board, crowded with papers and photos and handwritten charts behind Mitch. “It does help me. It’s something I should have seen to a long time ago. I should have known about the unfortunate and adulterous Beau, and the saloon-owning Lucybelle, and all the others you’ve brought to life for me.”
She rose to go to the board and study the faces, the names. Some were as familiar as her own, and others had been virtual strangers to her.
“My father, I see now, was more interested in the present than the past. And my grandfather died while I was so young, I don’t remember having him tell me family stories. Most of what I got was from my grandmother, who wasn’t a Harper by birth, or from older cousins. I’d go through the old papers now and again, always meaning to make time to do more, read more. But I didn’t.”
She stepped back from the board. “Family history, everyone who came before matters, and until recently I haven’t given them enough respect.”
“I agree with the first part, but not the second. This house shows the great respect you have for your family. Essentially, what I’m telling you is I can’t find her for you. I believe, from what I’ve observed, what I feel, Amelia is your ancestor. But she’s not your family. I won’t find her name in family documents. And I don’t believe she was a servant here.”
“You don’t.”
“Consider the time, the era, the societal mores. As a servant, it’s certainly possible that she was impregnated by a member of the family, but it’s doubtful she would have been permitted to remain on staff, to remain in the house during her pregnancy. She would’ve been sent away, given monetary compensation—maybe. But it doesn’t hold for me.”
After one last glance at the board, she walked back to her chair and sat. “Why not?”
“Reginald was head of the house. All the information I have on him indicates he was excessively proud, very aware of what we could say was his lofty standing in this area. Politics, business, society. To be frank, Roz, I don’t see him banging the parlor maid. He’d have been more selective. Certainly, said banging could have been done by a relative, an uncle, a brother-in-law, a cousin. But my gut tells me the connection with Amelia’s tighter than that.”
“Which leaves?”
“A lover. A woman not his wife, but who suited his needs. A mistress.”
She was silent for a long moment. “You know what I find interesting, Mitchell? That we’ve come, from different directions, to the same point. You’ve gone through so many reams of documents that it gives me a headache just to think of them. Phone calls, computer searches, courthouse searches. Graphs and charts and Christ only knows. And by doing all that you’ve not only given me a picture of my family I’ve never looked at, people whose names I didn’t know, but who are, in a very real sense, responsible for my life. But you’ve eliminated dozens of possibilities,
