Slowly scanning around the cemetery, Jack took in the scale of his work. The place looked as if it were newly consecrated. The weeds had been all but completely eradicated and he had now cleaned up around a quarter of the headstones. Just another month or so and he could move onto phase three: the research.
A low rumble of a slowing car drew Jack’s attention to the road. It was Mr Chipman’s green Chrysler. Jack looked at his watch: just after five. Time to collect his wages, pack up and go to his American History evening class in West Barnstable. Jack waved as Mr Chipman entered the cemetery.
‘Hey—wow—good work, Jack,’ Mr Chipman said, glancing around the place. ‘Looks amazing.’
‘Thanks,’ Jack replied, running the back of his hand over his sweaty forehead.
As Mr Chipman approached, he pulled out a roll of cash from his pocket. ‘Here you go. I’ve taken out the box money already.’
‘Thank you,’ Jack said, taking the proffered roll of cash.
Mr Chipman then held aloft a piece of folded paper and grimaced. ‘I’ve got some information.’
‘What about?’ Jack asked.
‘Your dad—his past.’
Jack frowned. ‘But I told you that you could stop all that back in March—my mom explained everything to me.’
‘I know, I know—I’ll take it away and destroy it if you want,’ Mr Chipman said. ‘I did stop digging—but I neglected to inform an old colleague of mine back in California that the search was off. He found something that I thought you might want to see.’
Jack shook his head. He didn’t want to reignite the embers of his mistrust. Since his mom had caught him leaving his dad’s study, things had returned to normal at home. She had confronted him that day with a surprising calmness.
‘What are you doing, Jack?’ she had asked.
Momentarily caught in a frozen terror, Jack had said nothing. He had considered lying—perhaps making something up about needing money—but then he had stopped that line of thinking dead; it was a whole patchwork quilt of lies from his mom and dad that he was now trying to unstitch. Truth was the only option. ‘I phoned the bank pretending to be dad,’ he had begun. ‘He gets a bunch of money in every month from San Francisco, which I believe comes from some inheritance or other. I think Dad was born there, not in Boston.’
His mom’s face had turned a deeper shade of pink, but other than that, she had kept her reaction guarded, reserved. ‘Okay, I think it’s time to explain, Jack,’ she had said quietly. ‘Come and sit down with me.’
His mom had sat opposite him at the kitchen table, her hands clasped piously together. ‘The truth is, your dad doesn’t know where he’s from. His mother—and I am sorry for speaking ill of the dead—was something of a loose woman and gave your dad up as a young baby. Can you imagine your dad—Vice President of the Cape Cod Chamber of Commerce—admitting to people, his own family, that he knows nothing of his past? He lied—yes—and that was wrong—but it was just easier to say that he was from Boston and that his parents were killed in an automobile accident. Do you see that, Jack?’
Jack had trusted his mother’s mournful eyes. He nodded. ‘Yeah, I guess so. But where does the money come from, then?’
His mom had laughed. ‘Investments—your dad isn’t as dumb as he makes out, you know.’
Jack had smiled and his mom had reached across the table and touched his hand. ‘Listen, Jack, I won’t tell him that you were in there, or about our little discussion, okay?’
‘Thank you,’ he had said. The past life, that he had imagined for his dad, suddenly seemed as foolish and absurd as the idiotic ones that he and Alice had dreamed up a couple of years ago.
‘Jack?’ Mr Chipman repeated. ‘What do you want me to do with this?’ He waved the sheet of paper in front of Jack’s eyes.
The words were dry in his mouth: destroy it. They were right there, sitting obstinately on his tongue. Destroy it. But he couldn’t vocalise them; they clashed with an imprecise but forceful intensity within him that kept his mouth clamped shut. Destroy it. It was his mom’s voice, he realised, encouraging him to say it. ‘Does it contradict what my mom told me?’ Jack breathed.
Mr Chipman nodded. It was a slow, apologetic nod of his head. His eyes fell to the floor. ‘Quite a dilemma for you.’
‘What would you do?’ Jack asked.
‘I’ll answer that after you do,’ he said.
‘Show me.’
‘You’re sure?’
‘No, but show me anyway. I’d spend my whole life wondering; I need to know.’
Mr Chipman silently unfolded the sheet of paper and held it out in Jack’s direction. It was a Xerox copy, covered in an old style of handwriting. Jack pushed his face closer to the paper. On the left-hand side was a long list of names. All men. He scanned down until he found a familiar surname. Jas. Jacklin. The next column listed ages. Nineteen. Next, judging by the content, were the men’s occupations. Jas.—James Jacklin—was, like many on the list, a miner. Lastly, was a place name: Pennsylvania.
‘James Jacklin?’ Jack queried. ‘Who’s he?’
‘Your great-great-great-grandfather.’
‘Okay,’ Jack said. So far, nothing that refuted his mom’s version of events.
‘This is the 1850 census. He was your first ancestor to live in California. Notice where he’s living?’
‘In a hotel with a bunch of other men from all over the world.’
‘Look at the place, at the top.’
‘Coloma?’
Mr Chipman opened his hands out and pulled a face that suggested the place should be familiar to Jack. ‘Come on, Jack! 1850.
