I watch Greg descend the stairs, unsure if I should follow. Before I can make a decision, I hear his footsteps heading back in my direction. He must have run track in high school, I think. “When grandpa died, he left me the key to his safe deposit box. Actually, it was grandma’s, but grandpa inherited it when she passed away. He never really touched it, or at least I didn’t think so. He kept stressing how there was nothing of monetary importance in there, just a couple of old documents, some sentimental letters and stuff like that. I think he wanted to avoid a fight among the family over the contents, to be honest. My aunt and my mom were given grandma’s jewelry and music boxes, and grandpa divided his valuables between the others. I got the house and everything that it came with. But I remember thinking that, while his old letters might be interesting, it wasn’t a rush. That was seven years ago, and I haven’t gotten around to getting the box officially transferred to me. But if Julienne really gave him that key, it’s in his safe deposit box. I’d be willing to bet anything.
“If he wanted you to know, why didn’t he just tell you to open it after he passed, leave it in his will?” “Actually, he did leave it in his will. Honestly, I’d just forgotten with everything I was doing with the house. Grandpa was a bit of a fate tempter. He’d been asked to keep the secret for the remainder of his life. He was old, but he wasn’t dead yet. He was determined to go to the grave with whatever he knew, and give me the tools to uncover it if I chose to.” “Like Annaleigh leaving that letter for the ‘right’ person to find.” “It will take a while to get into the safe deposit box. Let me call the bank and see what I need to do to transfer it over.”
A half hour later, armed with his grandfather’s will and numerous forms of ID for Greg, we head to the bank on Harbour Street. Once the appropriate forms are completed, we are told it would take several days to complete the necessary background and credit checks, and officially transfer the box over. “I don’t know about you,” I look at Greg, “but I could use a drink.” “I couldn’t agree more. Hey why don’t we see if Billy and Grace are free. We can double date,” he jokes. It sounds like a great idea to me. I still need to get an idea of the plan for this weekend at Grace’s house, and it might give us a break from the emotion of the morning. “You know they’re going to ask what we’ve found.” “We’ll give them the cliff notes version for now,” Greg suggests.
The great thing about your friends being retirees and teachers on break is that they’re almost always free. We arrange to meet them at McKinley’s, an Irish Pub near the south end of Harbour Street. Greg tries not to eat or drink where he works when he doesn’t have to. In an effort to steer clear of taxing conversation, we turn the conversation immediately to Grace’s family weekend. “Josh and the kids are getting in around one o’clock. I think Isabela is going to get in at three. She’s actually flying into Boston from a business trip out in San Antonio. I’m guessing cocktails around five, dinner around 6:30. Does that work? And by cocktails at five, I mean officially. I plan to start drinking at breakfast. In fact, I’d love some help if you guys are up for it. We could make a day of it.” It sounds a lot like my family gatherings, everyone bustling around the kitchen cooking, drinking, chatting, getting a little crazy but loving every minute of it. I find myself looking forward to the day. I also find myself missing my family a bit, and Billy, always the father even when he isn’t yours, takes notice.
“You ok?” “Oh yes, just missing my family a bit I guess. Your family get togethers sound a lot like mine.” “What are you talking about? We’re right here.” Billy says patting me on the arm. Then he gives me a knowing look, and I am reminded that he too knows what it’s like to be separated from your family. His kids lived close by growing up, but he wasn’t apart from them by choice, I remind myself. “You guys have been amazing,” I smile back, genuinely meaning it. While I’d pictured a solitary life of writing and inspiration here, I know now that I’d have been lonely. I like my “me” time, but with a larger family I’ve never been isolated and I’m not sure I could have taken it as well as I’d hoped. “When is your crew coming up?” Grace chimes in. “Nan is in town two weekends from now, and mom and dad will be in the weekend after that.” “I can’t wait to meet them!” she beams. She has such confidence, and I loved her for it. She then gives an almost imperceptible glance in Greg’s direction, who luckily has turned for a moment to see a soccer score, and I know the question she isn’t voicing. I decide to answer by way of invitation because, as wonderful as Grace is, subtly isn’t her strong suit and I know she’ll come right out and ask if I didn’t give her an answer.
“Speaking of which, when my parents are in town, I’m thinking of stealing Grace’s idea and having everyone over on that Saturday if that works for you guys? I meant to mention it before, sorry,” I direct this particularly at Greg, “but I wasn’t sure when they were getting in. My dad texted this afternoon and said they’ll be driving up Friday, so they’ll be rested and ready to meet everyone by Saturday.” Billy is right. These three are my family here, and the reason my move has been so easy. I want my parents to meet them.
“Do they know about the house?” Grace asks. It’s another point of internal debate for me. They’ll be staying in the girls’ old room, and I don’t want to creep them out. But now that the story is unfolding and we figure there had been no harm done in the actual house, it seems ok. Besides, my parents, my father especially, love a good historical mystery. Annaleigh’s words float through my mind: This house was once filled with love and laughter. Please fill this house with love once again. “Not yet, Nan told them there’s a ‘creepy door,’ but I didn’t want to say anything until we knew more.” I realize my slip up as soon as it comes out of mouth, and give Greg an apologetic glance.
“Did you finish reading the journal?” Grace jumps on the opportunity that I’m sure she’s been looking for. It’s only fair, I suppose. After all, the house does belong to her family. “No, there are about two pages left, but I can almost guess the contents. Really, the letter that he left there was his last entry.” We explain about the safe deposit box and our errands of the morning. An odd look crosses Billy’s face. “I think I saw her once, Annaleigh. I didn’t know it at the time.” We wait for him to continue. “She was out in the garden behind the house, walking along the back wall, looking at the vine, almost studying it. I thought it odd, but there were beautiful flowers growing on it, so I figured she was just enjoying them. I was on the sidewalk near the end of the block , just going for a stroll. I raised my hand in a “hello” wave, and after a moment, she waved back. She seemed timid. I figured she was an older relative of Linda’s, maybe not ‘all there’. I meant to ask Linda about it, but I never saw her again. Must have been twenty, twenty five years ago now. You know, I have a couple of photos that Linda left in the house when she moved. They were stuck back in a kitchen drawer - found them when I was cleaning the place one day. I think she may have been in one of them. I’ll see if I can find it.”
“So she’s related to Linda and Gerri? Or at least a friend of theirs?” Grace is the first one to ask what we’re all thinking. “Must be,” Billy muses noncommittally. “No wonder Linda was willing to do anything to stay in the house,” I wonder out loud, recalling the story Billy told about how he acquired it. “Do you know if she’s still alive?” He shakes his head. “I don’t even know how she knew them for sure. Hell, I don’t even know it was her. But I do, you know? When I was studying those photos in that book you have,” he says turning to me, “I felt like I’d seen her before. I didn’t realize where until just now.”
“Well, we know she and Gerri moved to Bologna,” Grace pointes out. “If we could get ahold of them…” We toss around theories and strategies for another half hour or so while finishing our drinks. As we part ways with Billy and Grace, a funny sensation comes over me. Greg, always astute to my feelings, notices immediately. “What’s wrong?”. “Nothing, really. It’s just, I’ve been digging into this fa
mily mystery as if it were some type of whodunit novel. But it’s real people, whose relatives are still alive, who may even be alive themselves. It just doesn’t feel right, somehow, exposing their past without their consent. They seemed to go to such great lengths to protect it. The whole family vanished into thin air so that nobody would know what happened. Annaleigh was the middle child. Scarlett was even younger and really could still be alive.” Greg grows quiet. I know he agrees with me, at least in part. “Then let’s try to find them. If we can find Linda and Gerri, it’s a good start. And Annaleigh lived back in the area. Death records are generally pretty public, as morbid as that sounds.” He pauses, thinking. “As for the things in grandpa’s safe deposit box and the letter in his journal, those were given to him and passed down to me. They are part of my history too in a roundabout way. Those I … we… have a right to look at.” He’s right. Those things belong to him, given freely by the original owners and by his grandfather, and he has every right to read them and choose what to do with the contents.
The next twenty four hours are spent waiting. There isn’t much more we can do until we get the legal OK from the bank, so we choose to divide and conquer the possible leads we do have. Grace is working on finding more -anything really - about Annaleigh’s later years, and Billy is trying to find contact information for Linda or Geraldine. He knows the last email address he has for Linda is no good, so he takes to the internet and scours universities in Bologna area with what little information he has. Greg contacts his aunt and cousin to see if they remember anything that might help us at all. I take the break to do some much-needed writing on my novel. The distraction proves helpful.
Chapter 14
It is, unexpectedly, my sisters who next come forward with information. First, Nan. She calls me to tell me that she’d been researching information on the lock - who knew, she’d taken pictures and had been looking for something similar - and through a stroke of luck found it resembles one that was reported missing from a famous English author back in the same year that Julienne had arrived in Massachusetts. Apparently it is quite rare, and therefore quite valuable, and easier to trace than one would expect. The author, though, insisted she had no need for it and wasn’t pressing charges. The next is Cat. “Check it out. Your au pair’s former boss didn’t exist!” she messages me excitedly. “Well, she did, and she didn’t. The name Julienne gave was her pseudonym. Her real name was Cecily Crafton, married name Sharpe. Her four year old son Kenneth drowned in the lake behind their house in ‘25 while under the care of their au pair….” Holy Crap! I exclaimed to the computer screen, immediately beginning my reply. “How’d you find this?” “I’m taking a psychology of crime class just for fun.” Only my family takes psychology of crime for fun, I think, smiling to myself, knowing I’d have done the same if it was offered when I was in school. “My prof is a wealth of knowledge and I asked him on a hunch. He said once that his grandfather was a police detective who focused in what we call cold cases today. The fact that Julienne up and left without so much as a goodbye, that she got the job here with no reference needed, and that her former employer, when she did mention her, seemed to not exist, struck me as odd. It seems, according to legend at least, that Crafton didn’t believe that Julienne was implicit in the boy’s drowning but that her powerful husband did. Crafton sent her here to the friend of a ‘friend’ in the States.” “And Edward Sharpe?” “Well, it’s a common name of course, but Kenneth had three older siblings, the oldest of whom was a twenty year old Oxford student named Edward…”
“Cat, you are simply amazing! How come none of this comes up in any searches. Surely by now with the power of the internet….” “Cecily paid off the reporters and police to keep it under wraps. Oh, and the husband reported a trunk with an ornate lock to be missing from their house in May of ‘25. Cecily said she must have tossed it out by accident and convinced him not to press charges. How one tosses a trunk by accident, I’m not sure, but she must have convinced him well enough. He dropped the case.” I have the urge to immediately pick up the phone and call Greg, but I miss my baby sister and spend the next twenty minutes chatting with her, catching up on each others’ lives.
I call Greg as soon as I finished my chat with Cat and excitedly fill him in. “So Sharpe - Edward - must have fallen for her when she was the au pair for his brother. He came over here when she left. That must have been a scandal.” “Son of famous author drops out of Oxford to chase family nanny across the ocean,” he laughs. I have to admit, it rings of a daytime soap opera. Still everything seems to fit. Sheffield took her on to help out the friend of a friend. Cat seems to think this friend of Sheffield’s was more than that, which might further the plausibility. Was this Johanna’s well-protected secret? That Sheffield was having an overseas affair, however one managed that in the 1920s? It didn’t seem like the type of thing the entire family would protect with their lives. “It might be a bit dramatic, but it does make sense.” “So we know, possibly, the circumstances that led her here. Could they be the same circumstances under which she vanished?” “Sometimes you sound so much like a university professor,” I tease him. “Sometimes you sound so much like a shrink,” he jabs back, laughing. “If she was a danger, wouldn’t Sheffield just let her go? I can’t imagine he’d put his kids at risk to protect her,” I continue. “It’s like a train wreck that you can’t turn away from,” Greg reads my thoughts.
“Maybe we should try a different angle,” he continues. I listen, curious. “I think we can all agree James and Johanna didn’t survive the night of January 5, 1926. There’s no sign of them afterward, and it would require abandoning their three young girls and vanishing into the night.” “Agreed.” “And our moral dilemma, or whatever you’d call it, was potentially exposing Annaleigh and her family’s secrets while she was still alive…” “But Johanna took her secret to the grave,” I finish for him. “Exactly”. “I have a feeling she holds a more important role than we’ve given her. So far, she’s been the forgotten wife of a guy who seems like a real jerk, and a grieving mother after a miscarriage. But she’s the only one that we know for a fact knows this big family secret. Then, she goes to a party, acts uncharacteristically upbeat, and is never seen or heard from again, nor is her husband.” “But the only people who may still be alive at all to remember her are the girls, and they’re certainly not talking,” I point out.
“Actually, they might be.” Now he has my full attention. I called my aunt and my cousin. My aunt said she vaguely remembers a woman coming to speak to grandpa that could have been Annaleigh. The time frame fits. My aunt had come out to visit grandpa, it was about twenty years ago, and an older woman came to the door. She tried to eavesdrop but couldn’t hear much. She heard the woman say that she’d been back but was going away again. My guess is to a nursing home or something, the way my aunt explained it. She gave grandpa an envelope of sorts. Aunt Molly said grandpa didn’t open it - she thought she heard the older lady say to keep it closed for as long as she lived. But Aunt Molly also has a knack for storytelling so I can’t be sure of the exact details…. even she admitted that.” “But if it was Annaleigh, surely she’d think she’d outlive him.” “Maybe that was the point. Her secret kept safely forever unless fate stepped in.” “You don’t think it could have been….” “Julienne? I did at first. But my aunt said at the time she’d asked who the woman was, and he’d just said ‘Someone I knew a long time ago, when she was a little girl.” “It could have been any of the girls, I guess. But my bet is on Annaleigh.” “She was here, under our noses, under his nose, and nobody noticed.” “What do you think she gave him?” “No idea. Aunt Molly said it looked like an envelope. A letter maybe? But I’ll tell you one thing - if she asked him not to open it, unless he outlived her, he died without knowing what was inside.” “And now, it’s sitting in his… your… safe deposit box,” I guess. “I’d bet my life savings on it.” “So now we wait.”
One would think that, as a writer, I’d n
aturally develop patience. You have to wait for inspiration, to hear back from your editor, the publicist, the critics, the sales. Maybe some writers have learned or inherited this virtue, but I am not among them. I look at the clock on the bottom right hand corner of my laptop. June 14th. We’d gone to the bank two days ago. Surely, the permission to get Greg ownership of the box would come through soon. They’d told us three to five business days. I couldn’t imagine Greg having anything come up in his security check that would delay it, so I was hopeful that we’d hear by the end of the week. If we didn’t, it would be another three days at the soonest. At least Grace’s family gathering would keep us busy, and hopefully, distracted over the weekend.
Grace’s family gathering. Damn, I forgot to get the liquor, which I promised her I’d do. I am not about to submit her family to my average-at-best cooking skills, so offering to buy some alcohol was the least I could do. I wonder at my disorganization. As a therapist, I’d had to be on top of every minute. Patients scheduled by the hour - not even, my sessions were fifty minutes long - hospital visits from this time to that. Now, I feel like a scatterbrained mess, jumping from thing to thing, all the while the mysterious case churning in the back of my brain. But isn’t that what this time was all about? Getting away from my former life, from the schedules and things that bound me, and having the opportunity to grow and create? It doesn’t feel troubling, I realize. Just unfamiliar. Perhaps this is how writers’ brains work, I tell myself. Maybe this jostled up conglomeration of thoughts is how inspiration strikes. My novel has certainly been coming along, I can’t deny that.
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