Uncertain Past

by Roz Denny Fox

  “We didn’t drink it. A patrol car pulled in behind us right after we loaded it all into the trunk of Jed’s old beater. Scared the heck out of us. That car didn’t do more than forty miles an hour. All we could think about was getting rid of the evidence.”

  “You dumped it?”

  “Nope. We lost our deputy tail, and Will directed us to Santiago’s.”

  “Oh? Does Rico’s family still serve wonderful Mexican food right out of their home kitchen? My mouth is watering just thinking about it.”

  “Santiago’s has grown. We’ll have to go there one evening. Getting back to my story—one of the cousins was getting married that weekend. Will had the clever idea of letting them have the beer for their reception. I didn’t go to the wedding, but Will said later they all partied till the cows came home.”

  “You guys! Don’t tell me anymore. And to think I used to idolize you.”

  “Yeah. Those were the good old days. If kids tried stunts like that today, you’d hear the hue and cry from here to the state penitentiary. Nobody looks on simple mischief anymore as juvenile pranks. Now they call it by harsher names—like vandalism.”

  “Hey, when Alanna’s a teen, she might be hanging out with guys just like you and Jed.”

  Riley blotted his mouth on his napkin. “Don’t say that. I doubt there’s anything scarier to a single dad than the thought of facing his daughter’s dating years.”

  Emmy folded her sandwich wrap into a neat square before she dumped it in the wastebasket. She didn’t know why her turkey sandwich suddenly felt like lead in her stomach or why she found it hard to breathe. “I guess I assumed you’d remarry long before Alanna goes to her first school dance.”

  “It’s possible. I’d really like her not to be an only child.”

  Emmy grabbed her coat, then rummaged in the umbrella holder and found her brightly patterned umbrella. “If you’re ready, we may as well take off. We’re on my dime.”

  “I said I was doing this as a favor, Emmy.”

  “I had Marge draw up a contract. I decided it’d be better to keep this search strictly business, Riley. I don’t want the town gossips to say I’m sleeping with you in payment for the help you’re giving me.”

  “They wouldn’t. We’re not.” He looked confused, then hurt. “As you wish, Emmy,” he muttered, shrugging back into his still damp top coat. “My car might be more comfortable, but your pickup probably uses less gas. It’s your choice, since Marge will undoubtedly bill you for transportation costs.”

  Emmy loitered at the threshold. “Uh, she and I agreed on a flat hourly fee. And I’d rather you drove. You know the area better. How about if I put the gas on my credit card? That should work.”

  Seizing the end of her umbrella, Riley spun her around. “Dammit, Emmy. What happened between last night and today to change you so drastically? Last night we parted as friends and lovers. Today we’re client and attorney.”

  Color flooded her cheeks. She drew in a deep breath and let it out in ragged spurts. “At the risk of sounding schizophrenic, let me say I feel like two people. The me who’s here, and a woman running in the background like . . . like some kind of shadow. Call it crazy, but I have to separate the two, until one way or another, this chase comes to an end. Please, Riley. You belong to the best part of my life. Riley Gray Wolf does. Not the lawyer Riley Gray. In a way, you’re two people, too. Oh, shoot. I’m not making sense. You probably think I should be committed.”

  “Oddly enough,” he said, kissing her on the forehead. “You make perfect sense.” He grasped her hand and brought it to his chest. “You’ve shown me I can’t continue to live my life as though I’m in the spin cycle of a washer. I can’t change the past, but now it’s patently clear that ignoring my background hasn’t made me like Jed or Will.”

  “And now?”

  He looked rueful. “The jury’s still out in my case. But in yours . . . I want to go on record here. How I feel about you will not change, regardless of what we uncover. Because you’re important to me, Emmy. I love you just the way you are.”

  “Oh, Riley. I hope with all my heart that what you’ve said will always be true.”

  Stooping, he kissed her again. “Let’s go. The sooner we find answers, the better.”

  The rain had slackened before they parked in front of Joleen Berber’s small yellow house. The siding was peeling badly. Her once showplace flower beds had gone to weeds. Windows Emmy remembered as having bright, cheery curtains were now covered in foil, possibly to cut heat and cooling bills.

  “The place looks dark,” she murmured. “Do you want to wait here while I go see if she’s home?”

  “Marge said she’s something of a recluse. An oddball, generally speaking.” Riley turned off the engine and pocketed the keys. “I’ll come with you.”

  Emmy stopped with one foot out of the car. “You mean she might not remember me?”

  “It’s possible.”

  The gate creaked. It needed oiling. Emmy’s knock was more tentative than she’d planned. She repeated it twice before they heard shuffling feet, and the door cracked open a few inches, releasing an odor of stale cigarette smoke. “Joleen. I’m—”

  Emmy glimpsed a stark expression of fear a split second before the woman stumbled backward and fell against the wall. Emmy made a helpless gesture, and Riley shoved at the door, but Joleen was no lightweight and her stout legs blocked him for a few minutes.

  Once they pushed their way inside, Emmy reached for the woman’s plump hand. She chafed it while Riley pulled out his cell phone to dial 911. Protesting, Joleen struggled to sit up straight before his call went through. He disconnected.

  “Joleen, it’s Emmy Monday. I lived with Frannie Granger. I’m sorry, I should’ve phoned before we came. I didn’t mean to give you a start.”

  “Emerald? Oh, I thought you were—Never mind. What do you want? Frannie’s gone. Murdered.” The word exploded out, her entire bulk shuddering.

  “I know.” Emmy watched with sad eyes as Riley expended a lot of effort to help the once-spry nurse to her feet. “You were Mom Fran’s best friend. I’m sure the news devastated you.”

  Joleen shook off Riley’s help. She twisted a lank gray braid back into the knot from which it had fallen and readjusted the pin. Shifting, she clutched the neck of the robe she still wore, though it was afternoon. She started to close the door, moving them out. Emmy raised one hand.

  “Go away,” Joleen told them. “Talking won’t bring Frannie back. She’s gone.” Joleen’s lips remained a thin slash in a sallow face.

  “And I’m so sorry,” Emmy said. “But since Sheriff Fielder’s asking questions anyway, I’d hoped something from that time might provide a lead to who I really am.”

  “You said you’re Emmy.” The faded eyes darted from side to side as the woman pulled a packet of cigarettes from her pocket and extracted one with a shaking hand.

  “I am.” Emmy didn’t want to lose patience, but it was difficult. “May we come in and ask you a few questions? This is Riley Gray. He’s an old friend of Jed and Will’s, Mom Fran’s other foster kids. You remember them, don’t you?”

  “Talking won’t bring Frannie back,” Joleen said again. She lit the cigarette and exhaled fast.

  “I agree. I know you found me at First Monday Trade Days. I want very much to locate my birth parents, Joleen. Anything you remember may be the information I need.”

  Joleen muttered darkly. She was surprisingly strong and succeeded in shoving them out onto the wet stoop. “Frannie loved you. She gave you a good home,” Joleen said harshly around a bobbing cigarette. “No good will come of disturbing the dead. Before you know it, folks’ll be saying she wasn’t a good mother, and she was.”

  “This isn’t about Mom Fran. I loved her, too,” Emmy said, tears sticking to her lashes. “Please, try to unders
tand. I need to know who—why someone discarded me. I’m interested in any memories you have. No detail is too small.”

  For a moment Joleen’s face softened. “You were in a basket under a table in the last row of antique booths at First Monday Trade Days. You looked so pretty. Like a life-size baby doll. Your dress was yellow as a buttercup, and you were wrapped in a pale-green blanket. The woman whose booth it was had gone to grab a bite to eat. She had no idea where you’d come from. No idea at all.”

  “That’s hard to believe,” Riley said.

  “I was there,” Joleen snapped. “Do you want to hear what I have to say or not?”

  “Oh, yes, please.” Emmy shot Riley a warning look.

  “Well, then . . . Frannie, my good friend, had lost her husband. She was deep in grief. Frannie needed to be needed again to get back on track. I notified Social Services. I knew Fran had applied for foster care and been approved. I talked them into turning you over to her. The agency’s probes turned up blank, so they left you with Frannie. It’s been thirty years, so any trail would be stone-cold by now.”

  “Thirty-two years,” Emmy said absently. “Did Social Services phone the police? Did they check the hospitals to see if any single mother had given birth around then? Is the date on my unofficial birth certificate accurate?”

  “I can’t help you.” Joleen was more forceful this time. “You look like a nice girl. And smart. My advice is to let the dead stay dead.” She flipped the cigarette through a crack in the screen.

  Emmy blinked, her nose mere inches from the door Joleen slammed shut.

  Riley let a moment pass before he slipped his arm around Emmy’s waist and gently urged her off the rain-slick porch. “Come on, Emmy. I warned you Marge said she’d gone around the bend.”

  “Has she, or is she hiding something? She seemed lucid enough when she described how I looked the day she found me.”

  “What would she be hiding, sugar babe?” He said it softly. Brokenly.

  Heaving a sigh, Emmy let Riley bear her weight as she matched her steps with his out to the car. “I let myself believe that Joleen would have all the answers. You told me not to pin my hopes on these interviews, but I’m afraid I got carried away.”

  “Are you all right to push on?” he asked after joining her in the car.

  “I’m fine. Heavens,” she said around a little laugh, “we’re only beginning. I’m in this for the long haul, Riley.”

  He didn’t say anything. Not even as he watched her grow more despondent after each stop. The women for whom Frannie had cleaned were more willing to talk than Joleen. None, however, had anything to add.

  Catherine Jennings, the last on their list of former clients, invited them into her parlor, a cold room that reeked of old money. Riley and Emmy sat side by side on a white damask sofa. Their elegantly turned out hostess rang a silver bell—like a queen, requesting her maid to serve coffee.

  Magically, a mousy-looking woman appeared wheeling a silver coffee service on an ornate serving cart. Catherine poured three dainty china cups full of strong brew. She listened politely to Emmy’s questions, but remained aloof. “I never involve myself in the private lives of my employees. All I can really tell you is that Frannie Granger did her job well. She wasn’t a gossip like so many domestics. She was honest. If Frannie found so much as a penny under the couch cushions, she left it on the table. You would appreciate that trait if, like us, you’d had sticky-fingered help. We’ve had an entire set of silverware vanish. In the past, Amanda’s been . . . well, careless with leaving money and jewelry lying around. We’re insured, of course, but I’d never tolerate keeping a thief in my employ.”

  Emmy made no comment. Riley, who had his own horror stories about housekeepers and sitters, commiserated with Catherine briefly. As nothing else came to light, they thanked her for the coffee and her time, and left.

  “We worked through that list quickly.” Riley glanced at his watch. “You want to call it a day, or forge on to Canton?”

  “Do you think there’ll be anyone hanging around the flea-market grounds today? It’s next Monday the market opens, right?”

  “Yes, but I think it takes days to set up. Although I’ll be first to admit the chances of finding any exhibitors who were there thirty years ago are slim to none. We could see if Canton has a newspaper, and if so check their archives.”

  “Are throwaway babies newsworthy?”

  Riley hooked his arm around Emmy’s neck and pulled her toward him. “There you go, sounding bitter again. Stop, or I’m going to be sorry I agreed to see this thing through.”

  “I know we’ve just begun. But it’s already discouraging.”

  “Keep taking good notes. In a few cases I’ve worked, I missed a detail the first time around. Next time, though, the very clue I missed popped out at me.”

  “We’ve learned zip,” she said in a despairing voice. “Nada. Absolutely nothing.”

  “Not exactly true,” he pointed out. “Did you know you’d been found wearing a yellow dress and wrapped in a green blanket?”

  “I vaguely remember having a blanket fitting that description for one of my first dolls. Fran loved buying me dolls. You know, Riley—I found something Catherine said interesting. The part about losing jewelry and silver. An expensive brooch, reportedly pinned to my baby blanket, disappeared from our house. Catherine blamed her hired help, but Fran didn’t have any. Do you think it’s possible someone in Uncertain was or is a jewel thief? Am I making any sense?”

  “Gotcha. If the thief fences through a pawn shop, there’d be a record. See, that’s a possible lead. I wonder if other residents have had robberies?”

  “I meant to ask Joleen about the brooch. Hardly a day went by that she didn’t stop at the house. She often ate supper with us before going home to change out of her uniform. It’s how I remember her, all dressed in crisp white. She looked . . . so . . . old, today.”

  “Where did she work? Not at a hospital in Canton?”

  “No. In Tyler. She took care of people who had terminal cancer. I remember Fran saying she didn’t know how Joleen could stand working year after year with people who almost always died. You know Fran nursed her husband until his death. He had lung cancer.”

  “If Joleen was assigned to the oncology ward, it shoots my theory that she might’ve met the woman who delivered you. Why couldn’t she have worked in obstetrics? But that would’ve been too easy.”

  “Nothing about my case is easy. I didn’t think it would be. Then again, I’d hoped some magical answer would leap out and hit me between the eyes.”

  “Maybe Reverend Briggs will be your savior.”

  “Are you always this optimistic, Riley?”

  He wrinkled his nose. “Rarely. Among colleagues, I’m known as the voice of gloom and doom. I tend to look for the storm clouds that ruin sunny days. My feeling is, if you prepare for the darkest hour, you’re better equipped to meet whatever comes.”

  “Well, today the storm has passed.” And indeed, the sun had come out and dried up the puddles by the time they finally found the rectory where Reverend Briggs lived. The humidity curled Emmy’s hair into ringlets.

  “I recognize you, my dear,” the pastor said the minute Emmy introduced herself. “Mrs. Granger used to pull a wool cap over your head on the way to church, no matter what the weather, so when you arrived at Sunday school your head was a mass of golden curls. Pure angel she said you were.”

  Emmy hid a smile. “Hardly, Reverend.”

  “I was so sorry to hear how that good, good woman came to such a bad end. But ours is not to question God’s will.”

  “I didn’t actually come to discuss my foster mother, Pastor Briggs. I’ve decided to try to locate my birth parents, or my birth mother at least. I’m hoping you might know something—anything that might provide me with a clue.”

/>   He invited them to walk in his rose garden. Emmy and Riley dutifully followed the old man’s measured steps. He stopped every so often to sniff one of the fragrant buds. They stopped, too, and waited. Emmy tried to be patient, but she fidgeted.

  “I do my best thinking out here,” Briggs explained when they reached one end of the garden and had circled back. “Not long after Mr. Granger passed on, Frannie applied for a foster care license. You were truly a gift from heaven for the poor, dear soul. Have you spoken with Joleen Berber? She found you when you were just a bit of a thing. I think that’s how it went. Oh, it was such a long time ago. My memory isn’t what it used to be.”

  Emmy traced her finger around a rose. “We visited Joleen earlier today. She isn’t really herself anymore.”

  “No. She took the disappearance of her dearest friend very hard. Her decline started when no trace was found. I was transferred from the church in Uncertain a while ago, but Joleen had already stopped attending services. She would be your best source, I believe.”

  “So you can’t help Emmy? Did you ever see a brooch that was supposedly found with the baby?” Riley asked. “It later disappeared.”

  “There were rumors to that effect, but Mrs. Granger never confirmed or denied their accuracy to me. She wasn’t a complainer, Lord love her.”

  Emmy’s face fell. “Mom Fran used to draw me pictures of the brooch. We drew together a lot if I was sick and had to miss school. I didn’t save the drawings.”

  The reverend smiled indulgently. “Perhaps the brooch was a figment of her imagination.”

  “I remember her description vividly. I’m sure she wouldn’t have fabricated it. Why would she?”

  “I don’t know, child. People make up fantasies for all kinds of reasons. Was Ms. Berber able to tell you about the brooch?”

  “I forgot to bring it up. I’ll talk with her again.” Emmy asked a few more questions and carefully logged the old minister’s responses on her legal pad. He didn’t recall hearing any gossip about illegitimate pregnancies among the town’s young women around the time of Emmy’s birth.