The Memory of Butterflies: A Novel

by Grace Greene

  Roger spoke loudly enough for everyone to hear. “There may be another hiding place here.” He waved his hands, indicating a large area. “Be careful in case there’s other personal property hidden under the floor that survived the fire.”

  He turned to me. “Keys?” He took them and secured the box in my car.

  Soon after the hearthstones were marked and moved, the front-end loader was back at work. The driver had started in the front porch area and was working his way back. I think the earlier find made everyone more aware of the age of the house and of the possibility of finding other family treasure. Sure enough, about thirty minutes later, one of the guys called out. The driver kept the shovel up and unmoving while the young man who’d yelled picked up objects from the ground.

  He held up several of Gran’s spoons. She’d kept her silver in a case, and though we found no sign of it, it was meaningful to me to hold the sooty, tarnished utensils. I recognized the floral pattern as her mother’s wedding silver.

  Other items found their way out of the ashes, but they were mostly broken dishes and partially burned fabrics—nothing exciting. It was, in fact, rather depressing. There was no evidence of anything in the hidden space under Gran’s bed, only a gaping hole into which the flooring and assorted junk had fallen.

  I was standing there, wishing for a proper ladies’ room and thinking about the mystery box, when a car came down the drive—a red sub-SUV—and Ellen climbed out. She waved at me, then spoke to the person in the vehicle, closed the door, and it drove away.

  Arms wide, and despite my dirt and ash smudges, I hugged her hard.

  “Was that Bonnie driving? What’s up?”

  “Nothing’s up.” She kissed my cheek. “I wanted to see what was happening out here. I knew you were still here, since you didn’t answer your cell phone. Mom, seriously, how are you going to live where you can’t get cell reception?”

  Ellen didn’t wait for a response. She was already waving at Roger. I noticed several of the work crew eyeing her. My temper rose. Ellen would never forgive me if I embarrassed her by instructing the workmen on manners. Still, if they didn’t mind those manners, all bets were off.

  She must’ve asked Roger about the worksite because he was walking the perimeter with her, pointing at this and that. She was always extra nice to Roger. I laughed, reminded that he was her pick for me. As I watched, he pointed across the creek toward the springhouse, then pointed again to where the front of the new house would begin.

  Her smile stopped my breath. Even after all these years, she owned my heart. Would I have bothered with this project if not in the hope she’d come home again? And, in the future, bring her husband and children? I think I would have, but I would’ve put a lot less money and effort into it. The totality of it was for more than me—for Gran, though she was gone, and for Ellen and her children.

  “Mom”—she was back at my side—“this is going to be fabulous.” Suddenly a little embarrassed, she added, “Not that our old home wasn’t wonderful, and not that our house now isn’t, but this sounds amazing. Roger was telling me about the springhouse logs and the fireplace stone and all that. Gran’s house, but with all the new cool stuff.”

  I hugged her again, pressing my face into her hair, so sweet smelling, but I didn’t hold her for long. I guess we had a sort of bargain. I was allowed those grabs in public as long as they were quick and brief.

  “I like how my room will face the back and the woods. I’ll have a gorgeous view of the creek and the forest. Except I won’t be here to enjoy it.”

  “By the time you graduate, the building should be well along. You’ll have a good idea of the final product to take as a memory and to come back home to.”

  “Speaking of going away, I have some things I need. I’ve been working on that list for college.” She smiled, her dimples showing.

  “Oh really?”

  One of the workmen shouted, drawing both of our attention.

  They’d found another box. I ran with the others to see.

  This box was bigger but flatter, and made of what appeared to be tin. Instead of being wrapped in oilcloth, a checked vinyl tablecloth had been folded around it and secured with twine.

  I recognized that tablecloth.

  “What’s this?” a man’s voice called out. “Ms. Cooper?”

  Roger stopped me from climbing into the wreckage.

  “I understand. I’ll wait.” I hadn’t seen that tablecloth in years. Since before Gran passed. It had covered her kitchen table until it disappeared.

  The vinyl fabric had decayed and softened. This box hadn’t held up as well as the aged wooden box found under the hearth. The outside was filthy and corroded, but it appeared to be intact. Might the inside be water-damaged? I wasn’t waiting to find out. Gran had wrapped this with her own hands.

  Roger saw my excitement—how could he not? He carried the box himself, asking me, “Where to? The cabin?”

  I nodded. Ellen walked with us and held open the door. Roger set the box on the wedging table. I practically pushed them aside.

  “This was Gran’s tablecloth.” I could hardly imagine the effort it had taken for her to wrap this and hide it beneath the floor.

  The twine holding the tablecloth in place fell apart at my touch. Forewarned, I eased the tablecloth from around the package. It was smudged with black ash, mud, and charred wood. My hands were soon as black and gritty as the vinyl, but the tablecloth had done its job. The box was intact, and a tiny latch held it shut. No lock.

  Ellen and Roger were so close to me that I felt their breath on my hair as I reached toward the box. What sort of treasure would Gran put in here? I lifted the lid, saw a flash of pink, and realized I might be making a big mistake.

  “What’s that, Mom?” Ellen spoke with delight. “Is that my baby book?”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Eva had brought the pink book tucked in the side of the grocery box. I remembered that day clearly. She’d also brought the local newspaper listing Ellen’s birth, which had prompted me to want to do better for my daughter than that bare announcement. I’d written my own version and drawn the pictures and had put those in the baby book.

  After Ellen’s death, I hadn’t thought about the book. When I did, I couldn’t find it. I was OK with not finding it.

  Now I knew what had become of the baby book. Gran had hidden it here during our grief. What exactly had I written in it? Anything that might cause a problem?

  Ellen reached for the book. I grabbed her hands. “Wait. It’s probably fragile.” I added, “You know, the fact is, I’m embarrassed. I didn’t keep up the book. I didn’t record first steps. No first teeth.” I fumbled about in my brain looking for other excuses. “I had my hands full with Gran, you know.”

  “Mom, I understand.”

  Ellen couldn’t quite hide her disappointment, and I could hardly blame her. I released her hands. “OK, honey. Be easy with it.”

  My daughter lifted the book from the box. There were a few smaller items in the box, but my attention was focused on Ellen and the baby book. She set it gently on the table. The page edges were slightly rippled, as if moisture had been absorbed, but when she opened the cover, the pages themselves were untouched.

  “Oh, Mommy.”

  She hadn’t called me Mommy in a while. Only Mom. Mommy was reserved for times of great distress or apology.

  I saw the lock of hair in clear plastic. I recalled Gran snipping it for a keepsake. I’d forgotten the drawing of the infant Ellen. The tiny hand, the soft cap of baby hair, and so much more, that I felt the feathery curls almost under my fingertips again. That baby smell . . .

  She read it aloud—that handwritten announcement on the cheap notebook paper. It had faded, but was clearly legible.

  Something in my brain tried to split. The reality? The clash of realities? The young-adult Ellen reading the birth announcement of her predecessor? Roger put his arm behind me, around my waist. I’d forgotten his presence. Only when I felt hi
s body alongside mine did I realize I was cold. My vision, which had grown unaccountably blurry, cleared, but a tiny vibration, no more than a shimmer inside me, caused me to shake.

  “Oh, Mommy,” Ellen repeated, then added, “that’s beautiful.” She turned the page, and there was my drawing of Gran holding our sweet baby Ellen. Ellen sighed, then laughed. “It says I was born with blue eyes! Imagine if they’d stayed that color?” She picked up a plastic bag. Within it was a keepsake—soft golden-brown curls.

  Then it happened. I don’t know exactly what. Roger was saying something about how lots of babies’ eyes change color as they get older, their hair, too, but his voice faded, and then . . .

  He was beside me. Ellen was upset and crying out. My head ached. Somehow, I was on the pottery cabin floor.

  Roger’s arm was around my back, and he was saying, “You’re dehydrated. You’ve been out here all day.”

  “Mommy. Mom? Are you OK?”

  I touched my face. It felt a little numb, and my skin was clammy.

  “Get her some water, will you? There are bottles in the cooler in the back of my truck.”

  “I fell?”

  “You fainted,” Roger said, his voice calm. “Luckily I was right beside you.”

  “My head hurts.”

  “Dehydration.” He lifted me to a sitting position. “How’s that? Any dizziness?”

  I saw the edge of the box on the table above and the book lying beside it.

  “Hannah?” he prompted.

  My nails were pinching him. I forcibly relaxed my grip, and Ellen came rushing back in, flushed and twisting the cap off the bottle of water. She tried to press it to my lips, spilling it down my shirt.

  “Wait,” I said. I sat up the rest of the way and leaned forward. I drank the water. It was cool and felt good going down. I closed my eyes and nodded. When I opened them, I saw their worried faces. “Help me up, please.”

  Their voices sounded around me. “Are you sure?” and “Take it easy. You might be light-headed.” But back on my feet, I felt steady. I brushed at my wet shirt. “I’m fine, truly.”

  “Come sit out here,” Roger said. “I’ll drive you home as soon as I let the guys know. We can pick up your car tomorrow.”

  “What?” I shook my head. “I’ll sit for a minute and drink the water, but I’m fine. I don’t know what happened. Maybe it was dehydration, but I’m good now. No need to worry.”

  Roger looked doubtful. “Are you sure?”

  “I am. I’m fine.” I was grateful for the chair.

  Roger brought a second lawn chair over for Ellen. She perched on the edge of it, only inches away from me, looking very uncomfortable and ready to grab for me at a moment’s notice.

  “Mom?”

  “Yes, sweetie?”

  “How are you feeling?”

  “I was dehydrated, that’s all.”

  “You scared me.” After a moment, she said, “Thank you for drawing those pictures of me. I never had any baby pictures, and I understand why, because of the fire and everything, but now to have some and to know they were drawn by you is the most amazing feeling, Mom.” She pressed a hand to her eye and sniffled, then made a show of shaking off the emotionalism. “I’m being silly.”

  “Not at all. I wish I had real baby pictures of you. I don’t have any of me, either.”

  “Mom, let me drive you home.”

  I gave her a look.

  “We’ll knock off soon,” Roger said. “I know you want to be here for the work, but you’ve had enough today. Besides, we’ve made good progress.” He went into the cabin and returned quickly, holding the opened tin box. He stopped beside me.

  “Hannah, what about the rest of these things?”

  In all the excitement, we’d forgotten there were other items in the box. Ellen moved closer again. I picked up a small oblong box. It looked like a carved wooden jeweler’s case, and I knew.

  “My grandmother’s pearls.” Tears pricked at my eyes.

  “They’re beautiful, Mom.”

  I nodded. “She rarely wore them. They were her mama’s before hers.”

  “Can I touch them?” Ellen asked.

  I thought I’d lost them forever. I picked up the pearls carefully, fearful the string would break, and laid them on Ellen’s palms. Ellen didn’t speak, but after a moment she handed them back. Silently, I received them and returned them to the case.

  Gran had managed to pack these away and then get herself down to the floor and back up again . . . during those dark few days after our baby left us. I didn’t remember those days. Or nights. But that was the only explanation.

  She’d tidied up loose ends—things that might hurt me and that hurt her, too. She’d tucked away the pain, hiding it with her treasures. I’m sure she intended to remind me someday that this box existed, otherwise what was the point of putting it in safekeeping? But something had interfered . . . had changed that plan, had perhaps even changed Gran’s memory of it, as her reality had apparently rewritten itself on the day that a child showed up on our porch and restored her happiness.

  I allowed Ellen to drive us home. I wanted to reward her for her kindness, to show I trusted her, and to give her another opportunity for practice and experience.

  “I know you probably worry about me driving because of how your mother and father died.” She looked over at me as she pulled from the driveway onto the main road. “But you don’t need to worry. I’m a good driver.”

  “Keep your eyes on the road and your mind on what you’re doing.” I laid my head back against the headrest. Because of how your mother and father died, she’d said. Should I tell her the truth? Why? If not for Duncan Browne, I would never have known . . . unless some busybody someday broke that code of silence and told me.

  My grandparents’ withdrawal from social life, at least Gran’s, was probably to avoid the gossip. Maybe also to reduce the opportunity for me to hear about it? And then time had passed, and the memory of it, surely hot when the crime happened, had dimmed and been pushed out of the limelight by new gossip.

  We’d accepted Gran’s ill health as the reason for her not going to town or church or socializing. I knew now it was more than that. She was doing what she could to control her world, her reality.

  I guess my brain was still addled from the dehydration or the fainting spell, but it occurred to me that I could solve the problem of Ellen hearing about it from someone else. I said, “Actually, it’s private family business, and I’d prefer to keep it that way.”

  “Like a secret? What?” She frowned.

  “It’s a very sad story. Are you sure you want to hear it?”

  She glanced over. “Tell me.”

  “Eyes straight ahead. Pay attention to the road, please. Or better still, why don’t you pull over at the next opportunity? The lumberyard is just ahead.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Ellen put on the blinker. She slowed and pulled into the parking lot, putting the car into park, and sat back. She looked at me, waiting.

  The irony of discussing it here, in this parking lot where I’d read the clippings, wasn’t lost on me.

  “I found out as an adult that my parents didn’t die in a car crash. Duncan Browne told me.”

  “Mr. Browne? Why?”

  “Gran thought I should know but couldn’t tell me herself, so she asked him to. In thinking back, I wonder whether Grand would’ve told me if it was up to him. I suspect Gran wouldn’t let him.”

  “Oh, Mom. How did they die? Did they die? Are they alive?” Her voice was edged with excitement.

  I dashed that strange, odd hope right away. “No, they’re dead. They died soon after I was born.”

  “But not in a car accident?”

  “No, sweetie. Sometimes people aren’t who we think they are. People can wear pleasant masks, and maybe they mean well and would do right by the other person, but at some point their darker nature, sometimes their true nature, comes out.”

  I was proud of her, but a cautionary ta
le might not be a bad idea. Knowing the truth might have been valuable for me, too, when I was her age.

  “A handsome young man came to town. Anne Marie, my mother, met him, and he swept her off her feet.”

  “A lot like what happened with you, Mom.”

  “Well, sort of, but not really. I delayed going off to college because of Gran and then met your father and had you . . .” I shrugged. “Well, maybe kind of like me.” I smiled to reassure her. “But also very different.”

  I continued. “They fell in love and eloped. Mr. Browne said my grandparents tried, but they couldn’t like him. When their daughter came home already married, they took the couple in, and everything was good for a while. She found out she was pregnant about the time he lost his job. He changed. He became suspicious and moody and eventually threatening.”

  She frowned. “He was really a bad guy after all.”

  “Maybe. I don’t think it’s as simple as that. Remember what I said about wearing masks? I think he knew who he wanted to be. I think he tried to be that person. But there was a sickness in his head. When things changed and the pressure got too rough, the darker part of his nature came out.”

  “What happened?”

  “Soon after I was born, he killed her, and then he killed himself.”

  Ellen’s eyes widened. Her jaw tightened, and she pressed her lips together as if she couldn’t decide what to say or think. Finally she whispered, “Is that true?”

  “It’s true, sweetheart, and very sad.” I touched her shoulder. “We’ll never really know, but I think he realized and regretted what he’d done. I want to believe that.” I shook my head. “But it was too late to take it back. He couldn’t face it. He couldn’t live with himself.”

  After several seconds of heavy silence, Ellen finally said, “You were lucky you had Gran and Grand.”

  “I was incredibly lucky. They were at the house when it happened, but Gran had me out in the yard with her and didn’t know until they heard the shots inside.”