The Wedding Tree (29 page)

•   •   •

“And your families accepted the story?” Hope asked.

I opened my eyelids. Hope was sitting on the edge of my bed, her face sad, her eyes enormous. I nodded. “Yes. Back in her day, Charlie's mother had had several miscarriages, and she'd suffered some serious depression over it. Melancholia, they used to call it, where she couldn't get out of bed. That helped make the story understandable.”

“But you never found out what happened to the baby?”

“No.” A heaviness weighed on my chest, a heaviness that had been there for decades but I'd tried to ignore. How could I have lived with it all these years? “I don't know what happened, but I know it was something awful.”

“Maybe not, Gran. Maybe Granddad helped with the birth and he was traumatized because it had gone so wrong.”

“No. Three things convinced me Charlie did something terrible.” I held up the pointer finger on my right hand. “The revolver that he always carried in the glove box was gone. On the trip home I opened the glove box looking for a tissue, and Charlie nearly drove off the road, he was so upset.”

I lifted a second finger. “Charlie wouldn't let me near the trunk of the car when we were packing up in Mississippi. He was trying
to hide something—I knew him well enough to know that. So I peeked in when he went back in the house for a bag and sure enough, there was a piece of luggage I'd never seen before. It was tan with dark brown stripes, and it looked brand-new.” I looked at Hope. She was watching me, her forehead furrowed. I lifted my third finger. “After we got home, that very night, Charlie went out and buried it in our backyard.”

“Oh, Gran!” Her hand flew to her mouth.

“I didn't see where he buried it. That's what I need your help with.”

Hope's eyes were round as full moons.

I sank back in my chair and closed my eyes. The events I'd tried so hard to forget for so many years began pressing in. I started talking, and before I knew it, I was reliving the past.

1948

That day we got home, Charlie convinced my mother that he'd take care of me and she should go back to her house for the night. I was too upset to sleep, and Charlie hadn't come to bed. I knew I'd have to stay in bed much of the next day—my parents thought I was just a week out from childbirth, remember, and that's how things were done back then—and I was restless. I got up and roamed the house and I looked out the window.

And there was Charlie, with that piece of luggage. He was holding it in one hand and coming out of the shed with a shovel in the other. And then Eddie woke up crying—he'd apparently picked up on the sadness and tension of everyone, and it gave him a nightmare—and I went to his room to comfort him. I spent probably forty-five minutes reading to him and getting him back asleep. When I went downstairs, Charlie was washing up at the kitchen sink.

“What are you doing?” I asked him.

“Washing my hands.”

Lady MacBeth came to mind. “I see that,” I said. “I meant what were you doing in the backyard with that luggage?”

His face got all mottled and red. “I don't know what you're talking about.”

“I saw you. You were getting a shovel out of the shed and you had that striped suitcase.”

He turned off the faucet and grabbed a dish towel. “It's dark. You can't be sure of what you saw. And sometimes, Addie, what happens in the dark should stay there.” He pressed the towel to his face for a moment. When he pulled it away, I saw that his hands were shaking. “Addie—I'm so, so sorry. All I wanted . . .” He looked at me. Tears rolled down his face, and for a moment, he looked like the little boy who'd been my friend in grade school. “All I ever wanted was for you to love me just a smidgeon as much as I love you.”

He sank into a chair, put his head in his hands, and sobbed. I've never heard anything so sad—it was a heart-wrenching, from-the-soul sob, so loud I feared he'd wake the children. He seemed like a child himself—lost and lonely and heartbroken and scared. And . . . I felt the exact same way.

I thought,
What will happen if I learn that he did the horrible thing I fear he did?
And I could come up with no good outcome. If I knew for sure, wouldn't I have to do something? What would that be? What would it do to our children? To his parents? To my parents? To our grandmothers? The shame would destroy us all.

He was right; I didn't want to know. So I decided to let the things of the dark stay in the dark.

•   •   •

I opened my eyes and looked at Hope. “Whatever Charlie did, he'd done because he loved me, and I'd driven him plumb out of his mind. It was as much my fault as Charlie's. I was as guilty as he was. And I've lived with the shame and guilt of that all my life. But now . . . well, now I've got to clear it up before I meet my maker.”

Hope's arms wound tight around me as she knelt beside my
chair. “Oh, Gran—you had so many people's lives to think about! You just did what you thought was best.”

“Best isn't the same as right. I let lie pile upon lie.”

“You tried to protect your children! And anyway, it doesn't make sense that Granddad would have deliberately killed the baby. Why on earth would he have done that, after you'd gone through the pregnancy ruse and were willing—eager, even—to raise it?”

I drew a deep breath. “I've thought and thought about that, all these years. And all these years, I've wondered . . .” I stopped.

“What, Gran?”

“Well, a man can never be sure that a child is really his.” I drew a deep breath and voiced my most secret thought. “All these years, I've wondered if that baby was black.”

hope

I
waited until eight thirty that night—after Gran went to bed and I knew it was past the girls' bedtime—and I called Matt.

“My grandmother told me something I need to talk about,” I whispered into the phone.

“Come on over.”

He let me in the kitchen door, poured me a glass of wine, then sat with me at the breakfast room table and listened somberly as I poured out the whole sordid tale.

“Do you think your grandmother's fears are justified?”

“I don't know. Maybe her memory is playing tricks on her—or maybe she misunderstood what was going on. One thing is certain, though: she won't rest until I find that suitcase.”

Matt's eyes were somber. “If you find it, and it contains what she thinks, you'll have to call the police.”

Oh, dear Lord. The possibility of a murder investigation hadn't even occurred to me.

“Are you prepared to do that? And what about your uncle?”

Eddie. Poor, sweet, tenderhearted Eddie. We texted every day and he called several times a week. I'd kept him up to date on Gran's story, and so far he'd been entirely sympathetic.

“Will he be torn up to find out his father was a murderer?” Matt asked.

I considered the question. “He'll be upset, but I don't think it'll devastate him. They were never that close. My grandfather wanted him to be a man's man, and Eddie . . . well, he's into flower arranging.”

Matt smiled.

“Granddad used to say things like ‘don't be a sissy' and ‘you're acting like a Nancy boy,' things that were really hurtful.”

“It's a big leap to go from knowing your dad was antigay to learning he might be a murderer.”

“True. But when I told Eddie about Joe, his first question was, ‘Is Joe my father, too?' He seemed disappointed that he wasn't.”

Matt was silent for a moment. “You know, there's another option here, Hope. You can write all this off as the ramblings of an elderly woman who had a head injury and let it go. She might not remember telling you about it in the morning.”

“Oh, she'll remember.” I took a sip of wine. “Everything she's told me up until now has been leading to this. She said she has to take care of this so she can die in peace.”

“And you said you'd help her.” It wasn't a question, but a statement.

He knew me pretty well. I nodded.

Matt took a thoughtful sip of wine. “Does she have any idea where to look?”

I shook my head. “Just the backyard.”

“Well, suitcases have metal hinges and locks. I know someone who has a professional metal detector. I'll see if I can borrow it.”

My heart warmed. I put my hand over his. “Thank you so much, Matt.”

“Hold your thanks until we see if we get anywhere.” He squeezed my fingers and looked into my eyes, his expression grim. “You may not thank me if we find what your grandmother fears.”

hope

K
irsten lived in a loft above the coffee shop. A separate doorway led to the staircase, and when she opened the second-story door, I felt like I'd been transported to London or New York. It had high ceilings, an industrial feel, and a vibe like a loft in Soho or Tribeca.

“This is amazing,” I said, looking at the wall of windows out the back, the modern decor, the industrial look of the high ceilings. “I'd never have guessed there was anything this cool and urban-looking in Wedding Tree.”

“There wasn't until Kirsten,” said Aimee.

“Oh, yeah?”

“Absolutely,” said a rotund woman wearing a strawberry-printed shirt. Kirsten introduced her as Linda and told me she was a strawberry farmer.

“Kirsten raised the taste level for all of us,” Linda said. “Came back from college on the East Coast with all kinds of highfalutin ideas.”

“Linda, you think cappuccino is highfalutin,” Freret teased laughingly.

“Well, it is! Don't know why you need to go to all that trouble for a cup of coffee.”

The women all laughed good-naturedly.

“I think you know almost everyone,” Kirsten said.

I looked around and saw all of the women from the Friends of the Forest outing, plus a few new faces. I shook hands with Lauren, a real estate agent who had met with Eddie about listing the house while Gran was in the hospital.

“How're things going?” she asked.

“Slowly,” I confessed.

She smiled. “That's to be expected. I think it's so great that you're helping your grandmother out this way.”

Kirsten introduced me to two women on the side of the room. “Rose is the produce manager at the grocery store, and Sarah is a piano teacher. And of course you know Jillian.”

“Of course.” I greeted the two new women and started to give Jillian a hug, but she held herself in a rigid way that made me opt for a handshake.

“Come and get a mojito,” said Kirsten.

I sauntered over to the kitchen bar, then fell into a conversation with Jen the librarian about possibilities for a mural in the children's section. I told her I wouldn't be in town long enough to paint it myself, then found myself regretting it as we discussed ideas.

Kirsten dinged a spoon on her glass. “All right, ladies—time to actually discuss the book.” I followed the other women to the center of the room, where two curved white sectionals floated over a bright African-style rug like commas.

“So what did you think of
In Your Dreams
?” Kirsten asked when we were all settled.

“I thought it was wonderful,” said Linda. “I just loved the characters and the way they interacted.”

“Yeah. They had such witty conversations!”

“I wish my husband were half as interesting as the hero,” said Marie.

“Fictional men are so much sexier than the real thing,” sighed Rose.

“What did the heroine think was essential in a relationship?” Kirsten said.

“I didn't have to time to read the book, but personally, I'd say the most essential thing is someone who puts me first,” Clarabel declared.

“I want a man who understands the work-life balance,” Freret said.

“I'd be happy with a man who understands the golf-life balance,” sighed Aimee.

Everyone laughed. I remembered from the dinner conversation at the fete that Aimee's husband was an avid golfer.

“Someone who meets his responsibilities,” said Linda.

Everyone nodded. “Someone who listens,” said Sarah.

“Someone who loves with his whole heart,” I chimed in.

“Ooh, that's a good one,” Kirsten said.

Everyone nodded—except Jillian. She looked right at me. “If you feel that way, you shouldn't date Matt.”

The room fell silent, except for a side conversation the grocer and strawberry farmer were having in the corner. Apparently I wasn't the only one too stunned to speak.

Marie leaned forward, her forehead scrunched. “Wait—Hope's dating Matt?”

“Not
dating
dating,” I muttered weakly.

“They kissed. Mrs. Ivy saw them,” Lauren announced.

“The thing is, Matt will never love anyone the way he loved Christine.” Jillian's face was earnest, her voice somber. “Any other woman will be always second best.”

“Oh, that's really sad!” said Jen.

“Yeah, Jillian. And maybe that's not the case,” Marie said.

“Oh, it's the case, all right. Christine was his first love and she'll always have part of his heart. Some women would be okay with it, but a woman who wants to be loved with a man's whole heart . . . well, Matt just doesn't have a whole heart to give.”

Once again, awkward silence enveloped the room.

“Bummer,” said Jen.

“I think the key is knowing what you're getting into from the start,” said Linda, who'd just finished talking with the produce buyer and apparently had missed the fact that Jillian's comments were aimed at me.

Kirsten sent me a sympathetic glance. “Well, let's get back to the book. How would you summarize the theme?”

The conversation moved on, but my mind never moved much beyond Jillian's remark.

After the book discussion, Kirsten brought out coffee and a decadent chocolate tart. “We have one more matter to discuss,” she announced. “Miss Addie is leaving next month, and I think it would be wonderful if the whole town gave her a surprise send-off party.”

“Ooh yes!” the group murmured.

“I'll host it in the coffee shop,” Kirsten said. “It'll be the unveiling of Hope's mural and the shop's extra room.”

“Perfect!” said Lauren. “How can we help?”

“Spread the word, but emphasize it's to be kept secret from Miss Addie. And get everyone to gather up photos she took for them. I want to have an exhibition of her work along the walls.”

The women all chattered excitedly about ideas for the party.

It was after eleven before I headed home. The sting of Jillian's words was largely washed away in the excitement of planning Gran's party, but an underlying sadness remained.

It didn't really matter if Jillian was right or wrong about Matt, I realized as I climbed Gran's porch, because I, too, was leaving Wedding Tree in a month. There was no point in thinking about the long term when our relationship was destined to end in a few short weeks.

And therein lay my problem: How could I keep that knowledge from ruining the little time I had left with him? And even more importantly, how did I keep from falling in love with him?

Love? I stopped short and stared at his house—at his window, where he was sleeping. No. I wasn't—I refused to be—falling in
love with Matt. I liked him, I found him wildly attractive, but I couldn't be—I wouldn't allow myself to be—falling in love with a man I'd never see after a few more weeks.

•   •   •

Gran was upset when I first told her Matt was going to help us try to find the buried suitcase on Saturday.

“You told him?” She'd clutched her chest and stopped rocking in her bedroom chair. “Oh, dear. What on earth did you say? What must he think?”

I hadn't realized how terrifying it would be to learn that the secret she'd hidden for more than sixty years was suddenly out in the open, known by a virtual stranger.

I patted her hand. “I just said that you thought Granddad had buried something and that you don't know what it is, but you'd always felt the need to find out.”

Gran drew in a ragged breath, then slowly exhaled. After a moment, she nodded. “Well, it'll all be a matter of public record when everything is said and done. Guess I might as well get used to the idea.”

“When do you want me to tell Eddie your suspicions?” I asked her gently. I'd told him everything else she'd told me, but I'd held off mentioning the buried suitcase.

“Later. After we see if we find anything.”

I leaned toward her from my perch on her bed. “You know, Gran, it's entirely possible there never was a baby. Maybe Granddad was just trying to jolt you into understanding how hard it was on him, knowing that you loved someone else.”

“Oh, child—I thought that, too, when he first insisted on the whole crazy scheme. But then I found a book on baby care hidden among his work papers. It had dog-eared pages about what to do when a mother rejects a baby and how to make an adopted baby feel like your own. Mind you, this was a man who didn't read a single book when either your mother or Eddie were born.” She set
the rocker back in motion. “That, more than anything, convinced me things were just as he said. He was worried I wouldn't accept this baby.”

I swallowed hard.

Her hand turned under mine so that we were palm to palm. She squeezed my fingers. “Thank you for helping me with this. You have no idea how much this means to me.”

•   •   •

Matt showed up bright and early Saturday morning, carrying a large metal detector and a complicated set of instructions. He fiddled with the settings, then set the instructions on the garden table. “I think we're ready to give it a go. Do we have any idea where to start looking?”

“Maybe Gran has some photos of what the yard looked like in 1948.”

We traipsed inside and asked her. Sure enough, she did—and amazingly, she knew just where to find them. “That last attic box in the dining room—the one with the red tape. It's full of albums. The dates are on the outside.”

Matt hauled it out and we gathered around, opening albums on the dining room table. It was a virtual treasure trove—so fascinating that I all but forgot why we were looking through it. There were photos of my mom and Uncle Eddie as children on a metal swing set. There were close-ups of flowers, wide shots of the backyard, and several photos of a tall, lean man in a fedora by the shed, his face shaded by the brim of his hat.

Gran's finger lingered on the photo. “That's Charlie.”

I'd seen dozens of similar photos, but for the first time, it occurred to me that in all the pictures where Eddie was a toddler or older, Gran almost always had photographed my grandfather so that his expression was unreadable. She always captured the essence of her subjects; she'd chosen to photograph her own husband as unknowable.

“Did you notice anything unusual about the backyard?” Matt's voice pulled my rambling thoughts back to the present. “Anything moved around, any ground disturbed?”

Gran shook her head. “I made a point of not looking.”

“It was fall, so there would have been leaves on the ground,” Matt mused.

Gran nodded. “That made it easier to turn a blind eye.”

Matt shuffled through the photos. He held up one of Mom and Uncle Eddie hunting Easter eggs in the backyard. “You had a vegetable garden in the back?”

“Yes.”

“That's a likely place, because the ground would have been softer,” Matt mused.

Gran nodded. “Charlie tilled it every spring.”

“Did he till it the following spring?”

“Yes.”

“So if he buried it there, it's probably at least three feet down. We'll set the detector for that depth, then.”

We went outside, and Matt fiddled with the metal detector. Holding the handle, he waved the round coils of the machine parallel to the ground over the dirt beside the patio. The detector pinged.

“There's something here!” I said.

Matt looked at the dial. “It says it's brass or steel. That's positive; that's what the hinges and locks were most likely made of.”

Excited, we both manned shovels. To our disappointment, we uncovered a pair of pliers.

•   •   •

Each ding led to an equally lackluster find. After two hours, our collection included nine bottle caps, eight nails, two garden trowels and thirty-eight cents.

Sophie's and Zoey's heads appeared over the fence.

“Whatcha doin'?” asked Sophie.

Matt glanced up. “Looking for something.”

“Is it buried treasure?” Zoey came through the shrubbery.

“Sort of,” I replied.

“Wow! Can we help?” Sophie followed her sister into Gran's lawn.

“No,” Matt said.

“Why not?” Zoey asked.

“Because this is grown-up work.”

I hated that Matt was giving up valuable time with his daughters to help me. I moved closer and whispered, “There's no reason they can't join us. If we find something, we can take a break and pull it out later.”

We were interrupted by Jillian emerging through the shrubbery opening. She was wearing a top cut low enough to show cleavage and fitted jeans, and her hair had been straightened. She looked lovely. My chest tensed.

“Hello,” she said.

I smiled. “Hi.”

Matt lowered the metal detector. “I thought Peggy and Griff were watching the girls at their house.”

“They were. But Sophie wanted to get her paints, and since I was visiting Mom and Dad, I offered to bring them over.”