Chapter 4 - Clara’s Father
Thomas read the note twice.
Clara sat very still.
“I was not there,” she said.
“I know.”
But Thomas’s voice carried uncertainty for the first time in their marriage.
Clara crossed the room and opened the cedar chest that had belonged to her father.
She removed old invoices, a Bible, and a bundle of documents tied with twine.
At the bottom lay his private journal.
She had never opened it.
The final pages were dated during the week Annie died.
Clara read aloud.
Silas came again.
Annie refuses the deed.
The doctor is frightened.
Thomas must not know until I can prove it.
The next entry was written in a shaking hand.
The child lived longer than they said.
Thomas stood so quickly that the chair fell behind him.
“What does that mean?”
Clara turned the page.
It had been torn out.
Thomas took the journal and examined the binding.
Several pages were missing.
He walked into the cold night without his coat.
Clara followed him to the barn.
“You knew your father kept secrets,” Thomas said.
“I knew he was afraid of something.”
“You never told me.”
“I did not know it concerned Annie.”
Thomas looked at her with a grief so sharp it seemed newly born.
“For five years, I trusted that the worst thing had already happened.”
Clara stepped closer.
“And now?”
“Now I don’t know what happened at all.”
At dawn, they rode to the cemetery.
Annie and James’s grave appeared undisturbed.
But the iron flower holder had been pulled from the earth.
Beneath it was a second brass key.
It matched Gideon’s.
Thomas dug carefully around the base of the stone.
His shovel struck wood.
Clara covered Annie Rose’s eyes.
Thomas uncovered a narrow box no larger than a book.
Inside lay a folded baptism certificate.
The name written on it was James Hail.
The date was two days after the night Thomas had been told his son died.
At the bottom was a witness signature.
May you like
Clara Bennett’s father.
