He darted a look at her. She amazed him sometimes. Sometimes? Who was he kidding? Most of the time.
“You’re right,” he said as he merged into the Knoxville traffic. “You’re absolutely right.”
Twenty minutes later they walked down the halls of Village Life Retirement Community. The facility looked more like a nice apartment complex than a nursing home. Beige carpet padded their footfalls, and potted plants and welcome mats greeted guests at each doorway. There were wall sconces beside each door, giving the homey illusion of porch lights.
“Nice place,” Molly whispered.
Adam could only nod. His throat was dry, and he wished he’d brought in his water bottle. He spotted room 107 just ahead to the right and made an effort to regulate his breathing.
The white five-panel door was closed like all the others. They came to a stop on a generic green welcome mat.
Molly looked his way. “Anytime you’re ready.”
Adam tapped on the door. He wished he had a clue what Benjamin looked like now. He kept picturing the photo from 1964, but that was decades ago. There was so much riding on this meeting. So many things to tell Benjamin regarding Lizzie and the letter. So much Adam wanted to know. He was also nervous on his mom’s behalf. He wanted to have good news for her.
A moment later the door swept open. A man about Adam’s height leaned against a walker, peering at him through a pair of black-framed glasses. Though his face was lined with age, his dark hair now white, Adam could still see traces of the younger Benjamin in the sloped eyes and thick brows.
Adam cleared his throat. “Mr. Schwartz? I’m Adam Bradford.” He shook the man’s hand. “We spoke on the phone.”
“Pleased to meet you, young man. You’re right on time.”
“This is Molly Bennett.”
“The innkeeper.” Benjamin shook her hand. “The one who found Lizzie’s letter.” Nothing wrong with his memory.
“Yes, sir,” Molly said with a heart-stopping smile. “It’s nice to finally meet you. We’ve been looking for you for weeks.”
He returned her smile. “I’ve been right here all along. Please come in.”
They followed him into a room that resembled a small hotel room with a few personal effects. Sunshine flooded through a picture window, making the room feel bright and cheerful, and the faint scent of pine cleaner hung in the air.
Benjamin’s shoulders were slightly stooped, his movements a little slow as he trudged behind his walker. “I usually entertain in one of the community areas, but I thought this conversation could benefit from a little privacy, yes? I’m sorry; I should’ve offered you something to drink. Would you like some coffee or tea? I have one of those new-fangled pod machines.”
“No, thank you,” Adam said, and Molly also declined.
They seated themselves around a small circular dinette table.
“I have to admit,” Benjamin said, “hearing from you the other day was quite a jolt. I’ve thought of Lizzie often over the years, but knowing she tried to contact me way back then leaves me with mixed feelings.”
“I’m sure it does, Mr. Schwartz,” Molly said. “We did bring the letter if you’d like to read it.”
“Oh, wild horses couldn’t stop me. I’ve driven myself crazy wondering what she might’ve said. And please, call me Ben.”
Molly explained in detail how she’d found the letter and a little about their search. Adam slipped in a detail or two when he could stop studying the man long enough to contribute to the conversation.
When Ben laced his hands on the table Adam noticed a simple gold wedding band circling his finger. He met Molly’s gaze and saw she’d noticed also. Adam quickly scanned the room for pictures of his family, but they were too far away.
“Here’s the letter.” Molly pulled it from her purse and slid it across the table. “Maybe we should give you some privacy. We could wait out in the lobby?”
Ben patted her hand. “No, that’s quite all right, dear. It’s been a lot of years. I’m more eager than anything, so if you don’t mind . . .”
“Go right ahead,” Adam said.
The man pulled out the sheet and began reading.
Wanting to give him a modicum of privacy, Adam turned to Molly. She gave him an encouraging smile before her gaze began drifting around the room.
He did the same. There was a twin-size bed, neatly made, and a bureau, covered in photos and greeting cards. Beside the bureau was a waist-high bookcase, its shelves bowing slightly under the weight. Adam could read a few authors from where he sat: C. S. Lewis, Stephen King, Kurt Vonnegut. Quite the variety. He couldn’t help but smile as he wondered at genetics. He also couldn’t help but scan the shelves for his own books, but he didn’t see any.
There was a hand-stitched wall hanging that read Be still and know that I am God. He shared another smile with Molly, his eyes lingering on hers for a moment, soaking in her composure. Her presence calmed him, he realized, and he was glad she was with him today.
“I will wait for you to come back to me,” Ben read softly. “I will wait four years or however long it takes, and we will become husband and wife as my heart has longed to do all along.”
Hands trembling, Ben folded up the letter, then slid it back into its envelope. When he removed his glasses, his dark eyes were clouded with tears. He cleared his throat. “My goodness. I didn’t expect it to hit me this hard.”
Molly slipped him a tissue she must’ve fished from her purse. “It’s an emotional letter. It’s obvious how much she loved you.”
“She sounds just as desperate as I felt at the time. I can’t believe she wrote this. For years I . . . I thought she meant what she’d said. Not at first. At first I just thought her temper had gotten the best of her. But later . . . when I never heard from her . . . when I wrote her and never heard back . . .”
“You wrote her?” Adam asked.
“Several letters. I apologized for upsetting her so, and I begged her to wait for me.”
“Her parents,” Adam said.
“They must’ve intercepted the letters,” Molly added.
Ben put his glasses back on. “I’m afraid you must be right.”
A beat of silence ensued as though they all needed a moment to digest the revelation. It was staggering how such an action could change the course of a person’s life. Multiple people’s lives: Ben, Lizzie, Adam, and his mom, just to start.
Had Lizzie’s lost letter and her parents’ interference advanced God’s will or gotten in the way of it? Maybe they’d never know. But here they were today, meeting Adam’s grandfather. And Adam knew this meeting had been divinely orchestrated. It gave him the courage to continue.
“What brought on the argument, Mr.—Ben? If you don’t mind my asking.”
“That night I’d gone to her house to ask for her father’s blessing. She warned me not to, but I didn’t understand why until much later.”
“Understand what?” Molly asked.
“Her daddy let me know in no uncertain terms that I wasn’t good enough for his little girl. I was a janitor at the time, you see. Lizzie was of a different class. Her parents owned a store, and they were well to do.
“I felt lower than a worm by the time I left his house that night. Asking for Lizzie’s hand had taken every bit of courage I could muster, and his rejection was a huge blow.
“Then I ran into Lizzie outside and we argued. She tried to tell me her father was prejudiced—I’m Jewish, you see. But I hardly registered what she was saying. He’d played on all my insecurities—and it worked. But I wasn’t going to give up. I was determined to prove my worth. I was going to enlist so I could go to college and get a degree—and I did. I was blind to the fact that, in his eyes, I would always be nothing. I only realized later that I’d been in no frame of mind to be making important decisions. But Lizzie pressed me, and I just reacted.”
“That’s so sad,” Molly said. “That one night, one mistake, could alter your future that way.”
“It took me four years in the army, four years at university, and several years beyond that to realize Lizzie had been right all along. My worth had nothing to do with a job or a paycheck. My worth, everyone’s worth, is based on God-given value.
“I tried to find her when I got out of the army, but her parents had moved away, and her friend wasn’t there anymore. Nobody knew where Lizzie had gone. It was as if she’d just disappeared into thin air.
“It took a lot of years to get over her. Lizzie was . . .” Ben shook his head, a wistful smile playing over his lips. “She was something. I was head over heels for her.”
Adam’s gaze flickered down to Ben’s hand. To the simple band, encircling his finger. “But you met somebody else, I see.”
Ben twisted the band. “Yes, I did. My Rosa Lee. We met at the school where I ended up teaching. She was a kindergarten teacher, and it was her first year also. She befriended me, but I was still heartsick over Lizzie and a little reticent to have my heart broken again. Rosa Lee was patient with me. I finally got a clue and asked her out.” He chuckled fondly. “We got married the next summer and taught in the same school through most of our careers. She was so good with children. It always grieved me so that—”
At his sudden silence Adam darted a look at Molly. She subtly lifted a shoulder.
“I’m afraid we weren’t able to have children. I was grieved over it, but not like Rosa Lee. She poured herself into every child who passed through her class.”
His mom had no siblings then. And now their news was even more significant. Because Ben did have a child after all.
But he also had a wife. Would she welcome a child another woman had been able to provide him? Adam wasn’t a woman, much less a childless one, but it seemed as though that might be a bitter pill for any woman to swallow.
“I’m sorry,” Molly said. “But I’m glad you were able to move on from Lizzie and find happiness with another woman.”
“Yes, we were very happy. She was my best friend.”
Were? Was? Adam’s heart rate kicked up. He traded looks with Molly. Guilt stabbed at the hope he felt.
“She’s been gone for four years now—complications with diabetes. She monitored it very carefully, but it’s a tricky disease. I was always healthy as a horse, but it turns out my bones are quite brittle, and I fell and broke my hip a while back. Never fully came back from that, and here I am. It’s a nice place though. Having no family, I like having a community so close.”
“Do you get many visitors?” Molly asked.
“I have a wonderful church family where Rosa Lee and I served for years. They have a service here on Sundays just for me—well, it started out that way. Now, a dozen or so of my new friends attend too. And if they fall asleep my pastor doesn’t seem to mind.” His chuckle was deep and rich.
His health—his heart—was apparently fine. He had no wife. The last of the potential obstacles were gone; the pathway was clear. There was no reason not to tell Benjamin Schwartz that he did, indeed, have a child. That at this very moment he was sitting face-to-face with his grandson.
forty-four
Adam could feel Molly’s gaze on him. She was waiting for him to make the next move.
Ben leaned back nonchalantly, just beginning to relax with them.
Adam hated to introduce shocking news, but there was no getting around it now. He shifted in his seat, taking a deep breath. “Ben . . . We brought two more letters with us. They’re letters Lizzie sent to her friend Nonnie. You remember her?”
Ben smiled, as if remembering Nonnie fondly. “Oh, yes. We were pretty tight that summer. That Nonnie was a real character.”
From his peripheral vision, Adam saw Molly reach into her purse.
“Lizzie wrote Nonnie these letters over the next year after you enlisted. I think it’s important that you read them.”
Ben’s smile fell from his lips. He straightened in his chair, as if bracing himself for whatever came next. “All right.”
Molly slid a letter over. “This is the first one. It was written in October of ’64.”
“Lizzie would’ve been in Ohio then, for her first semester at college.” Ben frowned at the envelope, then his gaze slid between them. “Louisiana?”
Adam nodded at the letter.
Ben slid the paper from the envelope, unfolded it, and began reading to himself.
Molly gave him an encouraging smile and a tiny nod. He tried to remember what information the letter contained. That Lizzie had dropped out of college and had gone to live with her aunt. And the big news: that she was—
“Pregnant?” Ben whispered, looking from Adam to Molly. “She was pregnant?”
Before they could answer he was reading again. His breaths had turned ragged. His gnarled hand grasped his shirtfront.
The signs of distress worried Adam. He felt Molly’s hand slide over his. She gave him a reassuring smile.
“Oh, dear God,” Ben said, still reading. “They wanted her to give up our baby.”
Adam closed his eyes. Please, God. It was all he could think to say. He could only imagine the shock Ben was feeling. The fear and regret that would surely follow.
When Ben finished reading he lowered the letter and removed his glasses. His eyes were wet with tears again. “How could they do that to her? She thought I didn’t care about her? I would’ve moved heaven and earth—”
Molly covered his hand with hers. “Of course you would have.”
“Did she have the baby? What happened to Lizzie? What happened to our child?”
“I know this is a lot to take in,” Adam said. “I’m sorry to deliver such shocking news.”
“Do you need a moment to catch your breath?” Molly asked.
A tear slipped down Ben’s cheek. “I need to know what happened.”
Adam gave Molly a nod, and she slid over the other letter. “This one was written in March.”
Ben’s fingers trembled so much he struggled with the envelope. When he finally had the letter in his hands he slipped on his glasses again and began reading.
This one explained about the adoptive couple and expounded on Lizzie’s grief at having to give up her child. It was heartbreaking, and Adam wished he could spare the man from knowing of Lizzie’s misery.
Most of all he hoped the forthcoming news would make it all worthwhile.
Ben lowered the letter, his gaze connecting with Adam’s, then Molly’s. “Did it happen then? Did they make her give up our baby?”
“Yes,” Adam said. “I’m afraid they did. To the couple she mentioned in the letter. Nonnie filled in the rest of the details for us. She was in contact with Lizzie for a while, but as you can see she was sworn to secrecy.”
Ben stared at Adam, but he was obviously lost in thought. Lost in another time and place, where grief and misery were close companions.
Adam leaned forward, placing a hand on the man’s arm. “Ben . . . You have a daughter.”
A tear trickled down the man’s cheek. He removed his glasses again. “I have a baby girl. Only she’s not a baby anymore, is she? My goodness, she’d be—in her fifties by now.”
“Yes,” Adam said.
“I’ve missed so much. I can hardly believe this.”
“I’m so sorry for all that’s happened,” Molly said. “For all you’ve missed. But I promise all the sadness will be worth it.”
Ben’s eyes darted between Adam and Molly. “Do you know where she is—my daughter? I have to find her. Is there any way to find her?”
Molly gave Adam a pointed look.
His heart stuttered at what lay ahead. He hoped Ben would be delighted by the news. But what if it backfired? What if his grandfather found him just as lacking as his father had?
Desperation flickered in the man’s eyes. “I have a daughter out there somewhere.”
“Yes, sir. You do.” Adam’s insecurities faded in light of the man’s distress. He swallowed hard against the lump swelling in his throat. “And we’ve already found
her.”
He’d planned, if it came to this, that he would back up and tell the man the whole story, starting years ago with his mother’s adoption. But the desperation in Ben’s eyes begged Adam to skip to the chase.
“Your daughter”—Adam’s voice trembled—“is my mother.”
Ben blinked at Adam. Confusion furrowed his brow.
The air conditioner kicked on, humming quietly.
“My mother was born Catherine Sue Mays on May 3, 1965. She was adopted by my grandparents. He was a banker and she was a stay-at-home—” He gave his head a shake. He was getting too bogged down in details.
“I don’t understand,” Ben said. “This doesn’t make sense. You just happened to be in Bluebell, and this gal here found the letter while you were there, and it just so happens that your mother is my daughter?”
It really did sound absurd, and Adam knew he should elucidate. Too bad emotions were crawling all over his mind, spinning a sticky web that trapped all his words of explanation.
Molly squeezed Adam’s hand. “I know it must sound impossible, Ben. But here’s how it happened.”
And then she told the story of his mother’s search for her birth mother years ago, which had led her to Bluebell. “Lizzie had already passed by then, but Catherine fell in love with the town. And so when Adam was searching for a place to set—” She stopped suddenly, her gaze darting to Adam, seeking guidance.
“I’m an author.” Adam couldn’t tell the man anything but the full truth. And, in truth, it felt good to say it out loud. Really good. “I needed a place to set my next novel, and I went to Bluebell to find inspiration—on my mother’s recommendation.”
“He came to my inn, and I found the letter and asked for his help. The rest is history.”
“When we discovered Nonnie had been friends with Lizzie, we enlisted her help too.”
“But she didn’t tell us about the pregnancy,” Molly added. “Not until just this week.”
“And then yesterday when I was talking to my mom, she happened to mention my grandfather being a banker, and I suddenly put two and two together. I asked her what her birth mother’s name was, and she told me—it was Elizabeth Van Buren.”
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