“She knows that.”
“Are you prepared to come up empty? Maybe Herbert Aldridge is guilty of having a hand in Rob’s disappearance and maybe he’s not. We just don’t know and we might never know. Sometimes the past is best left to itself.”
“I’ll deal with what comes,” Laura said firmly. The butterflies in her stomach belied her outward display of confidence. “I plan to spend a few days a week here in Port George—I’m booked at the Lilac Inn—and the rest of the time with Arden in Eliot’s Corner. Here’s my contact information.” Laura passed him a piece of notebook paper on which she had written her cell phone number and e-mail address. “I’m old-fashioned. I suppose most people would have asked for your phone number and sent you this information electronically.”
Mr. Coldwell smiled. “There’s nothing wrong with pencil and paper. They worked just fine for thousands of years. So, what’s your first step?”
“I’d like to speak with Frannie Smith. But given what I know of her stance against my mother’s family, I’m not sure she’ll agree to go into the story of my father’s disappearance again. After all, she had her brother declared dead. End of story.”
“Not for Frannie,” Mr. Coldwell corrected. “By the way, her married name is Armitage. Let me talk to her first, let her know you’re legitimate—Well, you know what I mean. I’ll call you when I’ve spoken to her.”
Laura rose from her chair. “Thank you, Mr. Coldwell.”
“Please, call me Ted. And remember me to your mother.”
“I will.”
Ted walked her to the door of his office. “Laura, it’s so good to finally know for sure that you exist.”
Laura felt tears threatening again; all she could manage in return was a nod before she hurried out of the office.
Chapter 43
Summer 1985
Victoria stood in front of the full-length mirror in her bedroom. It was strange, she thought. On the outside, she hadn’t changed. She was still tall and slim and blond. Her eyes were still blue. But on the inside . . . A stranger looked back at Victoria from the depths of the mirror. A new Victoria, older, not necessarily wiser, chastened by misfortune and heartache.
With a sigh, Victoria turned from her image. She had been back in Port George for almost two weeks, but not once had her parents mentioned the baby. Her mother seemed incapable of looking her daughter in the eye as she reminded Victoria that Ted Coldwell had always been interested in her and would make a fine match. Her father was even more formal and distant than he had been before he had sent Victoria away. That was all right. Victoria didn’t want to talk to him anyway. She didn’t even want to see him.
What she wanted, at least in that moment, was to get out of the house. The weather was fine. There was no reason why she had to continue her self-imposed isolation. No reason other than the fear of being found out.
But how could she be? She weighed less now than she had last summer; stress was an effective reducer. Nothing about her body would give away the truth. Her face, however, was another matter; it was etched with sadness. But she would wear sunglasses and avoid as best she could any conversations with passing busybodies. She couldn’t stay in the house forever. There had to be a first time and it might as well be now.
Before more doubts could assail her, Victoria reached for her sunglasses and shoulder bag. She encountered no one on her way out of the house or all the way to the bottom of Old Orchard Hill. The sun on her head felt comfortably warm. Her stride was strong.
Not until she had reached an isolated stretch of road that led into the heart of town did trouble appear, in the form of Frannie Smith, Rob’s older sister.
Victoria came to a halt, her stomach flipping. It was one of her worst nightmares come true. Why couldn’t it be one of Rob’s other sisters, or, better yet, a distant friend, an acquaintance? Why Frannie, of all people, the one member of the Smith family who hadn’t taken to Victoria?
Frannie Smith, too, had stopped in her tracks, effectively blocking the way forward. Her expression was dark, suspicious. Victoria felt a shiver of fear run through her. Would Frannie resort to physical violence against the girl she suspected of having led her beloved brother into trouble? If she turned around and ran, would Frannie fly after her?
Slowly, not knowing what else to do, Victoria continued on her way until Frannie was only three or four feet in front of her. Frannie was wearing jeans and a Kiss T-shirt. She looked much older than the last time Victoria had seen her, less than a year ago. Her eyes looked hard.
“You’re back.”
“Yes,” Victoria said simply. She could feel panic rising in her and prayed her fear didn’t show.
“How’s college?” Frannie’s tone of voice made it clear she had absolutely no interest in the answer.
Victoria smiled nervously. “Fine. You know.”
“No,” Frannie said sharply. “As a matter of fact, I don’t know.”
Victoria cringed. It had been a stupid thing to say, but she was so nervous. “Sorry,” she mumbled. “Rob. Has he come home?” Why was she asking such a ridiculous question? She knew the answer. Everyone in Port George knew the answer.
“You know he hasn’t,” Frannie snapped. She took a step closer to Victoria. “Did you know that the case was declared cold, that it was closed months ago? Did you hear that when you were away at your fancy college?”
Victoria swallowed. “No,” she said quietly. “No, I didn’t know.” And who would have told her if she had asked? Certainly, not her parents.
“Did you ever even think about Rob once you’d gone off?” Frannie demanded. “Or was he just a distant memory, an insignificant part of your past? Was he just a temporary plaything for a rich girl who wanted to see what it was like to slum it before going off to an exclusive private college to earn her Mrs. degree?”
Victoria clutched the strap of her pocketbook. “No!” she cried. “No, that’s not it at all. You’re wrong about me, about all of it.”
“Rumor has it that your father used his influence to get the investigation dropped.” Frannie had fairly spat the words.
“But why would he do that?” Victoria asked, though in her heart she knew the answer.
I’ll make that boy pay if it’s the last thing I do.
Herbert Aldridge was behind Rob’s disappearance. He had to be. In spite of the early-summer sun, Victoria felt suddenly chilled.
“You tell me,” Frannie spat.
“I can’t.” Victoria could hear the desperation in her voice. “I don’t know anything. I don’t know where Rob is or why he left—”
“Maybe your father did even more. Maybe he ‘took care’ of my brother. And don’t say you don’t know what I mean.” Again, Frannie came toward Victoria; her stance was unmistakably threatening. “There had to have been foul play. Rob would never have willingly left his family.”
“Maybe there was an accident,” Victoria said frantically, “a terrible accident. Maybe Rob was hit by a truck passing through town or . . .”
“Then why was a body never found? A bit of bloody clothing, the bike he was riding? Anyway, we’ll never know, will we? Not now that the case has been closed.”
Victoria took a deep breath. It didn’t much help. “Rob said nothing about where he was going or who he was meeting that day?”
“Nothing. Was it you he was going to meet?”
“No,” Victoria said firmly. “It wasn’t, honestly.”
“Do you know why he was on his bike that day? Why he didn’t take his car wherever it was he was going?”
Victoria shook her head. She wanted so badly to run away, but she was still too scared to move.
“It was because he had loaned the car to a friend who wanted to take his mother to see a sick relative a few towns away. That’s the sort of person my brother, Rob, was, kind and caring and generous. That’s the sort of person your—” Frannie swiped at her eyes with the back of her hand. “In the day or two before Rob went missing, he was moody an
d upset. I asked him what was bothering him, but he denied anything was the matter. He was lying. Something was wrong. Are you sure you don’t know what it was?”
“No,” Victoria cried. “I mean, yes, I’m sure, I’m totally sure.” But that was a lie. Rob had been worried about her. He knew she had told her parents about the pregnancy. Her ensuing silence had to have signaled that there had been trouble.
Frannie looked at Victoria with deepened suspicion. “You know I don’t believe you were off at college. I’m sure I’m not the only one in Port George who thinks there was a baby. There was, wasn’t there? Rob’s baby.”
“No,” Victoria cried more desperately now. “No there wasn’t, really. You have to believe me!”
“I don’t have to do anything of the sort. All I can say is that if there was a baby, my brother’s child, and you did something despicable with it, I’ll—”
“I didn’t do anything! There wasn’t a baby, I swear!”
Frannie looked at her with unmistakable contempt. “Don’t expect any sympathy from me. Poor little rich girl. You have no idea what you’ve put my family through.”
Victoria began to tremble.
I’ll make that boy pay if it’s the last thing I do.
Those words. Those awful, threatening words!
Suddenly, it was all too much. “I’ve got to go,” she gasped. Rather than attempt to push past Rob’s sister, she turned and fled back the way she had come.
Frannie did not pursue her.
Victoria ran straight for home, her thoughts keeping pace with her pounding feet and racing heart. Poor Rob! If he hadn’t loaned his car to his friend . . . Cars were much harder to hide or to make disappear than a bicycle. Assuming someone had hidden the bike. And Rob himself? Could someone have hidden his body?
No. It couldn’t be.
Victoria had barely taken a step onto the Aldridge property when she fell to her knees and was violently sick to her stomach. When the crisis was over, she crawled to her feet. She couldn’t go on this way, lying, keeping secrets, haunted and hunted. She stared ahead at the house, that massive brick structure with its impassive facade. She had to go inside. She couldn’t stand in the drive forever. But every fiber of her being fought the necessity of entering that building at the top of Old Orchard Hill.
She took a step and then another, up the long and curving drive, under the old apple trees, past the towering oaks, up the stone stairs until the front door was in reach. She extended her right hand to the doorknob. It felt icy cold.
What, she wondered, had happened to her life?
Chapter 44
Laura didn’t want to meet Frannie Armitage at the North Star Diner. Kathy was a gem but she might be inclined to eavesdrop (with no malicious intent), and Laura wanted to be as alone with Frannie as she could be in a public place.
Laura was nervous. She wondered if Frannie was going to mention her suspicions of a child having been born to Victoria Aldridge in the spring of 1985. If she did, Laura would do her best to remain calm and keep her expression impassive, professional. But it wouldn’t be easy.
The moment Laura stepped through the door of the Rosebud Café she spotted a woman sitting on her own at a table for two. Laura knew in her gut that this was Frannie Smith Armitage. Her aunt. Her father’s sister.
Life had been hard on Frannie if her appearance was anything to go by. She looked much older than her age of about sixty-one or -two, and she had an air of weariness about her. Not defeat, exactly, but great weariness. The disappearance of her only brother so long ago had to have changed the course of Frannie’s life forever, just as it had changed the course of so many other lives in Port George and beyond.
Frannie blew a stray lock of gray hair away from her face—an oddly youthful and carefree gesture. Somehow, it gave Laura the encouragement she needed to approach.
“Mrs. Armitage?”
The woman nodded.
“I’m Laura Huntington. Thank you for meeting me.”
Laura took the seat across from her aunt. A waitress appeared, and following Frannie’s lead, Laura ordered a cup of coffee.
When the waitress had moved off, Frannie said, “Your stomach had better be lined with lead. The coffee in this place is notorious.”
A smile was in her words if not on her face. Laura nodded. “Thanks for the warning.”
Neither woman spoke again until Laura’s coffee had been delivered. She took a sip and her eyebrows shot to the sky. “I see what you mean. But it’s good.”
Frannie now offered a real smile. “Mr. Coldwell called me. He handled everything when my family had my brother officially declared dead. Anyway, he told me about you. He said I could trust you, that you weren’t a phony or a scam artist.”
Laura hid a cringe behind a polite smile. “So, he explained my involvement with the podcast?”
“Can’t say I knew what a podcast was until Mr. Coldwell explained it. But I understand now. You’re trying to tell the story of what happens to a community when one of their own goes missing and never comes back.” Frannie took a sip of her coffee and was silent for a long moment. Finally she said, “One of the cases you might want to feature is my brother’s.”
Laura nodded. “Yes. I know this might be difficult for you, to talk about it again, and I’m sorry if I—”
Frannie put up a hand to silence Laura. “It is difficult. It always was and it always will be. But I talked it over with my husband, and we agree that there doesn’t seem to be any harm in someone taking another look at what might have happened to Rob.”
Laura felt her stomach clench. “I’m not really leading an investigation. I hope Mr. Coldwell was clear about that. I don’t want to mislead you.”
“He was clear.” Frannie nodded. “I know what I’m doing.”
“Okay. Good. So, what I’m looking for in this early stage of development is anecdotal evidence. It can be very helpful in painting a complete picture of a person and a place in time.”
Frannie took another sip of her coffee. “Okay.”
“I’ve learned that Rob might have been involved with a local girl, someone named Victoria Aldridge. What can you tell me about her?”
Frannie sat back and placed both hands flat on the table. “They were involved all right,” she said tightly. “Rob brought her around to the house a few times. It made us all uncomfortable at first, this privileged girl sitting in our tiny living room on furniture that my parents had had since the day they were married, and nibbling on oatmeal-raisin cookies, not some fancy pastries she was probably used to getting at home. The Aldridge family had staff, you see. The father was some sort of moneyman, big banking or something like that. I never really knew.”
Laura nodded. Her heart began to beat painfully. “Go on.”
“But soon enough my parents and sisters were fawning over her. You should have heard them once Victoria had gone home. How polite, how pretty, the way she gazed at Rob with such affection.” Frannie shook her head. “I was the voice of reason. I was the one who pointed out that nothing but trouble could come from the only daughter of the town’s wealthiest and most powerful man dating a mere local boy, son of a truck driver and homemaker, neither of whom had gone to college.”
“Didn’t your parents share your reservations at all?” Frannie’s parents. Laura’s grandparents. She felt a bit dazed for a moment, as if she had drunk one too many glasses of wine and now had to stand up.
“My mother did at first. But even she went over to Victoria’s side. She was a romantic at heart. She said she knew real love and affection when she saw it, and that only time would tell if her son would make a life with Victoria Aldridge.” Frannie took her hands from the table and let them fall into her lap. “Only problem was, there was no time, not much of it anyway, for anything to develop or not. By the end of the summer Rob was gone and it was all over.”
Laura just knew she was going to cry. With supreme effort, she got control of herself. “I’m so terribly sorry. I really am.
I know that even after all this time has passed—”
Frannie didn’t seem to need encouragement to continue with her story. “I hated Victoria Aldridge for a long time. I blamed her for what happened to Rob. But as I got older and Rob’s disappearance began to register as a reality and not a nightmare, I guess I didn’t hate her anymore. She was nice enough, sweet really, and I think she probably did love my brother. It was those parents of hers, manipulating everything, with their love of money and status. No, I don’t hate her. In fact, I hope she’s had a decent life since she left Port George. None of us deserve to suffer more than we have to in this life. That’s my belief.”
At that moment, Laura badly wanted to reveal herself to Frannie, to reach out and hug her long-suffering aunt, to ask for her forgiveness. After a moment, she said, “Thank you for your time. I appreciate your talking with me.”
Frannie eyed her carefully. “You seem like an honest enough sort, like Mr. Coldwell said. Do you really think this podcast thing will change anything?”
“I don’t know,” Laura said quietly. “I really don’t know.”
“Fair enough.” Frannie shrugged. “Never make a promise you can’t keep.”
“Yes. Though we go ahead and do just that, don’t we? We believe we can honor our promises, we make them in good faith, most of us anyway, and then, so often we just can’t stick to our word.”
Frannie nodded. Her expression thoughtful, she looked closely at Laura again. After what seemed an age she stood, nodded, and began to walk toward the door of the café. Laura noticed that Frannie—her aunt—walked with a slight limp but also with a great deal of native dignity.
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