CHAPTER 19
I’d made the walk so many times from the house on Monterey Square to Forsyth Park that I probably could have made it with my eyes closed.
In my early days in Savannah, when I was just starting to learn the secrets of her garden, my grandmother would take me to the park to study the flowers.
We didn’t study them as a botanist would, captivated by their propagation and their ability to survive in the heat of summer.
We studied them instead as a photographer would, focusing on the individual elements of each bloom: the shell-like interiors, the tiny veins inside delicate petals, and web-thin stamens that most people never bothered to see.
But the beauty of the flowers was dependent on these elements, and my grandmother and I would smile at each other, sharing our private knowledge of the wonderful, secret world of the garden that seemed to exist only for us.
Tucker and I walked without speaking, being careful to make sure our arms didn’t touch. As we passed the edge of the park along Gaston walking toward Whitaker, Tucker finally spoke. “You and George, are you . . . ?”
I almost choked. “No. Definitely not. I think he would probably like to, but, well, no. If I had a brother, that’s probably how I would feel about him: nice enough, but not somebody I’d want to kiss.”
Eager to change the subject, I turned to Tucker. “I appreciate you doing this. I know you have other places you could be.”
His pace slowed. “Please don’t make me out to be some kind of a hero. I have my own reasons.”
“I know. Because of Susan. But I still think you’re a bit of a hero.”
He stopped and I stopped, too, and we faced each other on the sidewalk. “Why?”
I didn’t even have to think about my answer. “Because you get out of bed each day. Because you try. Because you love Lucy and Sara even though you’re still not sure how to show it. But you try.”
He stared at me, his eyes darkening, and I wondered if I’d made him angry again. Finally, he said,“I could say the same thing about you, Piper Mills.”
I blinked in confusion and looked away, then continued walking toward Hodgson Hall, feeling his presence next to me as he caught up.
I’d become a regular fixture at the Georgia Historical Society during my years of burying my past life by hiding in someone else’s as a genealogist. Tucker and I climbed the familiar broad brownstone stairway with heavy curving balustrades to the solid mahogany doors tucked under a two-columned portico.
When we entered the great hall with its soaring three-story-high ceilings, Tucker stopped and looked up.
“I guess they’re pretty serious about their history here.
” I followed his gaze to the wall above the entrance, where engraved in gold leaf on red mottled marble were the words No Feasting, drinking, and smok-ing or amusements of any kind will be permitted within its walls.
I put my finger to my lips. “Quiet. They’ll ask us to leave.”
He raised an eyebrow, then rolled his eyes in an exaggerated version of Lucy’s favorite move, and I had to cough to hide my laughter. Shaking my head, I led him over to the reference desk to show my ID and sign in.
I was already a registered user, and after doing an online search of their catalog, I’d called in ahead of time so that the boxes and folders of information I’d requested had already been pulled from the repository.
I clasped my laptop—one of the few articles for note-taking actually allowed in the library—and we headed through the main hall with its large, vaulted windows, which had been designed in a time when there was little artificial light or ventilation, and into the reading room.
We sat down at one of the four large tables made of slabs of solid walnut supported by cast iron, and stared at each other over the boxes and folders that had been pulled for us.
“What do we do now?” asked Tucker.
I slid a large box across the table toward him.
“These are all from various personal collections housed here. I asked for them to be pulled because they contained newspaper clippings and obituaries from the years nineteen twenty-five through nineteen sixty. I want you to look for anybody with the last names of Montet, O’Hare, Harrington, or Ross—either birth or death information.
My preliminary online searches have only shown Josephine’s death information, but only because she was relatively well-known at the time of her death.
But I can’t find any of her birth information, and there’s nothing on Freddie, which makes me think that he used another last name for legal documents.
Anyway, after we verify that we’re looking at the right person, we’ll look through the newspaper obituaries on microfiche.
That’s where you find all of the interesting data—as in remaining family, where they were living, and where they’re buried. ”
He frowned. “What will you be doing?”
“I’ll be upstairs going through microfiche. They’ve got death registers from nineteen nineteen to nineteen ninety-four, so I’m bound to find something—assuming I can find the right name.”
He continued to regard me. “You’ve done this a lot, then.”
I nodded. “Kept me busy.”
Tucker eyed the boxes in front of him. “What time does the library close?”
“Five o’clock. And at four forty-five they’ll come and start making you pack up. They’re very strict about it.”
Sliding the box toward him, Tucker said, “Then I’d better get started.”
I made my way to the microfiche machines and, after retrieving the films for the dates I’d requested, worked in relative silence for several hours and through lunch, my stomach rumbling its protest but I was unwilling to stop.
I was no longer afraid of discovering my grandmother’s story; I was simply eager to know it.
Somewhere in the last months I’d begun to see my malaise of the last years as less of an inevitability, or a genetic response to failure.
Instead, in discovering my grandmother, I realized that I’d inherited a lot more from her, and my curiosity and need to push further and get there faster might even be related to the drive she’d once had as a young woman.
My stomach rumbled again and I thought of the granola bar I’d tucked in the pocket of the sweater I’d brought to keep me warm in the cool air-conditioning.
But the staff ’s eagerness to keep the researchers alert by the near-arctic temperatures was matched only in their desire to keep crumbs off of rare manuscripts and documents, and the first sound of a crinkling wrapper would bring staff from all corners of the building, resulting in us being tossed out on the sidewalk.
I went back to work, blinking my tired eyes and sighing in frustration when I realized we only had two more hours until closing.
My first perusal of the death register had yielded nothing unusual, only the death information for the fathers of both Lillian and Annabelle.
I could find nothing for either Josie or Freddie, although I did find the death register for their mother, Justine.
The only alternative that I could think of was to guess Freddie’s birth dates and start flipping through the birth registers in the hope that my guess had been accurate.
It was nearly four thirty when I stopped, my finger held in midair over a page of scrawled names of the dead.
I’d been focused on the death register of a woman with five different names, either given to her at birth or she’d been married multiple times, when it had occurred to me that we might know exactly where to look for Josie and Freddie, after all.
Quickly, I shoved the book out of the way and pulled out the register containing deaths for the year nineteen eighty-one.
I flipped open the nineteen eighty-one book, the year of Justine’s death—and found her name again, tucked in with the other Ms. In my experience in researching people’s genealogies, unwed mothers tended to use creative license on their children’s birth certificates to either hide the identity of the biological father, or protect their family name from scandal by using their middle or even their mother’s maiden name as a last name for their illegitimate children.
Still keeping the name in the family, but not close enough to warrant scrutiny.
I scanned the entry again. Justine’s middle name had been Marie, but her mother’s maiden name was Latrobe.
Looking around to make sure no one was watching, I pulled out my forbidden cell phone and sent a text to Tucker.
“Check Latrobe for last name.” Glancing at my watch again, I quickly skipped to the book containing the year of Josie’s birth, nineteen eighteen, and flipped to the Ls.
A member of the staff approached the table.
“The library will be closing in fifteen minutes. You may leave the books on the table, but you’ll need to start finishing up now.
” Her smile indicated that we would be locked inside the frigid library with the documents if we dared to linger any longer than the five o’clock closing.
I nodded, then quickly went back to the book again, looking for the last name of Latrobe.
I knew the information would still be here after we’d left, but I’d have to wait two more days before the library reopened the following Tuesday.
Despite all of my foot dragging up to this point, I didn’t think my patience could take having to wait even one more hour.
I felt nearly weak with relief when I found what I’d been searching for. The same staff member appeared again in the reading room doorway. “We’re closing. It’s time to leave.”
I stood as I scanned the entry quickly, not having time to take notes on my laptop, and instead committed the information to memory. I stopped, forgetting to breathe for a moment as I recognized a familiar name.
“My friend is downstairs,” I explained. “I’ll just go get him and we’ll leave together.” Without waiting for an answer, I headed down the stairs.