Chapter 27
I’m sulky as a teenager who just got dumped by her BFF. Only it’s stupid to be sulky—Jo is off on a life-changing mission of helping a loved one die. It’s ridiculous that I have the nerve to feel ... forgotten. Or abandoned.
Though I’m slightly appeased when I tell Matt later that afternoon and he’s just as stunned. “I’ll stop by tomorrow and ask Conrad if there’s anything I can do,” he says.
It makes me realize that maybe, in ways, I like him better than I like myself.
He’s good people. That’s what my mother would have said.
And it’s what my mother would have done, too.
Her first thought would be to ask how she could help.
Mine was to say to myself: I’d help but I’m too busy with my own things .
I scrunch up my nose at the thought as we sit on the back porch drinking Conrad’s wine.
As we chat, Matt mentions his daughter. “She got home the day before school started.”
I blink. “School already started?”
“Earlier every year, seems like. Anyway, she’s comin’ down for Labor Day weekend.”
I smile softly. I’ve never been a parent, but sometimes I can practically feel how much he misses her just dripping off him. “I bet you can’t wait.”
“You have no idea,” he tells me. “If you’re still here then, you can meet her.”
Why does this throw me a little? “She ... knows about me?”
He tosses me a sideways glance. “Well, just that you’re stayin’ next door and I’ve been seein’ you. Is that okay?”
Honestly, it gives me pause. Because I never thought about .
.. being part of his life, like in a way that would make him tell the people he’s closest to.
And for more insecure reasons, too. “Sure,” I say anyway, perhaps halfheartedly.
“Except ... won’t she think I’m some weird, lonely lady with bad taste in hairstyles? ”
This makes him let out a laugh. “For your information, she follows you on social media, and she loves what you’re doin’—for the lost items, and for Lost and Found.”
I balk slightly. “Really?”
“Anyone with over a hundred and fifty thousand followers is awesome in her book. She’s dyin’ to meet you.”
Although I’m not sure when I started caring what teenage girls think of me, this reaffirms my faith in our youth and reminds me I actually am pretty cool, even with very short hair.
And if Matt wants to introduce me to his daughter, well .
.. I am living next door to him and we do spend a lot of time together these days, so it’s no big deal.
Maybe the bigger deal is when I say, “Well, if I’m still here then, it’ll be nice to finally meet her.” If I’m still here then. I have no idea where I’ll be in less than two weeks. That seems strange.
I choose not to think about it and change the subject to some of the more interesting lost items I’ve recently unearthed: an autographed Donny Osmond record album made out to someone named Terri, a Ziploc baggie of baby teeth labeled Adam Jeffrey b.
4/3/92 , and a small painted portrait of a young girl standing in a field holding daisies, with My Miranda, 1988, by Mary Parelli , in the lower right corner.
I’m beginning to realize that no matter how deeply I dig into the boxes and bins, there will always be more lost things in this town.
So the next morning I head out early to Brandywine.
I have a lot of work to do, especially since I’ll be taking a couple of days away later in the week.
As has become the norm, there are a ton of messages to read and reply to—many being false leads, and when it comes to items of monetary value, like the diamond engagement ring I posted a few days ago, you get people on fishing expeditions.
After that, I comb through new comments on all the “open cases” posts, making notes in my logbook, and then I finally get around to posting new items.
I work until noon and then take a break, walking down the street for a sandwich, and I finish up the workday’s tasks around two. I still feel sad about Jo and realize I’ve probably thrown myself into the lost and found as a distraction, but that’s okay—I got a lot done.
The only negative aspect to the day is that I have upward of twenty lost items currently unclaimed and today brought no new “founds”—a good “found” would have cheered me up, and reminded me I’m doing something worthwhile.
I’m about to close my laptop and hit the road back to Lost Valley when a new message pops up in my inbox. And since a person without internet doesn’t have the luxury of thinking, I’ll answer it later , I click to open it.
I find a very long message from someone named Benita Kelly.
She lives in Biloxi, and Thomas Bennett Hartfell is her great-great-grandfather!
A former slave, he was the first Black attorney in Jackson, Mississippi, passing the bar in 1880.
She goes on to tell me how the line descends to her—she’s an attorney herself and an avid genealogist. The portrait would mean so much to me—I’d be honored to hang it in the entryway at my practice.
I’m so grateful someone cared enough to save it all these years!
Normally, I would fact-check some of this—but a click on her name quickly shows me she’s who she says she is, and I can tell she’s a smart, savvy, reliable woman. I can’t believe it—I have a message from the great-great-granddaughter of Grace’s distinguished gentleman!
I’m so heartened that I fight back tears of joy.
All this time, not one single clue or lead has arisen from my post about Mr. Hartfell—and now this !
A home for an important piece of history, a way of getting it back where it should have ended up in the first place.
I can’t help thinking that sometimes fate does have a way of putting things to right.
I tap out a quick reply to Ms. Kelly, expressing my elation and telling her how thrilled Grace will be to hear the news.
I say I’ll be in touch about shipping the portrait, and I ask her permission to share her photo online when I report that this particular lost item is now found.
Then I slap my laptop shut, slide it into its case, and leave the library with a skip in my step, so excited to get home to Grace that I can barely stand it.