Page 8 of The House on Forgotten Hill

“Did you ever find out?”

“No, I didn’t.”

“Were there any witnesses that saw her the night she went missing?”

“None who came forward. The police searched everywhere for months. They never found her. It was as if she had just vanished.”

“I’m so sorry, Estelle.”

“So am I.” She glanced out the front window. “You spend enough years waiting for someone to come home, not wanting to give up hope, and then one day you do because everyone stops looking. You don’t want to accept the inevitable, but sometimes you do because you have no choice.”

We chatted for a few more minutes, and then she stood. “It’s good to meet you, but I feel I’ve taken up enough of your afternoon.”

“You haven’t. It was nice to meet someone who lives in the neighborhood.”

“I’ll let you finish getting settled. We will chat again soon.”

“I’d like that.”

I walked her to the front door, thanking her again for the pie.

She stepped onto the porch. “If you ever need anything, I live in the blue and white house at the end of the hill.”

“And if you ever need anything, you know where to find me.”

I watched her make her way down the walkway toward the sidewalk.

Halfway there, she stopped and turned. “Oh, one more thing. The family who lived here years ago, they had a little girl named Olivia. Same as you.”

For a moment, neither of us spoke.

Then she tilted her head. “It’s such a coincidence. Don’t you think?”

5

That evening, I carried another box into my father’s office, realizing it had become my favorite room in the house.

The desk lamp cast a warm pool of light across the polished desktop while the rest of the room remained dim. Outside, crickets chirped somewhere beyond the open window, and a cool breeze drifted through the curtains.

I slid my pocketknife beneath a strip of packing tape and folded back the cardboard flaps. Inside were several sweaters that had belonged to my father, and beneath them sat an old camera case, a handful of cassette tapes, and a pair of worn leather gloves.

I moved the gloves to the side and smiled as my eyes came to rest on my father’s binoculars. I picked them up, noting they were heavier than I remembered.

My father had loved the binoculars. More than once, I’d caught him standing at the office window, surveying the neighborhood through them.

My mother used to tease him about it.

“Julian Caraway,” she’d say, laughing whenever she caught him. “One of these days you’re going to get yourself in trouble.”

He always laughed and insisted it was harmless and that he just wanted a closer look at the birds. The memory soon faded, replaced by my mother’s words of warning.

Was it possible my father had seen something he shouldn’t have?

The thought caught me off guard.

I turned toward the window almost without thinking. My father’s office overlooked much of the neighborhood. The trees had grown taller over the years, but a few houses on the street were still visible. Without thinking, I raised the binoculars to my eyes, looking at the trees, the driveway, the mailbox.

I adjusted the focus until the house next door came into view. Looking through one of the windows, I realized I could see straight into the neighbor’s bedroom.