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“I don’t want to get away from you. You three are my whole life.”
Stephen had frowned at that and she didn’t know why. But today she thought maybe she did understand it. Did she hover too much? Did she boss them around too much? Was she too possessive? Stephen’s father rarely visited them because he said Amy had too many damned rules for his taste. He wanted to have a good time and he didn’t want to be told what to do.
For the first time in days she thought of the baby she’d lost. Had her sadness been about the baby or because her plans hadn’t been realized?
Frowning, she put the book she was holding back onto the shelf. There were tall volumes at the top, but she couldn’t reach them. She looked about and saw a little stool in a corner, picked it up, moved it in front of the case and climbed on it. She still had to stretch to see the top shelf.
They seemed to be genealogy books. How to find your ancestors, that sort of thing. She wasn’t interested in them and was about to step down when a name caught her eye. A small book with a spine no more than a half-inch wide had a single name on it. All she could see was “awthor” but it was enough to pique her interest. She reached for it, stretching as far as she could. She had just touched it when she lost her balance and fell.
When she hit the floor, she put her arms over her head, expecting the entire case to come tumbling down on her, but it didn’t. Instead, the book she’d been trying to reach neatly fell into her lap.
“Good shot,” she said aloud as she picked up the book and opened it. It had been published in 1838 and its title was The Tragedy of the Hawthorne Family As Told by Someone Who Knows.
For a moment Amy just sat there staring at the title page, then she got up and went to the window seat and began to read. The sun came in bright and clear and she read, fascinated.
“There you are!” Zoë said, frowning at Amy.
She looked up, blinking. Zoë had on a raincoat and water was dripping off her shoulders.
“I’ve been looking everywhere for you.”
“I’ve been here for—” She looked at her watch. It was nearly three P.M. “My goodness, I’ve been here for hours. I just finished the most interesting book. I think I found the man I dreamed about.”
“You have a dreamboat, remember? I get the imaginary one. Have you had lunch?”
“No,” Amy said, uncurling herself off the window seat. “It was so nice here, with the sun shining in, that I lost track of time.”
“Sun? Are you out of your mind? It’s been raining for hours. If it keeps on like this the ocean level will rise.”
Amy glanced out the window and, sure enough, it was raining. Besides that, she saw that there was an ugly old stone warehouse just a few feet out the window, not the field of wildflowers that she’d seen every time she’d glanced up.
“Are you okay?” Zoë asked impatiently.
“Sure,” Amy said, but still blinking in bewilderment. Between what she’d read and the oddity of the rain and no rain, she was feeling a bit dazed.
“Faith wants us to meet her for tea at some shop about a half mile from here. We’ll have to walk through mud to get there. You look funny.”
“I know,” Amy said. “I’m sure the makeup’s worn off.”
“No, you can hardly see that. It’s just…” She trailed off, then shrugged. “I’ve been around Jeanne too long and I’m reading too much into everything. Do you want to go or not?”
“Oh yes, I want to go.” She opened the little book to the front end papers to see if there was a price on it. Of course she’d have to buy it no matter what it cost. It
was five dollars.
“What’s that?”
Amy saw that Zoë was looking at something on the floor. “I think it fell out of the book.” She picked it up and looked at it. It was a business card.
Futures, Inc.
“Have you ever wanted to rewrite your past?”
Madame Zoya can help
333 Everlasting Street
“If that’s a business card, take it. It’ll be our first one for Jeanne.”
