Chapter 7 - The Daughter Who Never Existed
The first thing my grandmother said was, “Vivienne is lying.”
But she didn't sound certain.
She sounded frightened.
I knelt beside her chair.
“Grandma.”
“Catherine would have told me.”
“Maybe she couldn't.”
Her eyes filled.
“We were sisters-in-law. We lived in the same house for nearly a year. She told me everything.”
I held her hand.
“Then we find out what happened.”
We drove to Portland the next morning.
Olivia came with us.
Rebecca insisted on joining by video when we interviewed Margaret Keene.
The retired nurse lived in a modest brick house with white shutters and a porch crowded with flowerpots.
Her granddaughter answered the door.
Margaret sat in a sunlit room beneath a quilt, her silver hair braided over one shoulder.
She looked at Catherine's photograph for a long time.
Then she began to cry.
“I wondered whether anyone would ever come.”
My heart hammered.
“You knew her?”
Margaret nodded.
“She was registered under another name.”
“What name?”
“Caroline Bell.”
I looked at Olivia.
She wrote it down.
Margaret continued.
“She arrived in November 1978. Frightened. Pregnant. She told me her family thought she was dead.”
My grandmother covered her mouth.
“Who brought her?”
“A man named Ross.”
I felt cold.
“Samuel Ross?”
Margaret nodded.
“He told the director she was unstable. Said she had threatened powerful people and needed to be kept away from them.”
“Was she mentally ill?”
“No.”
Margaret's answer was immediate.
“She was terrified. But she was perfectly clear about what had happened.”
“What did she tell you?”
Margaret looked toward the window.
“She said men were stealing her family's harbor property. She had found proof. They wanted her signature on transfer papers.”
“Did she sign?”
“No.”
I closed my eyes.
Of course she hadn't.
Margaret reached for a tissue.
“She gave birth in April 1979. A little girl.”
My grandmother made a broken sound.
“Did the baby survive?”
“Yes.”
“Where is she?”
Margaret hesitated.
“I don't know.”
My heart sank.
“The baby was taken three days after birth. Catherine was told she had been adopted by a good family.”
“Who took her?”
“A woman named Eleanor Ross.”
Daniel's grandmother.
The room seemed to tilt.
Margaret continued.
“Catherine begged to see the adoption papers. They wouldn't show her anything.”
“What happened to Catherine?”
“She escaped in 1987.”
I froze.
“Escaped?”
Margaret nodded.
“She had been transferred to a private residence after St. Agnes changed ownership. One night, she disappeared.”
“Did anyone find her?”
“Not that I know.”
I leaned forward.
“Did she leave anything?”
Margaret looked at me.
“Yes.”
She asked her granddaughter to bring a wooden box from the bedroom.
Inside were three letters.
A silver bracelet.
And a small photograph of a newborn girl.
On the back, Catherine had written:
My daughter. April 17, 1979.
I held the photograph carefully.
The baby was wrapped in a white blanket.
Her tiny fist rested against her cheek.
My grandmother began crying.
Not softly.
Not politely.
She cried like someone mourning forty-eight years of stolen time.
I held her until she could breathe.
Then Margaret gave me the final letter.
It was addressed to the Foster family.
The handwriting was unmistakably Catherine's.
I read it aloud.
If this reaches you, know that I never surrendered our seat.
They took my child because I refused to sign.
Samuel Ross arranged it, but he did not act alone.
The Vaughn chairman knew.
And the woman who helped them is still sitting at the council table.
I stopped.
The woman?
In 1978, the council had supposedly been all men.
I looked at Olivia.
She frowned.
“Who was the woman?”
Margaret shook her head.
“Catherine never told me.”
We returned to Grayport after dark.
Gideon was waiting outside my grandmother's house.
He stood beside his car, hands in his coat pockets.
When he saw my face, he knew.
“You found something.”
“Yes.”
I walked past him.
He followed me onto the porch.
“Madeline, please.”
I turned.
“Your grandfather helped imprison a woman because she wouldn't surrender her vote.”
His face went white.
“I know.”
I stared at him.
“What?”
“My mother admitted it this afternoon.”
Anger surged through me.
“And you waited until now to tell me?”
“I came as soon as I could.”
“What else did she admit?”
He swallowed.
“That my grandfather fathered Catherine's child.”
I shook my head.
“Then your family helped steal their own daughter.”
Gideon looked devastated.
“I didn't know.”
“I believe you.”
The words surprised us both.
I did believe he hadn't known.
But belief was not forgiveness.
He stepped closer.
“Madeline, I'm going to make this right.”
“You can't make forty-eight years right.”
“I can expose what happened.”
“Even if it destroys your family?”
He looked at me.
Then, slowly, he nodded.
“Yes.”
For the first time in days, I saw the man I had once trusted.
But before I could speak, his phone rang.
He looked at the screen.
Daniel.
Gideon answered.
“What?”
I watched his expression change.
First confusion.
Then shock.
Then fury.
“Where?”
He listened.
“Don't touch anything. I'm coming.”
He ended the call.
“What happened?” I asked.
His voice was flat.
“Victor Dane has been found.”
“Alive?”
Gideon looked at me.
“Yes.”
Relief flooded through me.
Then he added, “He walked into the council house carrying a signed confession.”
I frowned.
“He already confessed.”
Gideon's eyes darkened.
“Not to selling shipping schedules.”
May you like
He swallowed.
“To helping Daniel Ross murder Patrick Wynn.”
