Chương 6
“Can I see them?”
“Yes.”
“Today?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t want you bringing them here.”
“Understood.”
“I’ll come to you.”
“Okay.”
“And I’m bringing Emma.”
A strange silence filled the line.
Then William said, very carefully, “Okay.”
Claire heard what he did not say.
Thank you.
His house was smaller than she expected.
Not small. Just ordinary enough to irritate her assumptions.
A brick colonial at the end of a quiet street, with a slightly crooked mailbox and two empty planters by the steps. Claire had imagined guards, flags, perhaps a brass eagle over the door.
There was a faded doormat that said HELLO.
William opened the door before she knocked.
He wore dark trousers and a pale blue shirt with the sleeves rolled once at the forearms.
Without the uniform, he looked less like a general and more like a tired man near sixty who had slept badly.
His eyes went to the infant carrier.
Then to Claire.
“Do you want me to carry anything?”
“I’ve got it.”
“Okay.”
He moved aside.
Claire entered.
The house smelled faintly of coffee and furniture polish.
There were books everywhere. Military history, biographies, thrillers, two cookbooks that appeared unused. On a side table sat a ceramic bowl full of keys and loose change.
Claire noticed a framed photograph of William with an older woman she recognized from online pictures as his late mother.
No wife.
No children.
She knew from their earlier conversations that William had married once in his thirties and divorced after six years. No children from the marriage.
He had told Claire this with the same tone someone might use to report a canceled flight.
She had not asked whether he regretted it.
William pointed toward the dining room table.
“The letters are there.”
Seven envelopes lay inside a clear archival sleeve.
Claire stared.
“You put them in archival plastic?”
William looked embarrassed.
“I didn’t know if touching them would damage them.”
Claire glanced at him.
“That might be the most flattering thing anyone has ever done with my profession.”
He almost smiled.
Emma made a small squeak.
William’s attention snapped toward the carrier.
Claire saw it.
“You can look at her.”
“I am looking.”
“You’re pretending not to.”
He cleared his throat.
“I don’t want to hover.”
“You’re hovering from six feet away.”
William looked down at the floor.
Claire unfastened the carrier straps.
“She ate before we came. If you wash your hands, you can hold her.”
His head came up.
Claire immediately regretted saying it because his expression hurt to look at.
He recovered quickly.
“Are you sure?”
“No. Wash your hands before I change my mind.”
William went to the kitchen.
Claire heard water run for what seemed like an unreasonable length of time.
When he returned, he dried his hands on a paper towel.
Claire lifted Emma.
“Support her head.”
“I know.”
“You know theoretically.”
“That is fair.”
She placed the baby in his arms.
William froze.
Claire adjusted his elbow.
“Not so stiff.”
“I am not stiff.”
“You look like you’re transporting unstable chemicals.”
His mouth twitched.
Emma opened her eyes.
William stared down at her.
The room became quiet.
Claire had expected tears, perhaps because movies had taught her to expect them. William did not cry. He breathed out through his nose and shifted one finger beneath the edge of the blanket.
“Hello, Emma.”
The baby blinked.
William glanced at Claire.
“She has your mouth.”
“You knew me for three weeks.”
“I’ve seen your mouth.”
“That sounded strange.”
“It did.”
Claire laughed once.
William looked relieved.
Emma yawned.
He smiled.
It transformed him so completely that Claire had to look away.
She opened the first letter.
Margaret’s handwriting was narrow and slanted.
The date was January, thirty-seven years earlier.
The letters were not dramatic.
That made them worse.
Margaret complained about a roommate who borrowed sweaters. She wrote that she hated canned peaches. She teased William about a photograph in which he looked “like someone had just explained taxes to you.” She said she missed him. She said she was afraid of becoming “the kind of woman who organizes her life around waiting for a man to call.”
Claire read all seven.
The final letter was different.
Margaret wrote that her father had found out about the relationship.
She wrote that things at home were “bad.”
She asked William not to call for a while.
At the bottom, squeezed into the margin, she had added:
I don’t mean forever.
Claire read the sentence three times.
“What did you do after this?”
“I wrote.”
“How soon?”
“The next day.”
“What did you say?”
“That I’d give her space. That she could call when she was ready. Then I wrote again a week later because I was terrible at giving people space.”
Claire looked at him.
“How many letters did you send after this?”
“Eight or nine.”
“And none came back?”
“No.”
“Not returned?”
“No.”
“So someone received them.”
“Probably.”
Claire looked at the envelopes.
“Where was she living?”
“With her parents.”
“And Richard knew her family.”
“Yes.”
“How well?”
William’s jaw shifted.
“Very.”
Emma moved against his chest.
He immediately softened his arms.
Claire watched him.
“What did you know about him?”
“He was around. Her father liked him.”
“Did Mom?”
“Not that way. At least not then.”
“You sound sure.”
“I was twenty-two. I was sure about many things I had no business being sure about.”
Claire studied him.
“That’s the smartest thing you’ve said.”
“I’ve had decades to improve.”
Her phone buzzed.
Margaret.
Claire let it ring.
William looked away.
She noticed.
“You don’t have to pretend you can’t see my phone.”
“I’m trying not to interfere.”
“You interfered pretty effectively last night.”
He winced.
“Fair.”
Claire put the letters down.
“Do you hate her?”
William took so long to answer that Emma fell asleep before he spoke.
“No.”
May you like
“Why not?”
“I have been angry with a version of Margaret I invented. The woman who decided I wasn’t worth answering. The woman who married Richard immediately and never looked back.”
