I draw back a little. “Trent and I only met a few days ago, when I went down to Edisto.”
“Lovely place, Edisto.” She focuses on Trent, her eyes narrowing.
“Yes, it is,” I agree. Why is she studying him that way? “My grandmother spent quite a bit of time there over the years. Uncle Clifford told me that she liked to write at the cottage. It seems that she and Trent’s grandfather may have done some…business there.” Just as if I were working a witness on the stand, I watch for changes in her demeanor. She tries to hide them, but they are there, and they’re obvious—more so with each sentence.
She’s wondering how much I know.
“I don’t believe I caught your last name.” She blinks at Trent.
The air in the room seems to tighten as she awaits the answer, but when he offers a more formal introduction, she nods and smiles. “Mmmm,” she says. “Yes, you do have his eyes.”
I get the little tingle I always have when I know a witness is about to crack. Often, it’s this very thing that does it—the surprise appearance of the face that’s familiar, a tie to something hidden in the past, the fringes of a secret that’s been kept too long.
May’s trembling fingers lift away from Trent’s hand. She touches his jawline. Moisture mats her lashes. “You favor him. He was a looker too.” She offers a closed-lipped smile that tells me she was probably quite the flirt in her day, a woman who had no difficulty operating in a man’s world.
Trent even blushes a little. It’s cute. I can’t help enjoying the exchange.
May wags a finger my way. “This one’s a keeper. Mark my words.”
It’s my turn to blush. “Sadly, I’m already committed.”
“I don’t see a wedding band, yet.” May grabs my hand and makes a show of examining my engagement ring. “And I know a spark when I see it. I should know. I’ve outlived three husbands at this point.”
A puff of laughter spills past Trent’s lips, and he ducks his head, sandy-blond hair falling forward.
“And I had nothing to do with any of their deaths, in case you’re wondering,” May informs us. “I loved each of them dearly. One was a teacher, one was a preacher, and the last was an artist who found his calling later in life. One taught me to think, one taught me to know, and one taught me to see. Each inspired me. I was a musician, you understand. I worked in Hollywood and also traveled with big bands. That was back in the glory days, long before all this digital foolishness.”
My phone buzzes in my purse, and she frowns toward it. “Those infernal things. The world would be better off if they had never been invented.”
I silence the phone completely. If May is finally ready to tell me the story of that photo on her nightstand, I want nothing to distract us from it. In fact, it’s time to redirect the witness right now.
I open the envelope and slide out the pictures from the cabin at Trent’s. “Actually, it’s these we were wondering about. These, and the Tennessee Children’s Home Society.”
Her face instantly hardens. She flings a fiery look my way. “I could do without ever hearing those words again.”
Trent cups her hand in both of his, looks down at their intertwined fingers. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Crandall…if we’re dredging up painful memories. But my grandfather never told me. I mean, I knew he was adopted when he was fairly young, and I knew he broke ties with his adoptive parents after he found out. But I didn’t know much about the Tennessee Children’s Home Society—not until recently. Maybe in passing I’d overheard people mention it to my grandfather over the years, when visitors would stop by. I was aware that my grandfather helped those people in some way, and that he felt the need to conduct those meetings in private—in his workshop or out on the boat. My grandmother never liked any kind of business talk in the house, real estate or otherwise. I didn’t know anything about my grandfather’s hobby, or side business, or whatever it was, until I helped him take care of the remaining files before he died. He asked me not to read the papers, and I didn’t. Not until Avery came to Edisto a few days ago.”
May’s mouth falls open. Tears rim her eyes. “He’s passed, then? I knew he was very ill.”
Trent confirms that he lost his grandfather months ago, and May pulls him close for a kiss on the cheek. “He was a good man and a dear friend.”
“Was he adopted from the Tennessee Children’s Home Society?” Trent asks. “Was that why he was interested in it?”
A somber nod answers. “Yes, indeed he was. And I was as well. That was where we met. Of course, he was just three years old then. He was such a cute little thing, and sweet. His name wasn’t Trent at the time. He didn’t change it to that until years later, when he found out who he really was. He had a sister who was separated from him during our stay at the home. She was two or three years older, and I think he always hoped that using his real name might help her to find him. But that’s the irony of it. The man who aided so many of us in reconnecting with one another again never was able to locate his sister. Perhaps she was one of those who didn’t survive. There were many….”
Her voice cracks and trails away. She pushes upright in the bed, clears her throat. “I was born on the Mississippi River in a shantyboat my father built. Queenie was my mother and Briny was my father. I had three little sisters, Camellia, Lark, and Fern, and a brother, Gabion. He was the youngest….”
She closes her eyes, but I can see them moving under thin, blue-veined lids as she continues her story. It is as if she’s dreaming, watching the images float by. She talks about being taken off the boat by the police, ending up in the children’s home. She describes weeks of uncertainty and fear, workers who were cruel, separation from her siblings, horrors like the ones Trent and I have read about.
The story she tells is heartbreaking yet mesmerizing. We stand on either side of the bed, barely breathing as we listen. “I lost track of my other three siblings at the home,” she says at the end. “But Fern and I were fortunate. We were kept together. Adopted.”
She stares out the window, and for a moment, I wonder if she’s told us all she intends to. Finally, she returns her attention to Trent. “The last time I saw your grandfather as a child, I was afraid he would be one of those who wouldn’t survive the home. He was such a timid little thing. Always in trouble with the workers without meaning to be. He was practically like a little brother by the time I left. I never thought I’d see him again. When a man named Trent Turner contacted me years later, I assumed he was a fraud. I didn’t recognize the name, of course. Georgia Tann habitually gave new names to the children—to help prevent their birth families from finding them, no doubt. I can tell you that I remember her as a horrible, cruel woman and that I believe the extent of her crimes may never be fully told. Few of her victims were able to do what your grandfather did—reclaim a birth name and a heritage. He even found his biological mother before she died, and he reunited with other relatives. He became Trent again, but when he was little, I knew him as Stevie.”