“I received a letter from a British captain—I think his last name is Blake—from a ship called the Andes. He’s trying to locate Do?a María Purificación de Lafont y Toledo to notify her that her husband’s remains have been found. Apparently, the only address he has in connection to Mrs. Lafont is mine since her husband had sent me a telegram from Cuba.”
Cristóbal was found?
I leaned on the arm of the couch, light-headed. My face was on fire, my chest thumping. How had they found him? I wanted to see him! But then, as soon as I realized the extent of the news, I looked around the room at all the puzzled faces staring back at me. They didn’t understand a thing—obviously. How was it possible that my remains had been found when I was alive and well, standing right in front of them?
Here it was, the moment I’d been dreading. I looked around the room. Catalina, Angélica, and Laurent were staring at me. Alberto was simply nodding as if nothing could shock a man in his line of work.
“But if Don Cristóbal passed away weeks ago,” Aquilino said slowly, “then who are you?”
“An impostor!” Laurent said. “I knew it!”
“I don’t understand. Didn’t our sister die on the ship?” Angélica said. “Where is she now?”
Catalina had turned pale. She merely looked from one face to another trying to make sense of things.
“It was to be expected,” Laurent said. “A fortune like this one attracts all kinds of scoundrels.”
A scoundrel? He was the only scoundrel here! I was about to respond, to defend myself, but Angélica spoke first.
“Well? Aren’t you going to tell us who you are?”
“Yes,” Laurent said, pointing his finger at me, “and how did you find out about my father-in-law’s fortune?”
At that moment, Julia entered the room with a tray filled with espresso cups. I thought of the word “scoundrel” and suddenly I remembered what it was that I needed to recall, what my unconscious mind had been trying to tell me since I woke up.
As my siblings and my father’s lawyer stared at me, I removed my spectacles and set them on the coffee table, then I pulled off my beard and mustache, relieved that this would be the last time I would ever have to wear that dreadful thing.
Their faces transformed from confusion to shock.
As I removed my jacket, so relieved as if I’d been unlocking a pair of handcuffs from my wrists, I spoke with my regular voice. “I’m María Purificación.”
I raised my chin. I was not ashamed of what I’d done, especially now that I’d figured everything out.
Catalina covered her mouth.
“What? Purificación?” Angélica looked at me as if a sculpture had come to life. “Why would you do this? Why would you deceive us?”
“Because I needed to know which one of you had sent Franco to the ship to kill me; because I feared for my life and didn’t trust any of you after Franco murdered my husband.”
All of them spoke at once. In their faces, I read incredulity, confusion, and in Catalina’s case, an intense pain.
Finally, Angélica’s voice rose above the rest. “You’re mistaken. Nobody here would do such a thing!”
I glanced at each one of them until my eyes landed on the guilty one.
“Yes, one of you did.” I lifted my chin. “Since we’re all here confessing, why don’t you tell them the truth, Elisa?”
Still holding the tray, Julia looked directly at me, her eyes filled with tears of what I could only read as rage.
My sisters turned to the maid, incredulous.
“Elisa?” Catalina said.
Julia, or Elisa, set the tray on the sideboard. For a moment, I thought she was going to flee, but she simply stood there, staring at her hands, which were shaking even more than mine.
“I don’t know what this . . . this person is talking about.”
“Don’t deny it,” I said. “I saw the puppets in your room. Your stepfather was a puppeteer. I read about it in one of the letters you sent to Armand.”
That morning, when I’d been talking to Martin, taking inventory of the things in Julia’s room, I’d seen the puppets of Red Riding Hood and the Wolf sitting on one of the shelves, buried between other dolls and ornaments, but I hadn’t thought anything of it. Not at the time, anyway.
“And Ramona,” I said. “She’s always repeating something about the wolf, cuidado con el lobo. I heard you sing that tune this morning. Ramona must have learned it from you.”
“What on earth is she talking about?” Angélica asked Elisa.
Elisa frowned. For the first time, I noticed how much her gestures resembled Catalina’s, and yet they were so different.
Everything made sense now. Elisa had put Mayra in Aquilino’s house to get information about me and my father’s will. She’d forged my father’s check. Of course, she had access to his checkbook, to his signature, and she’d paid Franco with the pocket watch and promises of a fortune she would share with him. I glanced at Catalina. She was the woman he’d loved and he’d done this to be worthy of her.
“Caperucita,” Elisa said, void of emotion. “It was a show we put up for the kids.”
“Why didn’t you tell us you were Elisa?” Angélica said. “You’ve been living here for three and a half years!”
“I was going to do it,” Elisa said, unable to look Angélica in the eye. “I came here with every intention to tell the truth. After our mothers died, there was no reason to hide anymore, but Don Armand, with that problem in his brain, couldn’t remember me. At first, I told him who I was, and he hugged me.” Her voice broke. “But then, the next day, he’d forgotten all about me. He asked who I was again and again. In his mind, the only daughter he remembered and who really mattered was María Purificación, his firstborn, his legitimate, European daughter.” Her voice turned bitter. “I was an embarrassment to him because I was the daughter of a mestiza,” she scoffed, “the maid.” She dried her tears and straightened her back. “And his wife didn’t want us here.”
Catalina sat down, pressing her hand against her forehead.
“I know that!” Angélica sounded annoyed. “My parents argued about you all the time.”
“You knew?” Catalina asked.
“But there’s something I don’t understand, Ju . . . Elisa,” Alberto said, his voice rusty. “Why did you think that if Puri died, you would get her part of the inheritance?”