The Heritage Paper

Chapter 30



Part of Veronica wanted to hightail it home. She was kicking herself for taking Ellen’s bait. Her only objective was to protect Maggie and Jamie. And by bringing them here, she feared she’d done the opposite.

But the other half was intrigued by the stolen art, and was attracted to the mystery. The old Veronica was shining through the cracks.

Maggie must have noticed her inner turmoil and nudged up beside her. “You okay, Mom?”

“How could I not be? I’m surrounded by all the things I love—you and Jamie, amazing art, Uncle Eddie … okay, two out of three isn’t so bad.”

They had a good smile at that one—no comedian cracks this time.

The motif inside Flavia’s farmhouse was sort of an eclectic mix of Miami Vice and Colonial Williamsburg, but of course it worked.

Flavia disappeared into a long hallway, leaving the rest of them standing in a rustic kitchen that featured a tempting wine bar. The hallway was lined with paintings and Veronica couldn’t help wonder if they were also stolen. Flavia returned minutes later, carrying a pile of papers and envelopes and dropped them on the kitchen counter, reminiscent of when Veronica scrambled to pay the bills at the end of each month.

“These are letters between Gus Becker and Ellen Peterson,” she announced.

Veronica picked up the first one, dated March 28, 1953. The letter was addressed to Philip and signed by someone named Andrew.

“I don’t understand,” Veronica said. “These aren’t from Ellen.”

“Yes they are,” Youkelstein said, pulling the letter close to his face. “Philip and Andrew were names of Apostles. They are using their aliases.”

“When I first found them, I was confused myself,” Flavia explained. “I thought that perhaps Andrew and Philip were lovers who owned the farm prior to Gus. But then one day someone showed up to connect the dots.”

“Carsten,” Veronica blurted out.

Flavia nodded. “He traced a return address on one of the envelopes he’d discovered in the back of Ellen’s closet when they were moving her to Sunshine Village. He wasn’t sure what he was looking at either, but when we cross-matched them to the letters I’d found, we realized that we now had both ends of the letter chain. It became clear that Philip was Heinrich Müller/Gus Becker, and Andrew was Ellen. We assumed they had a secret love affair, but little did we know how much further it went.”

Eddie didn’t want to hear of any affair, or anything that would disparage his memories of Ellen and Harold Peterson. He stormed out of the room, almost knocking Zach over in the process.

Veronica thought to go after him, but thought better of it. She returned her focus to the letters, and when she began to read, she realized that when it came to the Peterson family, Eddie was the least of her worries.