The view was breathtaking. Mount Diablo rose in the distance. Annabel looked along Mitchell Canyon toward the peak and thought that sometime in the next few decades, a resort hotel would be built up there. She would probably even live to see it, though not the way it would be just after the turn of the millennium, when a certain fire would break out here in the Diablos and smoke-jumpers would be summoned to help battle it . . .
She froze suddenly as the familiarity of her surroundings came crashing in on her. Slowly, she turned, and there it was in the hillside, partially screened by brush now, the dark, irregular opening of the cave into which she had crawled over a year earlier, seeking shelter from the flames. Over a year earlier? Over ninety years in the future! Annabel realized she was having trouble breathing. She squeezed her eyes tightly shut, then opened them again. The entrance to the cave was still there, inviting and mocking her at the same time. The thoughts that went through her head now were the same ones she had when she first crawled out of that hole in the hillside. If she crawled back in, would the mysterious forces that had brought her here take her back to her own time? Or would she find herself lost in yet another era, another island in the stream of time?
She took a step toward the cave . . .
Then stopped, and turned, and looked down the hill. Cole still sat there below her, holding Michael, and as Annabel watched, he lowered his head and tenderly kissed the head of their sleeping son. Slowly, Annabel's lips curved in a smile.
Then she walked down to rejoin her family, and not once did she look back at the dark hole in the hillside behind her.
Epilogue
Vickie Pasetta flipped through the mail she had just taken out of her box, not paying much attention to it. Bills, ads, just the usual–
She stopped short and frowned at the large, special delivery envelope. The return address was that of one of the oldest and most prestigious legal firms in the city, and Vickie had no idea what a bunch of high-powered lawyers could want with her.
But hearing from lawyers was never good, was it?
She ripped open the package and took out a smaller but still good-sized envelope. A letter from the law firm accompanied it. Vickie frowned as she scanned the words.
. . . arrangements with one of the founders of this firm . . . deliver this package to you at this address on this date . . . consider our duties in this matter duly discharged . . .
What in the world?
Vickie looked from the letter to the envelope that had been in the larger package. Her breath caught in her throat as she recognized the handwriting of the person who had scrawled on it:
Vickie,
You and Earl look at this together.
All my love.
There was no signature, but Vickie didn’t need one. She charged up the stairs to her apartment, where Earl was waiting for her. They were going to go together to the memorial service. It couldn’t be considered a funeral, because Annabel’s body hadn’t been found yet, even though no one doubted that she had been killed in the terrible fire the day before.
“Earl!” Vickie called as she burst into the apartment. “Earl, you have to look at this!”
He emerged from the bathroom looking confused and worried by the frantic tone in Vickie’s voice. “What is it?” he asked.
She thrust the envelope in front of him. “That’s her writing, isn’t it? Annabel’s?”
His eyes widened as he said, “Yeah, it looks like it. Where did you get that?”
She showed him the package. “Somebody hired these lawyers to make sure it was delivered today.”
“Hired them when?”
“1906,” Vickie said. “The letter says it’s been in their safe ever since then.”
Earl swallowed hard, his face turning pale under the beard. “You’d better open it,” he said.
With trembling fingers, Vickie tore the envelope open. When she tilted it up, a photograph slid out. Locked in a safe all these years, away from heat and light, it looked new, like it had been taken just a few days earlier, even though it was an old-fashioned sepia print.
A man and a woman stood in the photo, both of them dressed in vintage uniforms of the San Francisco Fire Department, like the ones in the photo Vickie had pointed out to Annabel in the museum. Vickie’s heart pounded wildly as she recognized the man she had seen in that other photo.
She recognized the woman, too, and all she could say was, “How . . . how in the world . . .”
Earl put his arms around her shoulders and tightened it, saying, “I don’t know how it happened, but I think there’s one thing we can tell for certain from this picture.” He took a deep breath. “Annabel is right where she’s supposed to be.”
AUTHOR’S NOTE
THE SAN FRANCISCO Earthquake of 1906 and the great fire that followed it actually occurred, of course, including the bull that rampaged through Chinatown. Certain minor historical details have been slightly altered in this story for dramatic purposes. There was an actual Engine Company Twenty-one in the San Francisco Fire Department, but the characters I have placed in it are entirely fictional.
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About the Author—Livia J. Washburn