“When was this taken?”
She looked down at the photograph, a soft smile touching her lips. “At the lake house. When I couldn’t hide the pregnancy anymore, I told my agent I needed a break and Button brought me down to the lake to wait out my pregnancy and find a midwife. Sumter was traveling so much for work and paid to have the midwife live at the house full-time until the baby was born. That allowed Button to be in Charleston most of the time so Anna wouldn’t get suspicious.” She closed her eyes for a moment. “Sumter was in London when the baby was born—two weeks early. He didn’t get to see our baby, either.”
“Why didn’t you marry him? You were both free.”
She gave a delicate shrug. “Sumter wanted to marry, but I kept putting him off, saying we could decide after the baby was born. I knew he didn’t really want to marry again—he had loved Anna, at the beginning at least. Button didn’t want us to marry, either.”
“But why? You were her best friend. You would be sisters.”
“But there was Anna. Button was afraid of what Anna might do to me if she knew. And the baby. I have to say I was a little afraid of Anna, too. She’d never liked me, and losing Hasell had sent her over the edge. I can’t imagine what she might have been driven to if Sumter brought me and our baby back to Charleston. Even if we moved to New York, we could never have kept it a secret from her.”
“And then the decision was taken care of for you.”
She looked down at her hands and nodded. “I would have loved another baby, although I was afraid that I’d have the same problem I had when you were a child—how the restless dead found us to be a bright beacon and wouldn’t leave you alone. What if the baby had inherited our gift? Would I make that child’s life miserable, too? I confided in Button, and she just said we’d wait and see. She was like that, you know. Always seeing the silver lining. Always believing that everything would all work out. She gave me so much confidence that I’d started to secretly plan on how I’d raise this child in New York, where nobody would care that I didn’t have a husband.” She gave a shuddering sigh. “And then the baby died, and I moved back to New York on my own as if I’d never even been pregnant.”
I reached over and took my mother’s hands in mine. “I’m sorry, Mother. I’m so sorry. What an awful tragedy for you—and then to have to keep it to yourself all these years. But I’m glad I know now.” I squeezed her hands. “I’m assuming Dad doesn’t?”
She shook her head. “What would be the point? The truth is that I never stopped loving him, despite evidence to the contrary. If he knew I’d ever been pregnant with Sumter’s child, he’d always doubt it.”
I sat back. “You should tell him,” I said softly. “That’s what you’d tell me.”
She lifted her chin and pulled her shoulders back. “I probably would.”
I tapped the saltshaker. “Is there any significance to this date? It’s two months after the photograph was taken.”
She took a shuddering breath. “May thirtieth was the baby’s birthday—I’m assuming Button painted that on there, because I know I didn’t. And the photograph was taken the last time I saw Sumter. He came down for a week in March, and we had a St. Patrick’s Day party—just the three of us. Button organized it, saying I was lonely and needed a little party, even if we kept it small. Sumter surprised me—just showed up out of the blue. We had a lovely time—mostly reminiscing about the happy times we’d spent on the lake when we were younger.” She paused for a moment, lost in thought. “When I let my memories take me back, I never allow them to go past that week.”
I was listening to every word, but I was also focusing on the saltshaker and the photograph. They’d been put in the bag on purpose, to show me something. When she’d finished speaking, I asked, “Who do you think put these in my bag?”
She studied the saltshaker for a moment. “I’ve been wondering the same thing. I’m thinking it was Hasell, since the baby would have been her half brother or sister.”
“Maybe that’s her unfinished business,” I said. “She wanted to get the secret out in the open before she moved on.”
My mother looked doubtful. “That could be it—at least part of it, anyway. It would even follow why Anna would want to obstruct that knowledge. Her hatred of me and jealousy over Sumter would not have gone away in death. But the intensity of emotions in that house doesn’t match the circumstances. There’s something else. Something connected to me. Something bigger.”