Mia.
Simon.
That was all it took to make the connection. The page I was remembering wasn’t from a book, it was the second page of the letter Celia Hunter had shared with Simon. The outside edge of the paper had been faded and worn in exactly the same way as the book page in front of me. In the case of the book, the page had been loose and a small part of the edge had extended beyond the protection of the cover. So how had the second sheet of pink stationery gotten worn and faded?
I thought about it for a moment. Both sides of the envelope were worn almost through at the folds. If the two pages of the letter hadn’t been folded evenly then that edge of the second page would have been exposed to changes in temperature and humidity inside that dusty wall, unprotected by the first page of the letter and by the envelope worn thin along the crease. But why didn’t the first page of the letter show the same wear on the opposite edge of the page where that edge would have been exposed by an uneven fold of the pages?
Because there was a middle page, I realized. That wasn’t a two-page letter, it was a three-page letter. Celia had shown Simon his mother’s letter, she just hadn’t shown him all of it.
I didn’t stop to think whether it was a good idea or a bad idea; I closed up the workroom, got my purse and my jacket from my office and headed for the St. James Hotel to find Celia Hunter.
Sunday afternoons during the fall the St. James serves high tea in their dining room. That was where I found Celia. She was sitting at a table for two and I walked across the room as though I was supposed to be joining her, pulled out the second chair and sat down. She looked cool and elegant in a long purple heather sweater and black trousers.
“Hello, Celia,” I said.
“What do you want?” she asked.
Since she had skipped the social niceties and gotten right to the point, so did I. “I want to know what it says on the page of Meredith’s letter that you didn’t show us.”
The color drained from her face but it was the only sign that she was rattled. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said stiffly.
I leaned back in my seat, crossing one leg over the other to fake a confidence I didn’t exactly feel. I had no way to make her show me the missing page of the letter.
At that moment a waiter made his way across to us. “Ms. Paulson, hi,” he said as he came level with the table.
“Hello, Levi,” I said, smiling at the teen. He was a voracious reader, in the library at least once and often twice a week.
“I’ll bring you a cup and a fresh pot,” he said, smiling back at me.
“Thank you,” I said.
Celia was far too polite to protest that I wasn’t her guest. Levi moved to a nearby sideboard and returned with a larger pot of tea, wrapped in an old-fashioned quilted cozy, and a china cup and saucer. “Let me know if you need anything else,” he said.
I poured myself a cup of tea and added a little milk and two lumps of sugar. My mouth was dry and getting the tea ready bought me a little more time to figure out what I was going to say next. I took a sip and looked at Celia across the table. “The letter you received from Meredith had three pages, not two. For some reason you didn’t want Simon—or, I’m guessing, Leo—to see what was written on the middle page.”
“You have a very . . . fanciful imagination, Kathleen,” she said.
I may have rattled her a little when I’d first appeared at the table, but she seemed completely composed now. “What I don’t understand is if there’s something that you feel you need to hide in that letter then why show it to Leo or Simon at all?”
“And as I already said, I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
I studied her for a moment, hoping I seemed as unconcerned as she did, when I realized she wasn’t quite as calm as she seemed at first glance. Her hands were folded in her lap, left over right, and I noticed she was fingering something in her right hand. I caught a flash of something round and purple and suddenly a lot of things began to make sense.
“You’re working the twelve steps,” I said.
Something shifted in Celia’s face. She reached up and set the purple nine-month AA coin she had been fingering on the table. “Yes,” she said. “I wanted to make amends with Leo.”
I remembered what Oren had told me. “Because you helped break up his marriage.”
Wordlessly, she nodded.
“But you didn’t tell Leo or Simon the truth.”
Celia took a deep breath and let it out. “Kathleen, do you know the twelve steps?”
“Yes,” I said. Susan’s husband, Eric, was in AA.
“Then you know that it’s important to make amends but not if that will hurt the person or someone else.” She picked up the purple token and set it down again. “I’ve been sober for ten months,” she said. “I know what a cliché it is, but I really am a different person—a better person. What I did to Leo and Simon was unforgivable and forgiveness wasn’t what I was looking for. I wanted them both to know that Meredith wouldn’t have left them if it hadn’t been for me. If I hadn’t told Victor what to say to win her over.”
She closed her eyes for a moment. When she opened them again I could see regret and shame in them. “I was all set to tell Leo the truth and let him read the letter from Meredith. Yes, there’s another page. And then he told me that Victor was here and that he’s sick.”
I understood then. “And you knew if you told Leo the truth that any chance of the two of them reconciling would be gone.”
She nodded. “He’s sick, Kathleen. He could die. I couldn’t do it. No matter what he did—what we did—I couldn’t take away his chance to have a relationship with the only family he has left.”
“But you’d already told Leo about the letter.”
“Yes.” She studied the purple token for a moment and set it on the table once more. “Then I realized I could just remove the middle page. The letter still made sense.”
“Why did you push to show it to Simon?”
“A reporter who is doing an article about the mail that was found contacted me. I made the mistake of telling her that I had received a letter from an old friend. I was afraid Simon would put two and two together and figure out the friend was his mother. This way I could . . . control what he—what everyone—found out.” She looked past me for a moment and then her gaze met mine again. “And because, selfishly, it made me feel a little better.”
“What’s on the missing page?” I asked.
She reached for her purse tucked next to her hip in the upholstered chair, removed the pink envelope and handed it across the table to me. I took out the three sheets of paper and read the letter, the whole letter, from the beginning.
Dear Celia,
I hope you don’t throw this letter away as soon as you see it’s from me. You probably hate me for what I’ve done, but you couldn’t hate me more than I hate myself. Victor and Leo may look the same but they’re very different men. I thought Victor was exciting, and he seemed to know what I was thinking in a way Leo didn’t, as if he could see into my heart somehow. But I was wrong. I’ve learned that Victor is selfish, manipulative and cruel. He doesn’t really care about me. He doesn’t love me. I think the only reason he showed any interest in me at all was to hurt Leo. He’s so jealous of his brother and I have proof of that now. I miss Simon so much. Victor is going out of town in a couple of weeks. I’ll be able to leave then. I was a childish fool. I don’t know if Leo will ever forgive me but I have to find out.