“I won’t ever remember.”
“It was your favorite statue, and it will be a memory one day.”
“I don’t remember anything,” he pouted. “I don’t remember that stupid turtle. I don’t remember you, I don’t remember Mommy or Daddy or Roxy or Grandpa or anyone.”
I leaned in towards him. “Here’s what I promise you: One day, when you’re all grown up, you will remember that turtle and how I told you that when you were a really little boy, you loved it. I tell you that every day, so it will become a new memory for you one day.”
You will relearn, as I did.
“But I want to remember it now.”
“I know,” I said, looking down at my watch. Three o’clock.
“William, why don’t you show Roxy where we found that frog yesterday by the fountain? That foxglove is really spreading behind the Peddler, and I may want to make a bed there. I might have Don put the mulch back there.”
I quickly walked towards the shop, as Roxy’s raised eyebrow was like a stick poking me in the back. She knew I hated foxglove.
”Nanna, how long will you be gone?”
“Not long,” I said, giving him a wave without looking back.
I left the garden, pausing only to pick a few daylilies. The red bell jeered at me from the pitch of the roof of the Peddler. Look what happened to your life once you disregarded your father’s warning.
I glared back. I would have it removed this week. I certainly didn’t need it anymore.
Even though it was in deep summer and the trees were heavy with leaves, I could see the iron fence that now lined my property. It had been a massive expense; jaw dropping to get the final bill. But to install an entire eleven-foot tall fence, with extending upper rows of wicked barbed wire, around the entire perimeter of the woods, was an expensive project. And pricier still when I demanded the keyless entry.
I looked back to see Roxy and William deep in discussion near the fountain in the garden. I stepped past the first tree and reached into my pocket for the tiny remote. I’d practiced the code many times, for I was the only one who possessed it. Though my memory was legendary in my family, I still forced myself to recount the code every morning, to make sure it was set in my mind. I didn’t dare write it down. No one would ever be able to enter the woods again.
I had already activated the gate earlier that afternoon. As long as I was within a mile of it, the remote prompted it to unlock. So I had casually stepped outside, punched in the code, and went back inside.
Exactly an hour later, I was now standing directly in front of the gate. You couldn’t tell where the fence would open; there was no visible gate, at my request. The ironworkers who made it had looked at me with confusion at my request, but ultimately worked with a locksmith to design the hidden mechanics.
The remote looked like a small calculator in my hand. Once I touched the right combination, I heard a buzz, a click, and one section of fence opened.
I quickly seized it, for it was also manufactured to close within five seconds. I stepped inside and shut it behind me, making sure it locked.
The woods were bustling with a crush of squirrels, buzzing in the branches above. I was careful where I stepped. I was grateful for the way the woods were stubbornly territorial, trying to cover as much of the earth as possible with tangling underbrush and fallen limbs, preventing encroachment of the outside world. The fence was my contribution to the effort.
It should have been difficult to locate the clearing, with the crime-scene tape long removed and the evidence of hundreds of searchers now covered in decaying leaves under a new growth of weeds. But he still found it, as I knew he would. He’d come just as I’d opened the gate remotely and slipped in.
“Hello, Lynn.”
Steven stood in the center of the grassy area. Perhaps it had been the unflattering light of the hotel lamps the last time I saw him, in that frantic meeting before the government agents stormed in, but his skin seemed healthier now, his tan showcased nicely against his closely cropped white beard.
“Thank you for agreeing to meet with me,” he said.
I nodded. As he slipped his hands into the pockets of his jeans, I walked to the far end of the clearing. A few butterflies flew drunkenly before me. In the shadows of the tree line, I knelt down in front of the gray headstone I’d had delivered before the fence was finished. I laid the lilies before the stone.
Amelia Shrank, 1931–2018. Beloved Daughter, Friend to Children.
I traced my finger across her name, and then turned to Steven. “I’m here because I am indebted. Especially to you. To say a proper thank you for leading me to William. And also… to say I’m truly sorry for what all of this has cost you.”
“It wasn’t your fault. The government forced my hand when they planted the trumped-up investigation and then labeled me a child murderer. Even after the charges were dropped, I knew the damage was done. I should have left academia a long time ago and devoted all my time to investigating the disappearances. Not that I’ve had much of a choice, but I’ve chosen to go underground.”
“With this group you mentioned in the hotel? The Corcillium?”
“They’ve shown me so much, Lynn. The Researchers are just the front lines. The Corcillium guides it all. The Researchers are necessary to gather the intelligence, but the Corcillium is truly the heart of the effort. Through them, I finally learned the truth about Argentum.”
“So all that time, when you said Argentum was just a debunked theory… you truly didn’t know?”
He nodded. “Not even what it meant. The Corcillium wanted it that way. To protect all the Researchers.”
“I don’t understand.”
“You will. It all started when one of the members of the Corcillium came in contact with, of all things, a janitor,” Steven said, and then chuckled sadly. “A janitor in love, who fell for a woman with no memory. Helped her escape some sort of hospital in a remote town in Colorado.”
Despite the summer heat, I rubbed my arms.
Steven continued. “Of course, that colleague took extensive notes of his discussion with this janitor and his girlfriend. But not a day later, the two were killed. Tragic accident. Their car exploded. Brand-new car, too. Then that member of the Corcillium went to Argentum himself, to confirm what he’d been told… and was killed in a skiing accident. Strange, don’t you think? And when the Corcillium sent others to try and verify, they all disappeared. It became simply too dangerous. They knew what the janitor said—about people with no memories appearing in shafts of lights from the heavens—but could never prove it. And anyone who tried to find out never returned.”
I remembered what Don said about the academic couple who came to Argentum and were seized by the police and never seen again. And, of course, what almost happened to Roxy and myself.
“The janitor and his girlfriend had no proof, and when they died, their stories died with them. All the Corcillium had were the notes from the interviews with the janitor. To honor their sacrifice, they developed the idea of the poem to send to all the families of the missing. The idea was to give the families part of the key, and if the day came when we could prove the abducted were returned to Argentum, then the answer was there. In the last line of the poem. But I, and all the other Researchers, never knew.”
“The Corcillium did that to protect you.”
His mouth formed a straight line. “They assumed in our web of research, someone might come across a mention of Argentum. They couldn’t risk any of us losing our lives pursuing it. So they purposely disseminated what came to be called the Argentum theory. It was one of the first pieces of information a Researcher learned: never to believe anything that mentioned ‘Argentum.’ It was part of our vernacular. We debated it endlessly. I still remember getting my first piece of encrypted information, containing what avenues not to explore. The Argentum theory was at the top of the list. We all learned to dismiss it.”