Chapter 8

Leon left before the sun was up, bound for Springhole, leaving Otis wandering the halls as he awaited Leon's return. Would

Elisabeth be with him? The sooner he found her, the sooner he could leave Monticello for good. He knew he could leave now

and handle matters via correspondence, and there were moments when the thought tempted him, but the finances were still being

sorted, and the matter of Elisabeth was of utmost importance—he needed to be here for her.

Wolf tilted his head and looked up at him.

"I'm worried too," Otis said. He had no experience with children. He swallowed, but the lump in his throat refused to go away.

If he didn't find her, he would always wonder. If she was found, he'd be responsible for her every need, which was an intimidating

prospect.

Wolf yawned. He had an advantage over Otis. Everyone liked Wolf when they met him. They found him striking in looks and an

agreeable companion. Neither could be said about Otis, who lacked in both areas.

"You ought to busy yourself." Mildred brought him a cup of coffee. "Time won't go any faster with you staring through the

gap in the drapes."

"You're right." He turned his back to the window and looked at the endless stack of letters sent to his late brother. It held no appeal. "I think I'll search Reginald's room. I've put it off long enough, and there may be information on Elisabeth in there."

"Excellent." Mildred clapped her hands together. "Go on then, and stop fretting. We'll find her."

"I wish I were so certain."

"Your mother would have told you to cling to hope."

"Do you think... Would she have sent me off...?" His voice failed him.

"No," Mildred said with an affirmative shake of the head. "I think she would have done everything she could have to keep you

here and to convince you that your worth was not in your looks."

There was no way to know for sure. His mother had been gone from this earth for a very long time, but he wanted to believe

that Mildred was right. That not everyone who mattered would have sent him away given the chance.

"I wish I could know for certain. I'll be in Reginald's room." He backed away from her and made his way to his brother's garish

abode. It boasted finely crafted walnut furniture covered with burgundy blankets and pillows. Furniture fit for a king, or

for a man who thought himself equal to a king. What a waste to furnish a bedroom with such luxury.

No one even sees the chamber of an unmarried man. He cringed, realizing that might not be true of his brother.

"Come, Wolf," he ordered. "Let's see if we can learn something about Elisabeth."

He began at the closet, sifting through Reginald's tailored suits. When he'd last seen Reginald, they'd been boys, just beginning to grow into men. These suits would not have fit the lad he'd butted heads with and who he'd missed every day since they'd said goodbye.

"I don't think anyone thought you were going away for good, especially Reginald." He nearly jumped at the sound of Mildred's

voice. Where had she come from? "I thought I'd see if you wanted company. Some rooms are harder to go in."

"I didn't think I was going away for good either. I thought when my head healed, or when my father accepted me as I was...

But he couldn't stand the sight of me. After his hot oils failed, nothing was the same. Not even my scalp."

"The scars..." Mildred shook her head. "Your father cried that night."

"And then he made arrangements to send me away." Otis grasped the foot of the bed. "I hated his miracle cures. I was a fool

to believe." Even now that he was a grown man, the memories stung as much as the tonic rubbed into his once smooth scalp had.

No, the memories of his father's disapproving eyes stung more than even the hottest oil.

"You were a boy—of course you believed. Your father failed you the day he sent you away, and he failed himself. I can't speak

for him, but he was never the same after that. It was as though he carried a weight he couldn't free himself of."

Otis never saw his father again after that. And though his father continued to send remedies, he never asked Otis to come back. Mr. Crawford, the quiet old pianist, would hand him the parcels when they arrived, and like an innocent child, Otis believed he would find a reminder of home, a loving gift, or at least a letter full of heart. Instead, he found glass bottles that crowed their ability to cure any ailment. Bottles of lies. Bottles of rejection. Bottles of pain. In tears he would massage his scalp, his arms, his eyebrows, and take spoonful after spoonful of sour liquid that turned his stomach but did nothing for his hair.

At twenty he stopped, no longer believing he would be beckoned home nor that he would ever be cured. He looked in the mirror

at his face, void of eyebrows or hair on his scalp, riddled with scars from the many failed attempts to regrow what was lost.

He touched his smooth arms and blinked his eyelids that had no lashes and accepted that he would never look the part of a

Taylor gentleman. He'd merely live inside the shell of a broken man. His warring emotions were poured into his music, and

he captured the pain so thoroughly that his songs sold well. But even the piano could not ease the pain he carried.

Over the years the packages came with less frequency, and then his father died, and Otis grieved. He wept over a man who hadn't

wanted him. No packages came after that; no tonics, no letters until Leon sent for him. He was no closer to knowing where

he belonged or what to do with his life, but he did feel driven to find Elisabeth.

It made no difference that she was an illegitimate child. She could be disfigured, and he would not look away. When he found

her, he would keep her safe, no matter the cost. His resolve was firm. He would love her in the deep, forever way that he

had yearned for. If the feelings growing in his chest were any indication of his conviction, one could assume he loved her

already.

"I do hope to find Elisabeth," he said. For himself, he no longer knew what to reach for, but he would give her the world.

Mildred nodded and began searching the room.

His brother, he discovered, cared a great deal for clothes. His dressers and armoires were filled to bursting. His pockets

were mostly empty, aside from the one or two that contained sugar cubes.

"How strange that the only things I know about my grown brother are that he was obsessed with clothes and expensive furniture, that he had an abandoned offspring, and that he held an apparent affection for his horse," Otis said after finding another sugar cube. "Mother used to take sugar to the horses too."

"He kept your mother's mare until she died of old age only weeks before your brother died. Likely, those cubes were meant

for her."

"Ah, now I know another fact about Reginald. He looked after mother's horse. I'm glad of it. I have many memories of her in

the stable brushing that mare."

"There is talk that horses will soon be a thing of the past. Everyone says automobiles will take over the world," Mildred

said with one hand on the back of the chair by the dressing table.

"Mother would rue the day."

Buried in the back of a dresser drawer, Otis discovered a few unpaid notes that made them both groan. What they found next

silenced them. A handkerchief with his mother's initials embroidered in the corner was placed atop an embossed frame with

cracked glass sheltering an image of Reginald and Otis's mother. He stared into her soft eyes and she looked back at him,

the smile never leaving her lips. His throat tightened around words he wished he could speak to her. If only he could sit

beside her and search her every gesture for acceptance. Would she smile so contently if she saw his scars? Would she run her

fingers over his head in the same affectionate way she'd run her fingers through his once thick hair? If only he could take

her hand and listen to her voice instructing him on life and love and faith.

He turned to Mildred. "Why do you suppose Reginald had these?"

"Even a grown man misses his mama. Life soured him, but that doesn't mean he didn't grieve."

"When she was here everything was different."

"Your mother was a loss to both of you. But Reginald grieved your departure too. When you first left, he asked your father

every day when you were coming back."

"What did my father say?"

"At first he told him you would be back soon."

Otis scoffed. "Father wouldn't like knowing I'm back here now, still scarred and hairless."

"He should have gone and seen you. He would have realized that you're still you," Mildred said. "I tried to tell him to visit,

but he was a stubborn man. I think he even wanted to, but—"

"You know, I used to watch for him." But he never came. The words didn't need to be said aloud. They both knew the truth. Otis's temper threatened to boil over. The hurt young man

who still lived in him wanted to lash out, but then he saw his mother's face in the cracked frame and held on to the calming

love she had always shown him. "Tell me what happened with Reginald. You said he asked about me."

"Your father grew tired of answering him. I believe the guilt nagged at him, all the lies about where you were, and the constant

asking from Reginald wore him down. He slapped Reginald one night when he asked about you, and after that I never heard him

speak your name again." Mildred closed the drawer they'd found the photograph in and stepped away from the dresser. A heaviness,

like a thick fog, filled the air. "Your father put his energy into his businesses, and Reginald worked with him."

"Hmm." Otis set the frame aside and busied himself by shuffling through belongings. The fact that Reginald had asked after him, at least for a time, made it harder for Otis to hold on to his anger. But that was all he'd felt for his family for so long. Anger and a persistent longing to be near them—the mix forever sparring inside him. Now he wasn't sure what to feel.

Their continued search revealed more clothes and worldly possessions but little evidence of Reginald's comings and goings.

The obvious places had been thoroughly investigated, and they'd found nothing that pertained to Elisabeth. Otis shoved his

hands in his pockets and looked around the room. He must have missed something.

He looked under the dresser, tapped at the floorboards—nothing. He pulled every drawer from the dresser, looked for a false

bottom—nothing. His heart beat faster. There had to be more than trinkets and clothes. He ran his hand along the top of the

drapes. Dust soared through the air and he sneezed, but he kept his hand moving, feeling for something. Then his fingers brushed

across metal. A key. He grabbed it and held it tight.

"Mildred!" She rushed to his side. "What do you think this could be to?"

"I don't recognize it." She reached for it, and though he was remiss to let it go, he put it in her hand. She raised it close

to her face and studied it.

"It must be important," he said, eager to have it back in his hand.

"I wish I knew." She returned it to him. "Keep it. Someday we might know what it goes to."

He tucked it into his pocket, relieved that their efforts had amounted to something, even if they weren't sure what it was.

When they could think of nowhere else to search, Mildred opened the bedroom door. "I best get supper ready. You ought to go

and clean up—wouldn't want Sadie seeing you so disheveled."

He groaned. "I think I'll stay here."

"You stubborn man." She laughed as she walked from the room, leaving him with Wolf, a key with no lock, and thoughts of his new employee.

He'd kept to himself last evening, afraid to confront her. The last time he'd been alone with a woman his own age, he was

fourteen, just a boy. Mr.Crawford ensured that he received a solid education in mathematics, Latin, and even geography. But

no one had taught him how to converse with women or how to make himself feel at ease in their presence.

To Otis's great relief, Leon arrived before Sadie. "Tell me everything," Otis said, ready for a distraction and hopefully

a lead.

"Elisabeth isn't there."

"She's not?"

"No. Mary sent that letter two years ago. Reginald wouldn't pay more for the child's upkeep. He came and took the child, and

Mary doesn't know what happened after that. Since he didn't bring her here, she assumes he found a different home for her."

"I don't understand. Does Mary run an orphanage?"

"Not exactly. The children aren't orphans."

Otis clenched his jaw. "You're saying she takes in children whose parents don't want them?"

"They may want them," Mildred said. "But this world is harsh—"

"You can't excuse it," Otis said. He'd heard every justification, every reason why it was right to abandon one's own family.

They were lies, all of them. "Did she say what Reginald's connection was to Elisabeth? Are we sure that she is his child?"

"He is the father. Mary was brought the child as an infant and paid to care for her. Elisabeth was only a few days old when

the arrangement was made. Reginald said the mother left the baby with him and he could not keep her."

" Would not keep her, you mean."

"I don't know his reasoning," Leon said. "Mary did say he was adamant the child be kept a secret."

"And she does not know where the child is now? But his bank books continue to list Elisabeth up until his death."

"He must have found someone else willing to care for her," Mildred said. "But whoever has her hasn't been paid since his death.

It's been a year..."

"So whoever has her could turn her out?" Otis said.

"It's possible." Leon frowned. "I don't mean to speak ill of Mary, but... well, she wasn't caring for those children because

she felt a love for them. It appeared to be mercenary."

"Oh dear," Mildred said. "I don't like the thought of that."

"Could we discreetly ask around and see if there are known people who care for foundlings or children who have no one?" Otis

tapped his foot impatiently. He had to find her. Taking her in would be frightening, he knew so little about children, but

the thought of her being out there with no one was far worse.

"When I go to the next quilting night, I'll see if I can get the women talking. They love to gossip," Mildred said. "But I

can't promise anyone will know anything."

"I am not keen on gossip, having been the subject of so much. But if you would ask, I'd be grateful."

***

... I've never understood men, and the owner of the mansion is more complicated than any other. Whenever I see him, he ducks

into another room and looks away. Perhaps I should write him another letter....