Chapter 16

CHAPTER 16

TUESDAY, DECEMBER 8, 1925

L auren's birthdays had always been celebrated quietly. But this—her father's idea—this was no humble affair.

Beneath stained-glass panels in the soaring ceiling, orchids ringed the trunks of potted palms placed throughout The Plaza Hotel's Palm Court. Mirrors doubled the cream-and-gold décor that made this hotel a French Renaissance chateau on the edge of Central Park.

Two turquoise-and-gold teapots steamed with the fragrances of lavender and bergamot. A four-tiered stand held cucumber sandwiches, salmon bruschetta, miniature chocolate tarts, pumpkin cheesecakes, cinnamon scones, and more.

Lauren's mother would have loved to experience this. Then again, she would also love that Lauren and Lawrence were here now, together. "Redeem this." Those parting words resounded in Lauren's spirit, reminding her what Mother's priority had been.

"Happy birthday, sweetheart." Smiling, Lawrence picked up a teapot with trembling hands. The bandages were gone, but faint marks remained to remind her how close she'd come to losing him.

She half rose, and her strand of pearls swayed as she took the small pot from him and poured the tea herself. "This feels indulgent."

He laughed. "Good. You deserve a little indulgence, especially on your birthday. You're only thirty-three once, after all." He sobered, then added, "My heavens, but you look like your mother."

Lauren settled on the plum-colored velvet cushion and lifted a cheesecake from the tray. When her mother was thirty-three, she was married and had a six-year-old daughter. When her mother was thirty-three, she was already sick with a terminal illness that would take her life nine years later.

Closing her eyes, Lauren tried desperately to shove that aside, to focus instead on the present. This one bite of cake. This one sip of tea. The fact that after years of feeling like an orphan, her father had come back to her. Inhaling deeply, she opened her eyes again.

There on the table were two shabti figures. A man and a young woman. Unlike the wooden set she'd found at the Napoleon House, these were made of faience, that gorgeous luminous blue substance the Egyptians loved to use.

"Your gift," Lawrence said. "That is, I thought we could try this again."

He must know that to her they would look like a father and daughter.

She picked up each one, marveling at the handiwork that created them and at the distance of time and space they'd traveled to reach her. Her father told her the story of their discovery in his typical dramatic fashion, but for once she didn't care so much about where they'd come from.

She cared that he remembered her. She cared that he was trying.

"You aren't going to give that one back to me now, are you?" He pointed to the male figure.

"No," Lauren determined. Her throat grew tight. "These two will stay together." After standing them up on the white tablecloth as silent sentinels, she reached into her satchel and pulled out three typewritten pages. "And this is for you."

He accepted it. "What's this? Do I get a gift on your birthday?"

"It's as good a day as any," she said. "This is my first article for your newsletter." She knew it may not guarantee her a spot on the expedition team. But the reply she'd received in the post from Dr. Breasted yesterday had encouraged her to try. The golden age of Egyptian exploration is fast coming to a close , he'd written. She longed to go while she still could. But even if things didn't work out that way, the simple notion of helping her father and helping others avoid fraud had blossomed into a worthwhile goal of its own.

"You may have to mention the fire on the property, but that won't be the only news you share," she went on. "Hopefully this article will be of so much value to your subscribers they'll forget all about that."

She watched him scan the lines she'd typed as soon as she'd gotten home from the trip to Boston and Newport. It was an article based on what she'd found at Newell St. John's. No names had been used, of course.

"This is wonderful," he murmured, shaking his head. "Oh, Lauren, you've made an old man very happy. I have no doubt that the board and our subscribers will be even more impressed."

"I've got at least three more articles I can easily write, based on my notes from the consultations I've been doing for the police."

"Anything I don't know about yet? Please say you won't make me wait for the articles to find out." His eyes glinted with something she dared to hope was approval.

Lauren hoped that Mother would be pleased, too.

"Aunt Beryl!" Returning from The Plaza, Lauren closed the apartment door behind her and stepped into her aunt's delicate embrace to receive a kiss that never touched her skin. She was fifty-two years old now, her upswept blond hair just beginning to fade. Her spine remained finishing-school straight. Aunt Beryl's smile, too, was perfect, but Lauren could never tell if it was genuine or forged for appearance alone.

Lauren hoped her own smile was warmer. "This is a surprise," she said.

"You have no idea." Elsa beckoned from the sofa, where she sat on the front half of the cushion, her back flawlessly straight, hands folded in her lap. One ankle crossed over the other. Even if Lauren hadn't seen Aunt Beryl yet, she'd have detected her exacting presence by her daughter's rigid posture.

Ivy sat beside Elsa. "Maybe I should leave you three alone for this."

"Oh, applesauce," Elsa replied. "Stay right here."

Lauren lowered herself into an armchair, and Aunt Beryl did the same. The fire crackled behind the grate, toasting the room and releasing the spicy scent from evergreen branches on the mantel.

"I understand you and Elsa searched my house for a box of letters on the word of that nursemaid Nancy Foster. I've kept it in a wall safe in my bedroom, in case you ever asked for it." Rising, Aunt Beryl took a box from where it had been hidden beneath a crocheted blanket and passed it to Lauren. "I think Goldie would want you to have this at last."

Lauren grasped the corners of the box, the sharp edges digging into her palms. "You've had it all this time? Why didn't you say anything?"

"Like you, I had put it out of my mind. You're not the only one who forgot about this. Maybe neither of us was ready to dwell upon what these letters might hold."

"I'm ready now," Lauren said quietly. "Thank you."

The next few minutes blurred. Aunt Beryl gave her one more not-quite-kiss to the cheek, and Elsa and Ivy hugged her tightly before Lauren retreated to the privacy of her room.

Her nerves tremored. Dropping her handbag on the nightstand, she kicked off her shoes and curled her legs beneath her on the quilted bed. The box felt surprisingly light on her lap for the weight of what it held.

At last, she opened the lid and pulled out an envelope at random. Mother had written this one to Dad in September 1902. Lauren would have been almost ten years old at the time, her mother thirty-seven, and her father forty-seven.

My sister has asked me a thousand times if it was worth it to marry you, and a thousand times, I tell her yes, it was worth it. For Lauren. I struggle to understand why you stay away from her. I don't doubt that your love for me has faded. I have lost my shine, no longer bearing any resemblance to my name, and I know it began even before I got sick.

What I can't understand is why you choose Egypt over Lauren, too. We have been through so much to have this child. She is brilliant when you are near, but you don't see how she flattens every time you leave. I am not enough for her, Lawrence, nor did I ever expect to be. She needs her father, too. Will you not come home before her birthday this year? Be here for Christmas at least?

I worry for her. When nurses and doctors come to see me, she stays in your office. She is not afraid of strangers, Lawrence. She is hiding from the truth that her mother is dying. You run to Egypt. She runs to the idea of it. It's where she feels safe. She is more like you than you realize. I'm losing both of you to the ancient past because you don't like the present and future.

A tear slipped to the tip of Lauren's nose, and she caught it with the side of her finger. Every paragraph prompted a new question in her mind. Her eyes hot and sticky, she read the letter again, and then a third time, trying to decipher the code.

Two things, at least, were clear. Nancy had been right in that Mother had understood more than Lauren had realized. And Lauren had work to do if she was ever going to grasp the full picture herself.

Swiping the back of her hand over her cheek, she drifted to the living room.

"Aunt Beryl?" Lauren lifted the letter. "Can we talk?"

At once, her aunt rose and followed her back to her room, where Lauren sat on the end of her bed, and Aunt Beryl perched on the skirted stool at the vanity.

"You have questions," her aunt said quietly, brushing Cleo's hair from her skirt.

"Three of them, actually, and all from reading only one letter." Lauren spread the looping script over her lap. "Mother said in September 1902 that she'd started to lose her shine even before she got sick. Then she says that she and my father went ‘through so much' to have a child, and in the next paragraph implies that Dad was running away from something when he went to Egypt. Can you shed light on any of this?"

Aunt Beryl's spine seemed to soften by a degree. "The babies. Of course, Goldie was talking about the babies. That's your answer to all three questions."

Lauren shook her head, failing to comprehend.

Her aunt gazed at the photograph of Mother on the vanity. She picked up the frame. "My sister had trouble carrying babies to term. Before you were born, she suffered three miscarriages."

Lauren trapped the groan in her spirit, pressing a hand to the ache in her heart.

"Each baby that died took a little more of Goldie. The fourth baby was born twenty months before you. He was nearly full-term. I was there for that birth. I was there when my sister's perfect, tiny baby boy died three days later in her arms."

The pain became a fire in Lauren's chest. Four babies, four different sets of hopes and dreams wrapped in the most precious form. Four losses to grieve, with little time to heal between. Tears soaked the handkerchief balled in her fist.

"Shall I stop?" her aunt asked.

"No," Lauren rasped. "Tell me more. Tell me the truth."

"Your brother's name was Lawrence. Your father, for whom the child was named, never saw him. Can you imagine?" Aunt Beryl's voice shook with anger. "The man was off digging somewhere and never held his own son. He wasn't there to hold his wife after the death, the most devastating blow of all. Just like he wasn't there to comfort you when Goldie followed her little boys to heaven, at last."

Lauren squeezed shut her eyes, inhaled deeply, then exhaled. Again. "Why didn't they tell me?" she whispered.

The mattress squeaked, and Lauren opened her eyes to find her aunt sitting beside her.

"Your father made Goldie promise not to. It was too unpleasant, he said. He didn't even want to name the babies who came before Lawrence. But Goldie named them. William. Matthew. Isaac. And then Lawrence."

Four brothers in heaven. It was staggering.

"May I?" Aunt Beryl touched the letter, and Lauren passed it to her.

Quiet pulsed while she silently read. "‘You run to Egypt,'" she read aloud at last. "That's what he did, Lauren, though it gives me no pleasure to say it. Yes, it was his work. But it became a convenient obsession. He didn't want to face his wife's grief, or perhaps his own, at home. Then once she became ill, there was even more to run from, of course. He couldn't stand to witness her decline."

Lauren felt split in two. She wanted to confront her father about keeping this secret, about leaving Mother to mourn alone. She also wanted to honor Mother's dying wish that the years of separation in their family be redeemed. Was it possible to do both?

"But this is true, too, you know." Aunt Beryl broke into her thoughts, tapping the letter once more. "A thousand times she told me she wasn't sorry she'd married Lawrence, because of you. You were a gift to her. I felt better about her being way out in Chicago knowing she had you."

Fighting a swell of emotion, Lauren refolded the letter and placed it back in the box, closing the lid firmly. That was enough revelation for now.

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 9, 1925

Lauren couldn't sleep for thinking of her mother. "She had you," Aunt Beryl had said, surely intending to comfort.

Lauren placed the sentiment on a scale in her mind, weighing it against what she remembered of her childhood. She recalled climbing a tree to look for her father. Dashing out of the house before Nancy could scold her for making noise. Hiding in Dad's office, curling into a tight ball of loneliness. It was dark and cold, for no fire had been lit behind that grate for months.

Nancy hadn't bothered to look for her, but Mother knew where to find her that day. Sick as she was, Mother had crawled to join Lauren under the desk. Lauren's emotions had been too big to understand, too big to put into words. So all she'd said was that she was a hibernating bear, then pretended she was sleeping. Mother swept the hair off her forehead, kissed her, and said, "All right, hide away, baby bear. Sleep through the long winter's night. I will be here when you wake." Lauren felt Mother shivering at her back.

She should have turned around. She should have thrown her arms around her mother's neck and kissed her cheek and told her how much she loved her. She should have brought Mother back into her own warm room and put her back to bed herself. Why hadn't she?

Guilt filled Lauren's stomach with lead. But then something else, something sharp and burning, spread through her. She hated that she hadn't tried harder with Mother while she had the chance. But she'd been a child, with no idea that Mother had already lost four children. What Dad had done—and not done—was unthinkable. Unforgiveable, even, except for the fact that Mother had forgiven him.

After Aunt Beryl had left, Lauren had dared to look through the envelopes in the box, searching for any postmarked around the time of Lawrence's birth. She hadn't found any. All she had on the subject was her aunt's word.

Throwing back her covers, Lauren sat up and looked at the clock. Three thirty. She wouldn't be going back to sleep now. If she couldn't rest tonight, why should her father get to? She'd never be able to concentrate at work today if she didn't talk to him first. Never mind that she might have trouble focusing even after she heard what he had to say. That was a worry for later.

Lauren could bury many things for the sake of preserving peace. She could deny that others bothered her at all. With this, she could do neither.

At four o'clock, she called and woke her father. At five, she met him downstairs in the lobby.

"What's wrong? What is it?" He looked harried and alarmed, his jaw stubbled white. "Are you all right?" Through the windows behind him, light flashed in the dark from headlamps of passing taxis.

"Let's sit down." After leading him to the back of the room, she pointed to a wingback chair upholstered in ivory and camel-colored stripes.

She took the matching one beside it, a glass-topped table between them. A potted ficus tree and silk screen shielded their corner from the rest of the lobby.

"What's going on?" he asked.

Now that he was here, the lines she'd rehearsed fled her mind. She could do nothing more than blurt out, "I talked to Aunt Beryl last night."

His brow pleated. "That woman despises me."

At least now Lauren knew why. A few feet away, a Beresford staff member stoked the fire in the marble fireplace, replaced the screen, and left. Warmth bathed one side of Lauren's face. The other half felt cold.

Dad leaned back, his fingers pressing the brass nails at the ends of the chair arms. "That's what this is about?"

"She told me some things about our family that I'd never heard before." She crossed her ankles, her heels sinking into the carpet.

Lines carved deeper around his mouth. "Well, I hope you've considered the source. For goodness' sake, you might have brought me a cup of coffee for this."

It hadn't even occurred to her. She was wide awake, adrenaline charging through her. If he wasn't alert now, he soon would be. "She told me about my brothers. The three miscarried babies and little Lawrence, who died when he was three days old."

Instantly, water filled Dad's eyes, his entire composure collapsing. "My boys." A slow intake of air swelled his chest, and then deflated it.

Lauren tamped down an answering surge of emotion. "Why didn't you ever mention them? Why keep them a secret, as if they were something to hide?" Despite her best effort, her voice wobbled.

He bent forward, elbows on his knees. "We all grieve in different ways, Lauren. I'm ashamed to admit that mine was denial. I didn't know how to get away from the pain, so I—well, you know what I did. You may not believe this, but I figured that not telling you about your brothers was one way I could protect you from a sadness you shouldn't have to carry. By the time you were old enough to understand, we'd all moved on anyway."

Lauren tilted her head, wondering if that was possible. Would Mother have said she'd moved on from losing four children? Flames hissed behind the grate, a log crumbling. "But why weren't you there for Mother? Why didn't you help her through her grief? Why didn't you plan to be home for little Lawrence's birth?"

He leaned back so hard, so fast, it was as if by physical force. "So that's what Beryl told you."

Dread and doubt gripped Lauren. But whatever came next, she knew she needed to hear it.

"Did she tell you I was there when the first baby miscarried? I tried to comfort your mother, but she shut me out. She wouldn't see anyone but Nancy for weeks. The second miscarriage was the same, so when we lost the third baby while I was on an expedition, I didn't come home just so she could refuse to see me. With baby Lawrence, she didn't even tell me she was expecting. I suppose she thought she would miscarry again, and so she didn't bother. I didn't learn until weeks after his death that I'd ever had a son."

An elevator dinged, sending a jolt through Lauren. A maid stepped aside as residents exited, then polished the doors to a shine after they closed. Across the lobby, the doorman greeted early risers and opened the door to the cold day ahead. How surreal it was to sit on the edge of such ordinary routines while holding the pieces of her parents' broken hearts.

"How do you suppose that felt?" Dad went on. "Don't you think I would have moved heaven and earth to be there for the delivery of our first full-term child? I wasn't given the chance, Lauren. Your mother mourned without me, but she had her sister and Nancy. If anyone grieved him alone, it was me."

Tears glazed Lauren's eyes. She had no idea what to say but tried anyway. "I'm so sorry, Dad. I can't imagine how hard that was for either of you. Thank you for telling me your side of it, even though it hurt."

His chin trembled, and then he cleared his throat of whatever emotion gathered there. Dad passed her a handkerchief that smelled like the licorice he kept in his pocket. "There now. This is why I didn't want to tell you about all this. It does you no good." He sighed again. "This was a very long time ago. Your mother and I loved each other intensely, she loved you with her whole being, and I love you, too. That's more important than anything else I've said today. You have to know that."

She passed the linen square back to him, completely wrung out. "I do."