‘Did anyone dislike the place enough to burn it?’ Evan asked.
‘Everyone thought it was an accident at first, the wiring. But six months after the fire, a teenager named Eddie Childers shot his mama and himself. The police found souvenirs from both burn sites – baby socks, a girl’s uniform from the orphanage, family photos from the workers at the courthouse. All stashed under his bed. I’ll never forget that, I was there when the officers found the stuff. And he left a note taking responsibility. He was a wild kid. Sad, very sad.’
‘So the records of any children born at the Hope Home were destroyed,’ Evan said. ‘Because both the orphanage and the county courthouse were gone, and the owners went bankrupt.’
‘Yes, basically,’ Dealey said. ‘I remember I wrote a few stories about the company that owned the orphanage after it burned… because, you know, it brought about twenty or so jobs to the town. People hoped they’d rebuild. Twenty jobs is twenty jobs.’
‘Well, we’ll look up those stories at the library,’ Carrie said.
Evan thought, This is a dead end, this is nothing. It couldn’t be. And then he thought, That is the point, Goinsville is a dead end. Someone wanted it to be the end of the road for anyone who ever came looking for Evan’s parents. It can’t be. You can’t run a business that takes care of kids and have every bit of its history vanish…
‘Thanks for your time,’ Carrie said.
‘Twenty jobs,’ Evan said suddenly. ‘Hey, do you know anyone who worked at the Hope Home that might still be alive?’
Dealey bit his lip in thought. Mrs. Todd emerged from the kitchen. ‘Well, Dealey’s cousin’s wife worked at the orphanage as a volunteer. Read the kiddies stories every Wednesday, you know. Get ’em interested in books because you know that’s the key to success. I remember because Phyllis won a volunteer-of-the-year award, and my mother-in-law nagged at me for weeks to volunteer myself. She might be able to help you, or give you the names of the employees.’
‘Does she by any chance still live around here?’ Evan asked. ‘I could show her pictures of my mom and dad, see if she would remember them.’
‘Sure,’ Dealey said. ‘Phyllis Garner. She lives five streets over.’
‘Phyllis is as sharp as a tack,’ said Mrs. Todd. ‘Honey doll, shame it don’t run in your family.’
A quick phone call determined that Mrs. Garner was home, watching the same soap opera as Mrs. Todd. They drove over the five streets with Dealey Todd to an immaculately maintained brick home, shaded by giant oaks. Mrs. Garner wore a lavender sweater set, was perfectly coiffed, and was eighty-five if a day.
Phyllis Garner gestured them to sit on a floral couch.
‘I know it’s been many years, ma’am.’ Evan showed her current photos of his parents. ‘Their names were Arthur and Julie Smithson.’
Phyllis Garner studied the photo. ‘Smithson. I think I do recall that name. James!’ Phyllis called to her grandson, who was puttering around in her garage. ‘Come help me a minute.’ They vanished down into a basement, leaving Dealey, Evan, and Carrie to talk about the weather and college football, two of Dealey’s keen interests.
Phyllis returned fifteen minutes later, dusty, but smiling. The grandson carried a box. He set it on the coffee table and left to finish his puttering.
Phyllis sat down between Evan and Carrie, opened the box, and pulled out a yellowing scrapbook. ‘Photos of the kids. Mementos. They’d draw me a picture and sign it for Miss Phyllis. One girl always signed it for Mommy, told me she needed to practice on me, for the day when she got herself a real mother. It broke my heart. I wanted to bring her home but my husband wouldn’t hear of it, and it was the only argument I never won. My heart bled for those children. No one wanted them. That’s the worst thing in this world, to be unwanted. I hope you recognize your parents in here.’ She flipped through pages. Phyllis Garner, radiant and beautiful and probably every orphan’s dream. Evan wondered if she had been conscious of how the bereft children must have ached for her to slip her hand into theirs and say, You’re coming home with me. It might have been less painful if such an angel had kept her distance.
She pointed at a photo of a group of six or seven children. Evan’s eyes went to the children first, looking for his father and mother in every face. No. Not them. Then he noticed the man standing behind the children.
The man was short, balding, but not completely bald. He wore glasses and a thin, academician’s beard. But the shape of the face, the sureness of the stance, were the same. Evan had seen the face several times, in the news clippings left anonymously for him at his lecture four months ago. The man’s smile was tight, as though bottling in the scintillating personality that had made him such a force in London.
Alexander Bast.
‘That man. Who’s he?’ Evan asked. He kept his voice steady.
Phyllis Garner flipped the picture over; she had a list of names written in tidy cursive on the back. ‘Edward Simms. He owned the company that ran Hope Home. He only came here once, that I recall. I asked him to pose with a group of the children. In honor of his visit. My God, he smiled, but you would have thought I scalded him. He acted like the children were dirty. The other ladies found him charming, but I don’t have to count scales to know a snake.’
Carrie’s hand closed around Evan’s arm. Hard. She pointed wordlessly at a tall, thin boy standing near Bast. Shock on her face.
‘What’s the matter, dear?’ Phyllis asked.
29
A fter a long moment Carrie said, ‘Nothing. I thought… but it was nothing.’
‘Are you all right?’ Evan asked.
She nodded. ‘I’m fine.’
‘This was the last batch of kids that came in before the fire, I believe.’ Phyllis Garner laid the open scrapbook on her lap, ran her fingers along the page. ‘I remember they were shy at first. And of course, they were older kids, not babies. Sad that they hadn’t been adopted yet. People wanted babies.’
Carrie pointed at one tall, lanky kid. ‘He was in the picture with Mr. Simms.’ She kept her grip on Evan’s arm.
Phyllis pried the picture out of the plastic page cover. ‘I wrote their names on the back… Richard Allan.’ She frowned at Carrie. ‘Honey, are you okay? You still look upset.’
‘Yes, I’m fine, thank you. You’re right, it’s sad, these older kids not finding homes.’ Carrie’s voice was normal again.
‘It was just so unfair,’ Phyllis said. ‘The focus on finding babies. This was an appealing group of kids. Nice-looking, bright, clearly well cared for, well spoken. At the orphanage, you’d see kids, and all the hope had died in them. Hope that they would not just find families, but have a life beyond low-end jobs. Orphans face such an uphill fight. These kids, they don’t look very broken at all.’
Evan flipped a page. A picture of two teenage girls, a teenage boy standing between them, brownish hair thick, a wide smile on his face, a scattering of freckles across high cheekbones, a tiny gap between his front teeth.
Jargo. His eyes were the same, cold and knowing.
‘My God, my God,’ Carrie said. It was almost a moan.
Sweat broke out on Evan’s back.
‘Did you find your dad?’ Phyllis asked brightly.
Evan looked down the rest of the page. Two photos down were two kids, a girl, blond with green eyes, memorably pretty but with a serious cast to her face. A boy standing with her, holding a football, sweaty from play, light hair askew, grinning, ready to conquer the world.
Mitchell and Donna Casher, young teenagers. Frozen in time, like Jargo.
‘May I?’ Evan asked.
‘Of course,’ Phyllis said.
He loosened the picture from the plastic cover, flipped it over. Arthur Smithson and Julie Phelps, written in Phyllis’s neat script.
‘Smithson,’ Phyllis said. ‘Oh, that’s it! Are they your folks?’
‘Yes, ma’am.’ His voice was hoarse. He forced himself to smile at her.