Daniel felt the importance of that difference.
He also felt the cost of time.
There were still people whose names filled the ledgers and whose whereabouts remained unknown.
One evening Foster’s letter arrived at the carpenter’s shop.
The envelope bore a mark Daniel recognized immediately.
A tiny star had been drawn beside the address.
Inside was a message written in a careful hand.
“I have news of Ruth Carter.”
Daniel sat down before reading the next line.
The search that had begun beneath Catherine’s bedroom trunk was about to enter its final and most uncertain stage.
Chapter 25: Ruth’s Voice
Ruth Carter lived in a small house outside Philadelphia under a name she had chosen for herself.
The letter explained that she had survived the warehouse escape, spent years moving between trusted households, and helped preserve records for people seeking lost family members.
She had avoided public contact because Richard’s agents had searched for her long after the supposed sale.
The message included an address where Daniel could meet her if he traveled without attracting attention.
He read the letter three times before he believed what it said.
Then he asked Isaiah to sit beside him.
Isaiah listened as Daniel read aloud.
When he finished, his friend put a hand over his own eyes.
“You found her.”
“I found an address.”
“That’s more than we had.”
Daniel folded the letter into his father’s oilcloth packet.
He left the following morning by coach, carrying a small bag and a wooden box he had made for Ruth.
Inside were the bone button, his father’s chisel, and a scrap of the old family Bible Eunice had saved.
The journey took several days.
Daniel barely slept.
He imagined his mother as he had last seen her beside the wagon in Virginia.
Then he tried to imagine a woman eleven years older.
He wondered whether she would recognize him.
He wondered whether she had believed he was dead.
He feared arriving at the address only to learn the message was another false hope.
When he finally reached the small house, he stood at the gate longer than he intended.
A woman was kneeling in the garden, tying pea vines to a trellis.
Her hair was threaded with gray.
Her shoulders were narrower than he remembered.
She raised her head when the gate creaked.
Daniel saw the pale scar beneath her left ear.
His breath stopped.
“Mother?”
She stood slowly.
For a moment she looked at him without understanding.
