CHAPTER FOUR A: THE CHILD WHO WOULD NOT SPEAK

Caleb drove Nora home after the first visit to the hall, but he did not turn toward her apartment when they reached Briar Street.
He pulled into the parking lot of a closed pharmacy and switched off the engine.
Nora waited while a delivery truck passed behind them.
“My father left something out,” Caleb said.
“Then ask him to tell me himself.”
“He tried to tell me last night, but he couldn’t finish.”
Caleb rubbed the steering wheel with his thumb.
“When I was nine, he used to wake up calling for a girl named Ada.”
“Was she one of the children?”
“He said she had a red mitten, and he was supposed to hold it.”
Nora pictured the yellow kite in the photograph.


“Did she get out?”
“I don’t know.”
Caleb opened his glove compartment and removed a folded program from a commemorative dinner.
The program listed eleven children under a photograph of Grant Voss.
Nora counted the names twice.
“The plaque says twelve.”
“I know.”
“Who is missing?”
Caleb pointed to a blank space between two names where the printer had left a peculiar gap.
“I think somebody removed Ada before the program went to press.”
Nora examined the paper beneath the dashboard light.
A handwritten pencil mark ran beside the empty space.
The mark looked like a correction made by somebody who knew a name belonged there.
“Did your father make this?”
“He found it in a drawer after my grandmother died.”
“Then we should ask him what it means.”
Caleb stared at the dark pharmacy windows.


“He says he remembers Ada reaching the hatch.”
“That sounds like she survived.”
“He says he remembers letting go.”
Nora heard a car door slam across the lot.
A woman emerged from the pharmacy’s side entrance carrying a bag of cleaning supplies.
She struggled with the bag until another worker took one handle.
Nora watched the two strangers carry the weight together.
“Your father was a child,” she said.
“He still dreams about it.”
“Then we shouldn’t turn his memory into another accusation.”
Caleb nodded, but his hands remained fixed on the wheel.
“I thought this would be simple when he gave me the envelope.”
“Nothing that frightened a family for twenty years will be simple.”
Nora returned the program to him.
“Find out who Ada was before we decide what happened to her.”
Caleb started the truck.
For the first time that day, he drove without looking over his shoulder.

CHAPTER FOUR B: THE SCHOOL REGISTER

Nora visited the public library before her evening shift the following day.
The librarian, June Salter, recognized Ruth’s name and led Nora to a table near the local history shelves.
“My mother used to bring me here after work,” Nora said.
“She borrowed books about fixing things,” June replied.
Nora smiled despite herself.
“That sounds right.”
June brought out a bound collection of elementary school newsletters from the year of the fire.
The newsletters contained photographs of spelling contests, school lunches, and a winter art exhibition.
Nora turned the pages until she found a photograph of children wearing paper snowflakes.
A girl with a red mitten stood beside a boy who resembled young Walter.
The caption identified her as Ada Fletcher.
Nora read the name aloud.
June leaned over her shoulder.
“I remember that family.”
“Did they leave town?”
“They moved to the north side after the fire.”
“Was Ada injured?”
June pulled out a chair.
“Ada stopped attending school for a while.”
“Why?”
“Her mother said she was frightened of enclosed rooms.”
Nora looked at the girl’s solemn face.
“Is she still alive?”
“She runs a bicycle repair shop two counties away.”
Nora sat back.
The relief came so suddenly that she almost laughed.
“Caleb’s father thought he lost her.”
“Then somebody should tell him he didn’t.”
June hesitated before closing the newsletter.
“Ada’s family asked the school not to put her photograph in the anniversary displays.”
“Did they explain why?”
“Her father said she was tired of being asked to describe the worst day of her life.”
Nora looked again at the picture.
She had spent the morning wanting another witness.
Now she understood that a witness might have spent twenty years trying not to be one.
“Could you give me the shop’s public address?”
June wrote it on a library slip.
“Please don’t arrive with a camera crew.”
“I work at a cafe.”
“That doesn’t mean you can’t make somebody feel cornered.”
Nora folded the slip carefully.
“I’ll ask before I ask anything else.”
She left the library with the image of the red mitten fixed in her mind.