Page 31 of The Forsaken
“I’m happy with my steak pie and mash,” Gabe replied, eyeing his plate like a man who’d just come face to face with his long-lost love.
“Do I have time to visit the library before we leave tomorrow?” Quinn asked as she popped a piece of flaky fried fish into her mouth.
“Of course. I still have a few things to tidy up before we leave. Can you collect Emma on your way back from the library?”
“Sure. I might even take her with me. She can look at children’s books while I troll the research section.”
“She’d like that. I think she’s getting a bit restless with Mum and Cecily.”
“She misses us,” Quinn said and smiled happily. It still gladdened her heart to think that Emma saw them as her parents and not just a couple who looked after her in lieu of her mother. They were a real family.
Gabe smiled at her across the table as though he understood what she meant. “It’s wonderful, isn’t it?”
Quinn nodded, suddenly overcome. She was always close to tears these days.
NINETEEN
Quinn glanced toward the children’s section to make sure Emma was happy and occupied before returning to the folio she’d found on the history of Berwick. The library was small enough for Quinn to see Emma, who was sitting in a comfortable chair, her legs folded beneath her, a picture book in her lap.
Quinn leafed through the folio, searching for any references to Gabe’s family or ancestral home. She didn’t find anything, given that the family wasn’t titled, so not worthy of mention in the history books, but she did find sketches of other wealthy homes.
“Well, this is interesting,” she mumbled as she studied a drawing of a tower house from the fifteenth century. She went through all the source material she found, which wasn’t plentiful, and called out to Emma. “Time to go, darling.”
“All right,” Emma said and returned the picture book to the shelf. “I wish I could read this.”
“Would you like me to read it to you?” Quinn asked. “We have a few minutes to spare.”
“No, I want to read it myself.”
“You will be able to read for yourself very soon. By next year, in fact. Now that you’re starting school, you’ll be learning to read.”
“I want you to teach me,” Emma replied.
“I’d be happy to,” Quinn said. She’d taught Emma her letters over the past few months, but they hadn’t progressed to actually reading words. Quinn thought that Emma might be bored in class if she already knew how to read and had to wait for the other students to catch up. But if she wanted to start reading, Quinn could hardly refuse.
“All right then,” Emma replied happily. “Let’s go.”
By the time they returned to the house, Gabe had already loaded their cases into the boot of the car and had cleaned the kitchen. He’d procured some yellow tape from somewhere and made a large rectangle around the hole in the floor, also winding the tape around the backs of chairs that he’d placed next to the opening to alert Phoebe not to cross the line. She knew the hole was there, of course, but might forget and walk toward the sink out of habit and fall.
“We are ready to go,” Emma announced as she bounced into the kitchen.
“We’ll just stop by Cecily’s and say goodbye to Grandma. Shall we?” Gabe asked.
Emma nodded. She checked her backpack to make sure that her picture book, Mr. Rabbit, and several coloring books and pencils were all packed.
The stop at Cecily’s cottage took longer than expected since Emma had to say a very thorough goodbye to Buster, who seemed sad to see her go. Once Emma left, he’d go back to his routine of daily “walkies” with Phoebe, instead of running around happily as Emma tossed him a ball or chased him round the garden.
“Find anything at the library?” Gabe asked Quinn as they finally drove away.
“Not specifically pertaining to this house, but I did discover something else,” Quinn said. “There were a few drawings of houses from the period. Several showed a cross on the East-facing section of the house.”
“A chapel?”
“Yes, and our man was buried facing east.”
“That’s brilliant, Quinn. I should have realized there’d be a chapel at the keep. I found several prie-dieux in the attic and assumed they used the prayer desks in their chambers.”
“Some people used prie-dieux in chapels, particularly if the chapel was too small to hold actual pews. I think that our man was buried beneath the chapel floor,” Quinn theorized. “What I don’t understand is how come no one had come across him before, especially when they built a whole new house in the eighteenth century.”
