Page 20 of My Heart Will Find You

“Very clever,” Etta said.

The bath was cream and blue, with a walk-in shower.

The door to the bedroom was closed and Henry hesitated. Politely, Etta stepped back toward the main room.

“No,” he said. “It’s all right, but you’ll see.” He opened the door.

His bedroom was full of pictures of his late wife. There was a professional portrait of Henry and her on one wall. He could lay in bed and look at it. There was a long chest of drawers on the far wall, and it was covered with framed photos of his family, with Martha at the center of each one. There were several of her receiving awards.

“She must have been a great doctor.”

“Brilliant,” he said as he picked up a framed photo and looked at it lovingly. “Martha was the most undomestic woman I ever met, and we didn’t have a conventional marriage. When I met her, there was a young buck doctor who was going after her. Everyone told her she was a fool to choose an old man like me over him. But Martha knew that he’d want a traditional marriage. He’d expect her to run the household, cook dinner, that sort of thing. That wasn’t her.”

Etta picked up a photo of Ben. Henry was holding him and gleaming with pride. “So how long after you were married was your son born?”

“Nine months and a day.” His eyes twinkled and Etta laughed.

The cookbooks were in shelving on the opposite wall. There were a couple hundred of them, some big and glossy, some as old as Henry’s history books. There were four library box files with KANSAS REGIONAL COOKBOOKS. MARTHA M. LOGAN printed on the spine.

“You did that,” Etta said. “Your divine organizational skills put to use.”

Henry seemed to blush. “Not exactly divine, but handy. Oh dear, it fell down.”

Etta was on the far side of Henry’s queen-size bed with its blue-and-white duvet, so she didn’t see what he was picking up. He hung it on the nail to the right of the bookcase, then stepped back.

When Etta saw it, she grew dizzy and sat down on the bed. “It’s...”

“It’s what?”

“That’s what Alice was sewing. She hadn’t finished theëwith the dots over it.”

Henry took the old, framed needlework down and sat beside Etta. “When we first saw it, the last letter was missing. Martha used her surgical skills to sew it. See? Theëis newer than the rest.”

Etta held it.I need not sell my soul to buy bliss. Charlotte Brontë.“Tell me about it.”

“It’s from the auction, where Ben and I bought the desk and the trunk. The trunk was locked, and the woman said no one could open it so she didn’t know what was in it. She said a horrible thing. And I quote, ‘It’s just old stuff, so who cares?’”

“I assume you let her live and later you opened the trunk.”

“Ben did. I had a box of old keys, and he spent hours with them until he got the trunk open. Inside was the wrapped package and this. Martha saw it and claimed it. She said it was her life and what I had made come true.”

“You showed up with a house and a job that you could do at home. And a willingness to take care of your son. That meant she could keep her life. Yes, you were her bliss.”

“I like to think so,” he said.

Etta held up the frame and studied the letter at the end. She could see that it was different. “I wonder why Alice never finished it.”

“You hadn’t seen this, yet you put it in your dream.”

When she looked at him, she saw that he was serious. She stood up. “Oh, no, you don’t. What I dreamed wasn’t real. Somehow, I saw this before. I bet it’s in a photo in the house. I wasn’t conscious of seeing it, but I did.” She put the needlework on the bed and went to the bookcase. “Any books you recommend?”

“So you’ll know what to cook when you go back?”

“So I can help you with your next book about old time Kansas food.”

Henry chuckled. “Okay, I’ve been put in my place.” He pulled out three books and tossed them on the bed. “Mid-1800s. That should do it. Chuck wagons, the original food truck, Mexican cuisine, and farmyard.” He took out another book. “Fred Harvey was about then. Read about him.”

“Who’s he?”

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