The Bishop’s Wife (Linda Wallheim Mystery, #1)(63)

“He wouldn’t eat any food that I made for him,” Anna went on nostalgically. “If I served him dinner, he would get up and make himself a peanut butter sandwich, or just starve. And then he started to spit in my food, or put dirt in my side of the bed. He poured honey in between the keys of the new piano Tobias bought for my birthday. He was such a terror. Every time I turned my head, he was off doing something naughty.”

“And that’s when Tobias was writing to Helena?” I asked.

She looked down at the letters and held up one of them, underlining the date, November 1985. “Maybe he was just trying to find her for the boys. Poor Liam. I don’t think it would have helped him at all if his mother had returned. He would have hated her just as much as he hated me. Possibly more. But I can see how Tobias might have thought differently.”

I couldn’t help but think of Kelly Helm. If Carrie came back, how would it affect her? Carrie had been gone too long for there to be no changes in their relationship. When a mother abandons you, you can’t simply take her back like that. You can’t forget that she left and go on like you weren’t afraid she would go away again.

But Anna’s expression had darkened again. “What about all those years I spent with Tobias? I was his mistress, not his wife. We were living in sin all that time.”

“You didn’t know,” I said. “I’m sure no one could hold you responsible.” But that didn’t mean their family wouldn’t be torn apart by the truth.

“But what will happen to Tobias?” asked Anna.

“You mean, will he face excommunication posthumously?” That wasn’t something the church bothered with much, though there were occasions when people’s records were reinstated posthumously.

“And how will I tell the boys?” Anna went on.

Anna wasn’t at fault for any of this. But that didn’t mean her sons wouldn’t blame her. How could Tobias leave this for her to deal with after he was gone?

And then a thought occurred to me. “Can I see the photos of this woman the lawyer showed you? I’m curious.”

Anna looked through the piles and handed me some of the photos, all of a woman alone, on the beach or next to a building with blue skies overhead. I compared them to the wedding photo, which Anna had also tucked into the envelope, whether in anger or because she had also compared the faces.

The women were superficially quite similar: dark-haired, petite, with slightly pointed chins. But the eyes did not look at all the same to me. And the nose was certainly not the same. The Helena in the wedding photograph had a tiny, button nose. The other woman’s nose was rather large for her face and it had a bump on it, as if it had been broken at some point.

I let out a long breath and tapped the photo of the other woman. This wasn’t about bigamy.

“What is it?” said Anna.

I held out the two most distinct photographs. “Do you really think that’s the same woman?”

“I already looked at them. I thought it was.” She stared down at them again. “I don’t know,” she said softly. “She would have gotten older. Life might have been hard on her.” She touched the second picture, her fingertip landing on the bump. “It looks like her nose was broken.”

“But the nose is too big. Your nose doesn’t get bigger as you age. Not that much bigger, anyway.”

“Hmm,” said Anna. “I see what you mean.” She looked at the photo more closely. “Maybe she had plastic surgery or something.”

“To make her nose larger?” It certainly wasn’t what most women wanted.

“Maybe she was trying to hide her identity. Make sure that Tobias and the boys couldn’t find her.” I could tell even she didn’t believe what she was saying.

“It doesn’t sound in the letter like she was trying to hide.”

“What do you think it all means?” asked Anna.

I was making an enormous leap, but what if sometime soon after his marriage to Anna, Tobias had in a moment of doubt found a woman who looked like his deceased wife and had tried to use her to pretend that Helena was still alive? Then Anna and Tobias had been legally married all along, and the only sin here had been Tobias’s wishful thinking. Cautiously, I laid out this theory for Anna.

“So, she would have to prove she is actually Helena in order to get anything,” I said, nodding at the newer photograph of the woman with the big nose.

“I suppose. The lawyer is going to send a private detective out.”

“But if she isn’t Helena, then Tobias didn’t deceive you, right?”

“I don’t know,” said Anna. “It seems so far-fetched.” She had her hands balled up now.

“More than Tobias lying to you all these years and pretending his wife was dead?” Or my imagined history of him killing his own wife and burying her in the backyard? Surely this was the least difficult version of his life to believe in.

“Do you need anything while the will is in probate? The church might be able to help if you have bills to pay.” She’d said that Tobias had already paid for his own funeral, but I didn’t know about other funds. Did she have anything for groceries? For gas?

Anna took a breath and shook out her hands. She seemed more herself. “Thank you, but I’m sure I’ll be fine. In fact, I’m thinking of going back to work full-time. And there’s enough in our checking account for me to get by for a few months even if the will is contested.”