The River Widow(62)

Adah focused on the softness of Esther’s cheeks, which today had been lightly powdered, and then gazed upward toward her eyes. “I’m worried about you.”

Esther scoffed. “Worry about yourself.”

Adah almost laughed. Esther was one blunt woman. “What does that mean?”

Esther shrugged.

Knowing their time alone was limited, Adah pulled in a breath, hoping it would make her feel braver, and, letting it out, finally said, “Okay, I don’t know how much time we’ll have, and I want to ask you something important. About those rumors about how Betsy Branch died . . .”

Esther blanched, but her hands remained steady as she donned an apron and tied it about her waist. “I don’t listen to rumors.”

“But you admit there are rumors.”

“People gossip, that’s all I know for certain.”

“Did you know Betsy?”

Esther took one small step back. “Yes.”

“Tell me about her.”

Esther batted her eyelashes in a way that made her appear both sadder and younger as she gazed away, a far-off look on her face. Then she peered back at Adah. “You’ll find this odd. Believe it or not, she was a lot like you. She went to school with Lester and me. But she stuck to herself, she was kind of mysterious, also like you.”

“So you weren’t friends?”

“No. She was quiet, almost always serious. She was a good student, but she never went out on dates or came to parties. She had one good friend, who’s also a friend of mine. Kate was able to get close to Betsy, but none of the rest of us could. I tried once or twice. Betsy was a pretty girl and could’ve been popular, but she was a closed book.”

Adah absorbed this information, trying to fathom why a woman so described would’ve married Lester Branch. Why had someone so cautious fallen for him? But then again, Adah had, too. “Do you have any idea why she was ‘closed’?”

Esther shrugged again. “Her father disappeared when she was younger, when we all were still back in school. Ran off with another woman, they say, and her mother was left always working hard, trying to make ends meet. I don’t think Betsy ever got over her father taking off like that and her mother having to sacrifice so much.”

“Did she have anyone else?” Adah asked this even though Lester once told her that Daisy had no living relatives on her mother’s side.

“No, it was just the two of them, Betsy and her mother. After Betsy and Lester got married, her mother had to move to Louisville for work. I heard she got a job on the bottling line at Brown-Forman. I think that nearly killed Betsy. I heard from Kate she missed her mother something fierce, and she wrote her letters every few days.”

Adah nodded, remembering the letters from the attic.

Esther shrugged. “It’s odd, though. After a while, she started sending and receiving letters to and from her mother at Kate’s house.”

All sounds disappeared from the room, and Adah’s flesh rose in goose bumps. She barely remembered to breathe while the sickest feeling overcame her. Something like a vision from the past clawed through Adah’s body. She looked outside and saw an image of Betsy Branch fighting for her life, like a bird with a broken wing, struggling on the hard ground, never to fly again. “She wrote her mother through a third party? Why do you think she did that?”

“Funny thing. My friend Kate thought it was strange, too, but she never questioned it, just did the favor for her friend. Like I said, Betsy kept to herself.” Esther paused for a long moment and then set a firm, flat gaze on Adah’s face. “I think I know what you’re going after.”

Esther was having the same thoughts; Adah knew it. A simple understanding ran between them now, back and forth during the hush between their spoken words. It didn’t need to be said. Esther wanted Adah and Daisy gone badly enough that she was willing to pass on information that might help.

If Betsy had been communicating with her mother in secret, not wanting Lester to know about it, there had to be a reason. Perhaps there were letters that followed the ones Adah had found in the attic, and maybe they would reveal what had transpired between Betsy and Lester before her death. What had happened to make Betsy Branch correspond with her mother in secret? Was she scared? Had her spirit been destroyed before her body was? Had every tiny bone in her bird body been crushed one by one?

Adah’s voice surprised her when she spoke. She somehow managed to sound as if she was carrying on a typical conversation, while inside she was roiling in utter turmoil. “Will you help me?”

“Of course not,” Esther barked. Then her voice calmed. “I can never help you, you understand. But . . . I won’t interfere, either.”

“Do you think Kate would talk to me?”

“I have no idea. What excuse could you possibly have to talk to her?”

Adah searched for a reason. “I have some of Betsy’s letters from her mother. I found them in the attic. Her mother is now dead, is that right?”

Esther nodded. “I think she died soon after Betsy did.”

“All the more reason for me to keep her letters for Daisy. You could find out if Kate has any other letters and tell her I’m keeping them for when Daisy is old enough to read them. After all, that’s all she has left of her mother and grandmother.”