The Hand on the Wall(86)

Guest, Miss Flora Robinson, breakfast tray service: tea without milk, ginger ale, saltine crackers, dry toast.

“That’s what she gets, if she gets anything at all,” Stevie said. “All of this starts in late May and goes on through June. What does this suggest?”

“Morning sickness,” Nate said, his eyes widening.

“Morning sickness,” Stevie replied, smiling.

“You terrify me,” Nate said quietly.

“I went through the rest of the records. Flora was here for most of 1932. Like, almost all of it. Then, in September, they all pack up and go to Switzerland. So, let’s say Flora was Alice’s biological mother. It means there must also be a biological father. Who is he? This is where George Marsh’s actions start to make sense. . . .”

Stevie was getting that high, frenzied excitement, the one that made Nate visibly nervous.

“George Marsh is never written down as a guest, but he turns up in the records because they have to make up his room and he also gets meals. Here he is, all over March and April. In fact, for at least one weekend in April, it was the Ellinghams, George Marsh, and Flora Robinson. It’s the weekend that, if you count back, would have been pretty much exactly nine months before Alice’s birth. But if you want more, here is Flora . . .”

She brought up a picture of Flora Robinson.

“And here is George Marsh . . .”

One more photo.

“And here is Alice.”

Nate examined the three photos together.

“Oh,” he said.

“This is why he brought her back,” Stevie said. “Because he was her biological father. He wanted to bury her properly, at home.”

“Okay, so you’re going to explain all of this so you get the money? I guess it would be hard to prove, but they could probably do it, check birth records and get DNA . . .”

“Nah,” Stevie said again.

“Okay, what is this nah thing? You aren’t going to try to prove it?”

“It wasn’t about the money,” she said. “If I even tried to claim it, think of the lawyers and the creeps I’d have to deal with. It would ruin my life.”

“Seriously?” he said. “You’re not going to fight for seventy million dollars?”

“What can I buy for seventy million dollars?”

“Anything. Almost literally anything.”

“The way it is now,” she said, “the money stays here, in the school. Alice’s home. The one her father made. He wanted to make a place where impossible things could happen. Albert Ellingham believed in me. He let me come here, and I’m making sure it stays open. This is for Alice and Iris, and for Albert, for Hayes, and Ellie and Fenton.”

She raised her mug.

“Oh my God,” he said. “What are you, a saint or something?”

“I stole this mug,” she said. “So, no. Besides, if the school closed down, you’d have to go home and finish your book or something. I did it for you. I’m not even telling anyone else. I mean, aside from my friends. Like you.”

“Are you trying to make me have an emotion?” Nate said, his eyes reddening a bit. “Because I’ve spent my whole life learning how to repress and deflect and you’re kind of ruining my thing.”

“I have more bad news. Look behind you. The happy couples are coming out . . .”

Janelle and Vi waved back, arm in arm. Behind them, Hunter and Germaine were not quite at this level, but they were talking intently, in that way couples do. Janelle and Vi had only grown closer since the events of the fall and were even planning on how they would visit each other during the summer and coordinate their schedules. Hunter and Germaine and bonded over a mutual interest in the environment and K-dramas. Things at school had not been easy or perfect for anyone, but they were definitely pretty good. It turned out school was generally more straightforward when people weren’t getting murdered all the time.

As the others reached Stevie and Nate, Stevie’s phone rang. She held up a hand and stepped off a few paces to take a video call.

“Where are you?” she asked.

David was on a street somewhere, in a purple campaign T-shirt.

“Oh, um . . .” He looked around. “Iowa. We’re going to three cities today. I’m doing prep work, setting up events at some diners, stuff like that. I wanted to call early because I saw that DNA stuff. You’re all good?”

“I’m great,” she said. “How’s the campaign going?”

“I knocked on three hundred and fifteen doors yesterday. Imagine how lucky those people were, opening their doors to see me.”

“Blessed,” Stevie said.

“That’s the exact word. Blessed. I even knocked on the doors of some people who had a sign for my dad out on their lawn. Some people just won’t give up on the dream.”

Since leaving Ellingham, David had landed an internship with a rival presidential candidate. Ellingham had offered him the chance to return, but his father had blocked it. He was technically without a school, working on his own to finish his GED. Between the two things, he was going day and night. Stevie had never seen him at this pace, and it seemed to suit him. He looked and sounded healthier, even though she suspected he wasn’t sleeping much. They spoke two or three times a day. Her parents, ironically, were absolutely delighted that she continued to have a relationship with that nice boy who turned out to be Senator King’s son. Senator King’s views on David’s relationship with Stevie were not known and not sought out.