Christmas in Evergreen Tidings of Joy - Nancy Naigle Page 0,17
to Katie. “Join us.”
“Glad to have you aboard.” Ezra motioned Katie to an empty seat at the long table. “Ben was just telling me that you’re writing about Evergreen.”
Ben could feel his face go red. He hadn’t meant for Ezra to share that. Why didn’t I keep that comment to myself? He pulled out the chairs for Carol and Katie.
She looked into his eyes, as if the gesture had been unexpected, but took the seat. Her eyes seemed even bluer up close.
“Thank you.” Katie sat down and directed her response to Ezra. “Well, to be fair, I’m not entirely sure I’m writing about anything yet. But I’m collecting a few notes. I’ve been reading about this time capsule…”
Ben sat down next to her. It hadn’t taken her two seconds to stir up old Evergreen lore.
“Oh—whoa. We haven’t talked about that for a while.” Carol placed her palms on the table. “That one’s a mystery. Has been for years. Maybe some fresh eyes can help us figure it out.”
Looking excited about the possibility, Joe’s glasses lifted on his face as his eyebrows rose. “And now we have two journalists for the price of one.”
“Two?” Katie looked puzzled. “Who?”
Ben pressed his lips together, trying to make it look like he wasn’t regretting Joe’s comment. He avoided Katie’s gaze, but he could feel it without even turning her way.
“Well, you and Ben,” Ezra explained. “He has a journalism degree. He wrote for a paper in Chicago before coming back to—”
“Okay.” Ben leaned his forearm on the table wishing he’d thought to ask Ezra not to mention that. “Okay. It’s not a—”
“He failed to mention a journalism background.” Katie turned in her chair, her back to him. “All right, bring me up to speed on this time capsule.”
“Well,” Carol said. “My parents used to run this diner when it was just a bakery. And they were best friends with—”
“My parents,” Hannah continued, “who, of course as I already told you, ran the town Tinker Shop.”
“Which is also the town arts center.” Katie remembered from Elliott and Hannah’s discussion at the inn.
“Yes,” Hannah confirmed.
“When we were kids,” Carol said, “we’d always hear this talk about a Christmas time capsule, but then every time we’d ask our parents about it, they just kind of smiled and said ‘oh, you’ll know one day,’ but that day never seemed to come.”
“Then a few years ago, we found this archive of newspapers and found this article.” Hannah flipped through papers in a folder on the table in front of David. “David’s been tracking it since he could read. We love puzzles.”
“We do, and we’re good at them. We’ll have to tell you about the key to the bells.”
“Later,” Hannah said. “That’s a whole other story. So, this time capsule…” She passed the old copy of the Evergreen Mirror across the table.
The paper had only been a quarter back then. The headline in bold black ink read: “Evergreen Hit By Record Snow!” Below it, a picture of snow piled high along the power lines and fallen trees filled half the page. The article was titled, “Blizzard Blankets Evergreen.”
Ben watched as Katie scanned the article. He knew the content by heart. As a kid, he’d once tried to solve that mystery too. There probably wasn’t anyone in town who hadn’t spent at least a little bit of time over the years trying to piece together if it was fact or fiction.
“Yes,” Joe said. “The Christmas blizzard. Fifty years ago, a blizzard kept everyone in town for almost the whole month of December. And if you read right there. Down at the bottom…” Joe pointed out something in the article. “Read that, David.”
“Some residents of Evergreen also passed the time by making a surprise time capsule to be opened in fifty years.”
Katie put her hand on the date of the newspaper in the top right corner. A little quick math in her head, and her eyes widened. “Meaning this year?”
“Uh-huh,” Hannah remarked.
“The problem is, there haven’t been any other articles written,” said Ben. “No new clues uncovered.”
“And our parents have passed,” Carol said with a shrug. “There’s really nobody who remembers anything.”
“Nobody?” Katie looked skeptical to him, but then, he was a little too. He tried to squelch his mixed feelings about her. Since the divorce, she was the first woman to catch his attention. Then again, he had no plans to repeat that mistake. There was never a good reason to start something up with someone just passing through town, either.