“Listen,” I continued, “needle anxiety aside, how are you feeling?”
“Very well, dear,” he said. “I don’t know why they’re keeping me here. Doc said I might be able to go home later today. I sure hope so. Anyway, how are you?”
“I’ve had a lot on my mind,” I replied. “Which is why I’m calling, actually.” I paused, thinking of Glenda’s warning not to bother him with my “drama.” A moth flew onto my computer screen, right above the first line of my story. I waved it away and it flew toward me, taunting me. I batted it down again. Glenda or no Glenda, I wouldn’t say anything about the article, about the Kensington connection. Not yet. I could, however, ask a question. “Warren, I was just curious,” I began, thinking of how to phrase the query. Be delicate. “Curious about the Kensington family tree. It occurred to me that I’ve never asked Ethan much about his ancestors. You know, great-aunts, uncles. I’d like to learn more about Ethan’s family—er, my family.”
“Well,” Warren said, sighing, “the Kensingtons were one of the original Seattle families. A very important clan, we are.”
“And not the least bit conceited, either,” I added playfully.
“Claire, you’re a Kensington, through and through.”
I grinned. “So your parents, will you remind me of their names? I don’t recall Ethan telling me.”
“Ah, yes,” he said, obviously relishing the chance to travel back in time. “Mother’s name was Elaine. Father was Charles.”
My heart beat faster.
“He was a good man. A good father.”
“Did you have any…brothers?”
“A younger sister, yes, but no brothers,” he said. “But I did for a time. Well, the closest thing to a brother, anyway. He was Aunt Josephine’s little boy. He and Aunt Josephine came to stay with us for a while before he died.”
“Died?”
“Yes,” he said, sighing. “Fell down a ladder. Bumped his head. Died right there on the gravel driveway. I was there when it happened. Josephine blamed me. I was a little older. She said I dared him to climb the ladder. I didn’t. I was too afraid to step foot on it, but he didn’t have an ounce of fear in him, that one. He had it in his mind that he wanted to see a robin’s eggs, so by golly, he climbed that ladder.”
“What was his name, Warren?” My heart beat faster.
“Thomas,” he said. “But that wasn’t his given name. I can’t remember what it was. But we called him Thomas. The old house wasn’t ever the same after he died. Aunt Josephine never fully recovered. Children shouldn’t die before their mothers.”
“No, they shouldn’t,” I said, opening up my notebook.
“What was Josephine’s husband’s name?”
“You know,” he said, pausing, “I don’t quite remember. He died, I was told.”
“Died?”
“In any case, he was never around. For as long as I can remember, it was just Thomas and Josephine.”
So, in her grief, she took Daniel and claimed him as her own? But why?
“Warren, do you know where Thomas is buried?”
“Why do you ask?”
“Oh, just curious. I’ve always had a thing for cemeteries.”
“Bryant Park,” he said. “Where all the Kensingtons are buried. It’s the cemetery on the hill by the university.”
I felt a deep pain emanating from my chest, my heart. “I know the cemetery,” I said. “It’s where the baby was…”
“Oh, honey. How insensitive of me. Of course I remember. I—”
“It’s fine,” I said. But it wasn’t. I hadn’t been back to that cemetery since Ethan and I had watched our firstborn, tucked inside a tiny mahogany box—eerily tiny—lowered into a hole in the earth. Our baby was the youngest, and newest, addition to the Kensington grave site, where dozens of deceased family members rested. Glenda had already seen to it that ten feet of earth next to the baby’s grave was reserved for Ethan and me. There was much I didn’t like about my mother-in-law, but I will always appreciate that she arranged for us to one day be reunited in death.
“The only thing I remember about Thomas’s funeral is the big mound of dirt and that little coffin,” Warren said, reminiscing. “It was trimmed in gold, all the way around. I couldn’t understand why they’d put such a pretty thing in the ground. Father had to hold Josephine back. She almost threw herself into the hole after they lowered the coffin down. It was all very strange for a six-year-old boy to watch.”
I sighed. “So if you were six, how old was the little boy?