The urn wobbles, drowning out whatever the Chancellor replies.
I frantically grip its handles, preventing it from toppling over, but grimacing at the noise.
There’s a slight pause, as if Miss Robin and the Chancellor glanced back over their shoulders.
I hold my breath, worried that they might hear even an exhale.
After a moment, their motion resumes.
“Well, that’s your problem,” Miss Robin says coldly.
Then I hear the light patter of her feet descending the stairs.
Luther Hugo comes stomping back down the hallway.
I shrink behind the urn, praying that he won’t look in my direction. I’m only partly concealed by the oversized pottery.
Born along in a cloud of irritation, he sweeps into his office and slams the door.
I stay exactly where I am, too scared to move.
I only heard a fragment of the conversation.
But I can’t help thinking they must be talking about Snow.
Finally Saturday rolls around again. I prefer the weekend—it’s much easier to avoid Lola.
Rakel and I spend the morning as we’ve been spending all our weekends lately—searching for my missing person.
We have to take the laptop up to ground level, because there’s no connection down in the Undercroft. We’re holed up in the ice house on the west side of campus, Rakel tapping away on Ozzy’s laptop and me keeping watch by the door so we’re not caught with technological contraband.
Rakel has become even more obsessed with this task than I am. She’s been neglecting her homework in favor of chasing up obscure leads that inevitably conclude in more dead ends.
“People can’t really disappear,” Rakel says grimly, her eyes fixed on the glowing screen. “There’s always some trace . . .”
“Unless they’re dead,” I reply.
“She’s not dead.”
“How do you know?”
“I just do.”
I don’t share Rakel’s confidence. I told her from the beginning this might be a fool’s errand.
“I found her sister easy enough,” Rakel says. “She’s a nurse, too. Works at Evanston Women’s Hospital in Chicago. Which is a little weird ‘cause the address on her tax return is Madison. That’s a long commute.”
“Could be an old address,” I say, drawing idly in my sketchbook with a piece of charcoal.
“No, it’s from January.”
“Is that her only family?”
“Yeah, her parents are dead.”
I’m drawing two sisters, both blonde and dressed in nurse’s uniforms.
Two sisters that look alike, not like me and Zoe.
The charcoal smudges on the page as my hand jerks involuntarily.
“Rakel . . .” I say.
“What?”
“Pull up the hospital directory.”
Rakel finds the right page, scrolling until she sees the nurse in question: Lida Copeland.
“Look at that,” Rakel says. “They could be twins.”
I join her at the laptop, my eyes fixed on the blonde woman facing the camera with only the ghost of a smile. Her face is angular and elegant, the austere lines of her jaw and her wide, full mouth offset by the heavy frames of her glasses.
The glasses can’t disguise her beauty, or the sadness in her eyes that is all too familiar to me.
Cat comes running up the stairs of the Bell Tower, filled with a nervous energy I’ve never seen before.
“You look excited to see me.” I grin, grabbing her and trying to kiss her.
“I am!” she cries. “But not for—not just for that.”
“What, then?” I say, my fingers slipping through her curls as she twists out of my grasp, too anxious to stay still.
She’s pacing around the tower, nervy and almost hectic. Bright spots of color flame in her cheeks, her eyes glinting like black jet. She’s grasping a folded piece of paper in her fist.
“I was looking for something. I didn’t want to say anything in case I couldn’t find it. But I did! Earlier this morning. And I’m almost certain of it.”
“What . . .” I say.
Her agitation is infecting me. Not in a positive way—I’ve never liked surprises.
Cat twists the paper in her hand, her eyes as big as I’ve ever seen them.
“I think I found your mother.”
I stare at her, uncomprehending.
“She’s working at a hospital in Chicago. At first I thought it was her sister, but her sister lives in Madison with her husband and kids. I think your mother is using her name and social so she can work without anyone knowing . . .”
Cat’s words are a swarm of wasps swirling around me—too fast and too loud.
“It took some digging but she has an apartment in Chicago, too. You wouldn’t need an apartment and a house if it was the same person .