“Elizabeth?” Hannah sighed. “She was born Elizabeth Anne Cook, which wasnota unique name in colonial New England by any means. She married Elmer Whaley in 1869 at the age of sixteen. In 1872, there’s mention in a congregation member’s diary that she seemed to have gone away without a word to anybody. Many people have scoured records and personal documents, but she just disappeared from history.”
“What do you think happened to her?”
She shrugged. “Nobody knows, and we’re not really supposed to guess. But I know she married Whaley in 1869 and that’s the last mention of her in the Whaley family bible. No mentions of babies and no death notation.”
“They usually kept track of those things, right?”
“Absolutely. They kept meticulous records and family bibles are a treasure trove of genealogical information. But after Elizabeth’s marriage in 1869, she doesn’t show up in the family bibles—neither the Cooks’ nor the Whaleys’—or census or church records.”
“And that’s unusual. So I can see why she’d be considered a missing person.”
Hannah nodded. “And in 1873, Elmer married Elizabeth’s sister, Rebecca, and they had a son who was, according to midwifery and church records, quite premature. And thatprematurewould be in air quotes if you weren’t holding my hand.”
“No!” Rob stopped walking, his eyes wide.
“Yes. The marriage and birth are in the family bible.”
“But nowhere does anything say what happened to Elizabeth?” When she shook her head, he started walking again. “So she didn’t give him a child right away, so he killed her and married her sister. Or he fell in love with her sister and since they didn’t have any children yet, he killed her and started over before it got more complicated.”
“Those are two theories, yes.”
“What else could it be? That bastard totally killed her.”
Hannah laughed, appreciating his enthusiasm, despite the fact he was jumping to conclusions.
“She might have run away,” she said. “Or she could have been kidnapped or fallen in an abandoned well. Maybe Elmer Whaley loved his wife and couldn’t bring himself to write her out of the family bible without knowing what happened to her. But a man needed a wife and wanted children, so he married her sister.”
“According to the midwife, they were getting busy before the vows were said.”
“Or she actually gave birth to a premature infant,” she cautioned. “But let’s say theyweregetting busy. It could have been two grieving souls finding comfort in each other’s arms.”
He was frowning again. “So your job is talking about stories that literally have no ending?”
“Some of them do, but a lot of them don’t. Maybe that’s why I get frustrated when I’m reading fiction and the ending is ambiguous.”
“What do you really think happened to Elizabeth?”
“It’s a question I’ve been asking for years, but the answers can only be found in and substantiated by historical records, and she disappeared.”
“Okay, but you must have a favorite theory.” He nudged her with his elbow. “Just between us.”
“Just between us, I think he got angry about the lack of children, killed her and then married her younger sister.” Stones in a line that were maybe a stone wall but might be a foundation caught her attention. “Look.”
There wasn’t much of it left, but when Hannah pushed through the last of the brush in the way, the stones were clearly the remains of a very old foundation. She stood there for a long time, simply breathing and blinking away the tears that kept welling in her eyes.
She was standing in a place Elizabeth Whaley had stood over a century and a half before her, and she soaked it in. There would be no answers here, of course, but it was important to her that a woman who had simply disappeared wasn’t forgotten.
That was why her show had mattered so much to her. No, she couldn’t change history. And maybe a crime that happened so long ago wasn’t relevant. But she liked to share the stories of those whose stories might otherwise go untold.
When she finally moved, she turned to see Rob leaning against a tree, watching her. His camera still dangled from the neck strap, and the lens cap was still on.
“I thought you’d be taking pictures,” she said after clearing the emotion from her throat.
He pushed himself away from the tree and popped the lens cap off. “Oh, I will. It just seemed like you were having a moment and I didn’t want to intrude.”
Smiling, she gestured toward the foundation, indicating that it was all his. She tried to stay out of his way while she explored the area, looking at the stones that made up the crumbling remains of Elizabeth Whaley’s home. Cautiously, of course, because there had been a brook running close by according to maps roughly sketched in her time, but there probably would still have been a well and a root cellar of some kind nearby.
Then Rob caught her eye. He stretched out on his stomach, the camera almost on the ground as he framed a shot that had some sinister-looking dead trees behind the most intact part of the foundation.
