Will reached for the cookies, then stopped. He stared at Laura for the longest moment, but not at her face. She glanced down, wondering what had captured his attention. The only thing she could see was the locket.
“Where did you get that?” His voice seemed almost strangled.
“My father. It was a birthday gift. He had it engraved for me. Let me show you.” She set the cookies aside on the countertop.
Will stepped back and finally looked her in the eye. “You don’t have to. I know what’s engraved there.”
“You do? Did Father tell you about it?”
Will shook his head very slowly. The color had drained from his face. Laura grew concerned. “What’s wrong? Are you ill?”
He pointed at the necklace. “‘Jesus is the way, the truth, the life.’”
Laura nodded. “Yes. How did you know?”
“I had ... It was made ... for my sister. I gave it to her for her birthday last summer.”
“Your sister?”
“That’s her necklace. I picked it out myself.”
“It can’t be.” Laura shook her head and reached up to take hold of the piece. “My father said he had it made for my birthday ... for me.”
“I ought to know. I spent days figuring out which locket to get her. Then I worked with the engraver. It was difficult to fit the Scripture in the locket. We had to cut it down, yet I was determined it wouldn’t lose the meaning.”
Will looked as if he’d seen a ghost. He stumbled back a step, then took a seat on a high stool. “Where did your father get it? It was stolen from her during the Indian attack.”
For a moment, Laura couldn’t draw breath. She felt as if he had hit her hard, knocking the wind from her. Having no explanation, she backed out of the open door. “I ... I ... don’t know.” She needed space to think. Unable to look at Will any longer, she turned and hurried across the yard.
How could this be? What in the world had possessed her father to give her the necklace of a dead woman and claim it to be something he’d had made just for Laura?
She reached the carriage and didn’t even wait for Curtis to help her climb up. “Get me home. Hurry.”
If this locket belonged to Will’s sister, how did it come intothe possession of her father? Had someone wandered into his store to trade it for something? Had someone sold it to one of the local jewelers, and they in turn offered it for sale?
None of this made sense. Will had to be mistaken. He just had to be.
16
Laura barely slept that night. She wrestled with the idea of her birthday gift belonging to Will’s sister and found sleep impossible. By morning, she knew she would have to face her father and ask him about the necklace, but when she came down to breakfast, her father was already gone for the day.
“He said he had some important business to tend to, Miss,” Rosey told her after pouring her a cup of coffee.
Laura added some cream and slowly stirred. The aroma of the nutty brew did nothing to soothe her as it usually did. She took a sip and found it bitter in her mouth.
Rosey left and returned with a plate of eggs and bacon, as well as a rack of toast. Laura had no appetite, however. She could still see the strained look on Will’s face from the night before. What a horrible shock. How terrible he must have felt.
How had it all happened? There had to be an answer to why her father had possession of the necklace. Throughout the night, Laura had considered so many possibilities, butalways it came down to the fact that her father had lied to her. He had told her he had the necklace made for her.
Nothing about him had turned out to be as she expected. She had believed him to be a stellar individual who always told the truth and, despite not wanting a relationship with God, maintained a godly sort of presence. Although, as she sat contemplating that very thought, that didn’t make sense either.
Father had never tried to pretend that he was a man of God. Even in letters, he had made it clear that he blamed God for his woes. Laura had always tried to defend God’s position. She had found God to be her only comfort. To contemplate Him taking her mother in the heartless manner her father declared it to be threatened Laura’s serenity.
“I really know nothing about him,” she murmured, still holding the coffee cup close to her lips. She sighed and finally put the cup down.
How could Father have come into possession of the necklace?
“Miss, Mrs. Murphy wants to confirm that the ladies will be coming at precisely eleven,” Rosey said.
