“There is a whole town filled with folks descended from a member of that fateful Lost Colony Legend trip.”
“Who? I thought everyone died.”
“The guard that everyone thought was dead because he never came back to the landing site where Miss Penny and her mom waited? Well, he survived.”
Diesel’s eyes narrowed in the same way they always did when she came to him with a grand money-making scheme for the old folks’ home. “If he survived, why didn’t he go back to the landing site?”
Dixie Lou couldn’t contain herself. It was the best story she’d ever heard. Like a TV movie, only better, because it was true.
“He had an accident, hit his head and lost his memory.”
“What? I don’t believe it.” Diesel had another familiar look, the skeptical one. He’d mastered it.
“It’s true. He made it almost to the location of the supplies, but got hit in the head by a falling rock slide during some bad weather and lost his memory. Someone found him, took him into Suspicion, Minnesota and nursed him back to health. He couldn’t remember who he was so he made a life there as a wheat farmer named Delvin Miller, and then later he had a mill that ground wheat into flour. Isn’t that amazing?”
“Amazing? Okay. Sure.” Diesel was the opposite of amazed. He was wary. “Suspicion, Minnesota. I remember that name.” Diesel’s gaze went up for a moment as if he tried to recall what he’d heard. “There were rumors of people with mind-reading skills or something seventy or eighty years ago. Didn’t Alpha-Prime send a Guardsman there several decades ago to investigate?”
Dixie Lou rocked from one foot to the other, her speed increasing as she revealed the details of her investigation. “Yes. They did. Seventy-seven years ago. Her name was Constance Brickwood and she sent a report back that said the guard wasn’t there and she couldn’t locate the supplies sent ahead in the harsh terrain where they were supposed to have landed, which then closed down any further action there.”
“Okay.” Diesel’s brow-furrowing scowl was back.
“Then do you know what happened, Diesel?”
“I’m certain you’re about to tell me no matter what I say.”
She gave him a scolding look, but he was right. Dixie Lou was fairly bursting to tell them all about what she’d discovered. “It’s so exciting. Anyway, after Constance submitted her, well, interpretation of events regarding no Alpha activity, it was reported that she was accidentally killed. She had no family or friends on Alpha-Prime to return to anyway.”
“That’s too bad,” Diesel said.
“But guess what?”
“What?” Diesel played her game. He didn’t smile, exactly, but he didn’t seem as unhappy as usual.
“She was laid to rest in Suspicion by a local minister instead of being sent back to Alpha-Prime.”
“Interesting. I’m surprised they didn’t send a Guardsmen contingent to retrieve her.”
“Yes. But way back then, they weren’t as careful as they are now. Progress, right? But I also looked up the Alpha history of that particular time period and they were definitely not as strict as nowadays. Plus, there was lots of brouhaha going on about alien contact and whether the program of colonization should be scrapped. The powers in charge finally decided to move forward, but in all the ruckus, Constance’s Earth burial was forgotten or deemed unimportant.”
“Right. So she died and was buried in Suspicion. Why is that relevant now?”
Dixie Lou grinned wide. “Because…” Dixie quickly looked around to ensure everyone was listening closely when she said dramatically, “Get this! Constance faked her death.”
More than one person gasped.
“Faked her death? I don’t believe it,” Diesel said.
Dixie Lou’s feet were practically dancing a jig by now. “I know. Isn’t it awesome? I didn’t believe it either. So that’s why Miss Penny and I took a road trip up there to investigate. We spent almost two weeks on the trail of this Lost Colony investigation to learn the truth.”
“Is that where you went? To track down information on the Lost Colony Legend in Minnesota?”
“Yep. Good thing I did, too. After scouring my scrapbooks for historical information, I remembered Constance.”
“You remembered her?”
“She was sent to Suspicion, Minnesota on the day I was born. Isn’t that cool?”
“Very cool,” Diesel agreed.
