“Not today, dear.” The older woman smiled. “The first time, you’re our guest. The next time you come, you’re family, and at that point you can help as much as you like. For now, it’s my pleasure to serve you. Danielle, would you care for tea?”
The girl shook her head, clearly content to stay where she was.
Tatiana nodded. “As I thought.”
“Nice chatting with you, Danielle,” Elsa said. “Next time you see George, tell him I said hello.”
“He doesn’t know your name yet. That won’t mean anything to him. If you see him again, I’ll introduce you properly.”
“I look forward to it.” Swallowing a chuckle, Elsa followed Tatiana to the wooden picnic table and helped her spread a floral tablecloth over the boards. Then Tatiana insisted on pouring the steaming brew for both of them. “This flavor—rose—is my favorite. I hope you like it, too.”
Elsa tasted it. “It’s heavenly.”
“That it is. All of this is my little slice of heaven right here. Especially when the weather is so fine.”
Elsa glanced at the ramshackle cottage behind Tatiana. “Did the will say anything about repairing the cottage?”
“Oh my, no.” Tatiana settled her cup back into its saucer. “Mr. Spalding explained that there was no cash appropriated for such a thing. There are debts to pay, through no fault of Mrs. Van Tessel’s. She inherited them when the master died. Completely blindsided by all of it, she was.” She paused, rolling her lips between her teeth for a moment. “How I do go on. You must forgive me, dear, if I rattle overlong. It’s such a treat to have someone to talk to. Not that I would share freely with just anyone. But I have a gift for discerning character, if I do say so myself, and I feel instinctively that I can trust you.”
Elsa smiled at the compliment. “Do you know, when I’m alone, I sometimes talk to birds, whether they’re living or not? It’s a pleasure to chat with both you and your daughter.”
Tatiana squeezed Elsa’s hand. “Then I hope you’ll come visit us whenever it’s convenient for you.”
“I will.” She drank from the teacup again, savoring the flavor. “Speaking of the Van Tessels’ relatives, do you know if Birdie and Linus had children?”
A sigh lifted Tatiana’s shoulders and released them. “Not that I was ever aware of. But Mrs. Van Tessel’s maternal instinct was obvious in the way she treated me and Danielle.”
“How so?”
Tatiana glanced to Danielle, who remained absorbed with the buttons. She lowered her voice. “Danielle didn’t speak to anyone other than me until she was three years old, and many labeled her a moron, but Mrs. Van Tessel insisted otherwise. She told me to have patience. To take heart that Danielle would speak to others when she was ready. And in the meantime, Mrs. Van Tessel took her into the house and showed her all the birds and all the art on the walls, talking to her as though she were as intelligent as any other child. Danielle opened up to her—verbally—long before she would interact with anyone else. When she was four, she finally spoke to others, as well.”
“So she has been inside the house. Danielle mentioned the blue room.”
“Yes. My husband passed away when Danielle was only two years old, so being able to trust her into Mrs. Van Tessel’s care while I worked outside was a great gift to me.”
“It sounds like it was a gift to everyone concerned.”
“I believe you’re right. Otherwise, Mrs. Van Tessel would not have willed to Danielle the aviary book they had often looked through.”
Elsa nearly dropped her teacup. “An aviary?”
Tatiana nodded. “A medieval manuscript is an odd gift for a twelve-year-old daughter of a servant, I know. But it’s true. Mr. Van Tessel was quite a collector, and not only of birds and paintings. The aviary he acquired has been dated to the fourteenth century.”
“What a treasure! Is this the same aviary Mr. Spalding is looking for?”
Tatiana shrugged. “Likely so. The Van Tessels only ever owned one, and it’s missing.”
Dismay fanned through Elsa. She hadn’t given much thought to Mr. Spalding’s search for the medieval manuscript. But that was before she knew it had been willed to the Petrovics. No wonder he wanted to locate the book for them. The price it would fetch would be exponentially more than the cost of rebuilding their cottage. They could live anywhere they wanted, regardless of what the county might say about keeping them on. The aviary would secure their future.
If only they could find it.
“Do you think it has been stolen?” Elsa asked.
“I don’t know about that. We just don’t know where it is. It used to be kept in a glass-enclosed bookcase in the library, but Mr. Spalding said it wasn’t there when he looked.”
The Petrovics had so little. They deserved to have what Birdie intended to be theirs. “I’ll be searching through the house for field notes anyway,” Elsa told her. “Mr. Spalding already asked me to look for the aviary while I’m at it, and now I know why. I’m happy to help if I can.”
Beaming, Tatiana thanked her. “Now, enough about that. Tell me, dear, what made you so interested in birds in the first place?”
