certifiable, Ivy!”
“She has lucid moments. She got two things right. She remembered that Josephine spent time by the rocks and she also knew that we look alike. She knew the graves were decorated at Christmas.”
“So what?”
“Who decorated them, Egan? None of us did!”
“The Grave Beautification Committee of Upstate New York!”
“Dig.”
“The ground’s frozen!”
“Dig harder. You’re a sports hero.”
Egan rammed his boot down on the shovel. “What are we looking for?”
“Anything.”
He held up a little rock. “Can we go in now?”
We dug for one hour.
Found nothing.
But it didn’t matter.
I grabbed Egan and the car keys and we drove to town.
“Explain to me, Ivy, what we’re doing.”
I pulled into a parking lot in front of the post office. A little man with glasses was locking the door.
I screamed, “No!” and started running to him.
The postal worker sidestepped me like he was a matador and I was a rampaging bull. “We close at noon today,” he said sourly.
“Sir, please help me.” I grabbed his arm. “Does the name Josephine Breedlove sound familiar to you?”
The man thought. “There’s the old Breedlove place up the hill.”
“This is another Breedlove—my aunt. We thought she might be dead. But now our crazy neighbor mentioned that she’s seen her in the family cemetery decorating the graves and—”
Egan put his hand on my shoulder. “Think, Ivy, of how you’re sounding to others.”
I stood there. “Please, are there any records you could check?”
The postman sighed, took out his keys, unlocked the post office.
After a few minutes, he came out holding a piece of paper. “The only Breedlove address we have is the place up the hill. I suppose you could try the Hall of Records. See if she ownsany property, has paid any taxes, something like that. The clerk might open up, especially if you scream loud like you did at me. She lives upstairs.”
* * *
The Hall of Records was closed. I pounded and pounded on the door. Finally, it opened. A short, round woman stared at me.
“I know you’re closed, ma’am, but this is an emergency. I need information. I’m trying to find my aunt.”
The woman looked at me unsure.
“It would mean so much if you could help.”
The clerk considered that. She nodded and led us into the small office.
“What’s the name?”
“Josephine Breedlove.”
The clerk eased herself into a creaky wooden chair, pulled out a big book, LAND RECORDS , started going through it, put her finger down the long page, stopped. “I’ve got the Breedloves up on the hill.”
I shook my head.
The clerk kept looking, checked another book. “Would it be under another name?”
“Not that I know of.”
“I’ve got nothing here for a Josephine Breedlove.”
Egan asked if he could see the book. The clerk handed it to him. Egan put his finger on the first B in the long list. “Baar, Babbitt, Bacer, Backwater, Beller—”
I lunged for the book. “What did you say?”
“Baar, Babbitt, Bacer, Backwater—”
“Backwater!”
Egan looked at me. “So?”
“That’s what people said about her. She was stuck in the backwater.”
“I never heard that.”
I grabbed the book. “If you cared about your family history, if you listened when people talked about your ancestors, you would know these things.”
There it was. Backwater.
The clerk went to her file, looked it up. “There’s property,” she said, “way up in the mountains.” She looked at another book. “Way up. Looks like she’s got some decent acreage.”
“What’s the address?”
“There aren’t really addresses in the mountains. She doesn’t have neighbors. Did you try the post office? That’s the only way to get in touch with these folks.”
I explained what the postmaster had said.
The clerk checked another book. “She paid her taxes last April—J.P. Breedlove.”
Josephine’s middle name was Pauline.
I looked at the record book.
Zoe Francois, Jeff Hertzberg MD