The Keepsake

“Oh dear.”

“The museum keys weren’t on the ring, so you don’t have to worry about the building. The collection’s safe.”

“I’m not worried about the collection. I’m worried about you. ” He took in a deep breath, like a swimmer about to plunge deep underwater. “If you don’t feel safe here, Josephine, you could always…” Suddenly he straightened and boldly a

She smiled. “Thank you. But I’m going to leave town for a while, so I won’t be coming in to work for a few weeks. I’m sorry to leave you in the lurch, especially now.”

“Where are you going?”

“It seems like a good time to visit my aunt. I haven’t seen her in a year.” She went to the window, where she looked out at a view that she would miss. “Thank you for everything, Nicholas,” she said. Thank you for being the closest thing to a friend I’ve had in years.

“What’s really going on?” he asked. He came up behind her, close enough to touch her, yet he didn’t. He merely stood there, a quiet presence patiently hovering nearby, as he always did. “You can trust me, you know. No matter what.”

Suddenly she wanted to tell him the truth, tell him everything about her past. But she did not want to witness his reaction. He had believed in the bland fiction known as Josephine Pulcillo. He had always been kind to her, and the best way for her to repay that kindness was to maintain the illusion and not disappoint him.

“Josephine? What happened today?” he asked.

“You’ll probably see it on the news tonight,” she said. “Someone used my keys to get into my car. To leave something in my trunk.”

“What did they leave?”

She turned and faced him. “Another Madam X.”

THIRTEEN

Josephine awakened to the glare of the late-afternoon sun in her eyes. Squinting through the window of the Greyhound bus, she saw rolling green fields cloaked in the golden haze of sunset. Last night she had scarcely slept, and only after boarding the bus that morning had she finally nodded off from sheer exhaustion. Now she had no idea where she was, but judging by the time they must be close to the Massachusetts-New York State border. Had she been driving her own car, the entire journey would take only six hours. By bus, with transfers in Albany and Syracuse and Binghamton, the journey would take all day.

When they finally pulled into her last transfer stop in Binghamton, it was dark. Once again she dragged herself off the bus and made her way to a pay phone. Cell phone calls could be traced, and she’d left hers turned off since leaving Boston. Instead she reached into her pocket for quarters and deposited coins into the hungry phone. The same answering machine message greeted her, delivered in a brisk female voice.

“I’m probably out digging. Leave a number and I’ll call you back.”

Josephine hung up without saying a word. Then she hauled her two suitcases to the next bus and joined the short line of passengers waiting to board. No one spoke; they all seemed as drained as she was, and resigned to the next stage of their journey.

At elevenPM, the bus pulled into the village of Waverly.

She was the only passenger to step off, and she found herself standing alone in front of a dark mini-mart. Even a village this small had to have a taxi service. She headed toward a phone booth and was about to deposit quarters when she saw theOUT OF SERVICE note taped across the coin slot. It was the final blow at the end of an exhausting day. Staring at that useless pay phone, she suddenly laughed: a raw, desperate sound that echoed across the empty parking lot. If she couldn’t get a cab, she faced a five-mile hike in the dark, hauling two suitcases.

She weighed the risks of turning on her cell phone. Use it even once, and she could be tracked here. But I’m so tired, she thought, and I don’t know what else to do, or where else to go. I’m stranded in a small town and the only person I know here seems to be unreachable.

Headlights appeared on the road.

The car moved toward her-a patrol car with blue rack lights. She froze, unsure whether to duck into the shadows or to brazenly maintain her role of stranded passenger.

It was too late to run now; the police cruiser was already turning into the mini-mart parking lot. The window rolled down, and a young patrolman peered out.

“Hello, miss. Do you have someone coming to get you?”

She cleared her throat. “I was about to call a cab.”

“That phone’s out of order.”

“I just noticed.”

“Been out of order for six months. These phone companies hardly bother fixing them now that everyone’s got a cell.”

“I have one, too. I’ll just use it.”

He eyed her for a moment, no doubt wondering why someone who had a cell phone would fuss with a pay phone.

“I needed to use the directory,” she explained and opened the phone book that was hanging in the booth.

“Okay, I’ll just sit here till the cab arrives,” he said.

As they waited together, he explained that the previous month there’d been an unpleasant incident involving a young lady in this same parking lot. “She got off the elevenPM bus from Binghamton, just like you,” he said. Since then, he’d made it a point to drive by just to make sure no other young ladies were accosted. Protect and serve, that was his job, and if she knew about the terrible things that sometimes happened, even in a little village like Waverly, population forty-six hundred, she’d never again be caught standing alone at a dark mini-mart.

When the taxi finally arrived, Officer Friendly had been bending her ear for so long she was afraid he might follow her home, just to continue the conversation. But his cruiser headed in the opposite direction and she sank back with a sigh and considered her next moves. The first order of business was a good night’s sleep, in a home where she felt safe. A home where she need not hide who she really was. She’d juggled truth and fiction for so long that she sometimes forgot which details of her life were real and which were fabrications. A few too many drinks, a moment of carelessness, and she might let slip the truth, which could send the whole house of cards tumbling down. In her college dormitory of partying students, she had remained the sober one, adept at meaningless chitchat that revealed absolutely nothing about herself.

I’m tired of this life, she thought. Tired of having to consider the consequences of every word before I say it. Tonight, at last, I can be myself.

The taxi pulled to a stop in front of a large farmhouse and the driver said, “Here we are, miss. Want me to carry those bags to the door?”

“No, I can handle them.” She paid him and started up the walkway, wheeling her suitcases toward the front steps. There she paused, as though searching for her keys, until the taxi drove away. The instant it vanished from sight, she turned and headed back to the road.

A five-minute walk brought her to a long gravel driveway that cut through thick woods. The moon had risen, and she could see the path just well enough not to stumble. The sound of the suitcase wheels plowing through the gravel seemed alarmingly loud. In the woods crickets had fallen silent, aware that a trespasser had entered their kingdom.

She climbed the steps to the dark house. A few knocks on the door, a few rings of the bell, told her what she’d already suspected. No one was home.

Not a problem.

She found the key where it was always hidden, wedged under the stack of firewood on the porch, and let herself in. Flipping on the light, she found the living room exactly as she remembered it since she’d last visited two years ago. The same clutter filled every available shelf and niche, the same photos framed in Mexican tin shadow boxes hung on the walls. She saw sunburned faces gri