Page 43 of The Ghostwriter

“Poppy was too scared to write anything down in her diary. But if she told my father about the abortion and that the baby wasn’t his, he would have been enraged.”

Jack shakes his head. “Take a breath and think. How would you handle this if it wasn’t your father—your family—you were writing about? What would you do next?”

I don’t have to think very long. “I’d try to figure out why the DA thought he had enough evidence to call a grand jury in 1993. And whether that coroner got the time of death wrong.”

“Okay then,” Jack says.

“If my father finds out I violated the contract,” I tell him, “I’ll lose the job. The only person I’m allowed to talk about it with is him. And I think he set it up that way on purpose. To keep me from figuring out the story he’s been telling me is a lie.”

We sit there, on the floor of Poppy’s room, until Jack finally says, “No offense, but this place gives me the creeps. How about we go back to my place? Matt and I can get you nice and drunk.”

“Hold on,” I say, pulling my phone out of my pocket again. I crawl back into the closet, kneeling this time so that I can capture the words with my camera. I take three pictures, making sure I have a good shot, before sitting back on my haunches.

That’s when the floorboard beneath my left foot wobbles. I rise up and shift my weight back, and it wobbles again. I dig my fingers into the edgeof the rug and pull it back. Hardwood floorboards are directly beneath, the carpet nails still sharp around the perimeter.

I fold it over and kneel on it, pressing down on the floorboards until I find the one that’s loose. Lifting it up, I shine my flashlight into the crevice, revealing several round film reel canisters.

I start pulling them out, one at a time, stacking them on the rug as Jack watches, dumbfounded. All of them labeled in a young girl’s hand.

March 1975

April 1975

May 1975

June 1975

Poppy’s missing home movies.

Chapter 20

There are ten film reels in all. Three from March, two from April, four from May, and one from June. Such a short period of time. And such a consequential one.

I spool out one of the reels—the one labeledMarch #1in Poppy’s familiar handwriting—and hold the film up to the light. Jack leans in, our heads touching as we each try to see what’s on it. Tiny shapes move across it—people I can’t quite recognize, rooms and locations all unfamiliar—1975 alive and waiting for me to discover.

He looks at me, grinning. “I think you have your next steps.”

People’s recollections are tinted with their own biases. Their beliefs, layered over the top, sometimes rendering a completely different meaning. Red becomes purple. Yellow becomes green. I’d always believed my father had invented Lionel Foolhardy, until he’d presented me with evidence to the contrary. There’s a reason historians rely so heavily on primary sources. Because human memory is flawed.

Up until this moment, all I’ve had to work with was my father’s brokenmemory and Poppy’s cryptic diary. But now I have the film that will unlock everything.

***

“I’ve got ten Super 8 reels I need transferred to digital.” I’ve driven straight to Ventura with the movies. Jack had given me a rain check on that drink and made me promise to tell him if there was anything earth-shattering on the film.

The man behind the counter nods and says, “Let’s have a look.”

I pull them out of my bag and stack them in front of me, and he opens one of the reels, peering at a few inches of film. “These are pretty old,” he says.

“My aunt shot them when she was a young girl in 1975,” I tell him. “We just found them.”

“You won’t have any sound on these,” he says, tracing a finger along the edge. “There’s a gold band that runs along the base that recorded sound.” He spools out a few more inches of film. “This one doesn’t have that.” He wraps it back up again and slides on the lid. “I can put these on a flash drive, or I can email you a link.”

“A link would be great. How soon can you get them done?”

He slides all ten reels to the side and consults a notebook open next to the register. “I have a couple jobs ahead of this one, but definitely by end of the day.”

I smile. “Perfect. Thank you.”

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