Page 11 of Dear Bookworm Beauty
“What we found,” I correct him.
7
GRANT
“I was wondering if you two would be clever enough to find it,” Evangeline smiles into her teacup. “Then again, Mr. Waters did lay out the breadcrumbs for you two to find it putting you in Josephine’s old room.”
“You knew we would find it?” Laurel asks incredulously.
Evangeline shrugs. "If you two were anyone else, I would have sent you on your way, as I did with all the others."
Laurel and I exchange confused glances.
“What do you mean?” I ask.
"Well, it's was pretty clear from the moment Laurel called that you found something about Josephine and Gideon.”
“Gideon?” Laurel and I ask at the same time.
Evangeline laughs and looks at Mr. Waters. “It appears we gave these two too much credit.”
“Hang on.” Laurel holds up her hands. “We knew there was someone, but the letter we found didn’t have a name. Or at least we realized later it wasn’t his name, but his initials.”
“Gideon Alexander Deslauriers.”
“Wow, that’s quite a name. What was he some southern gentleman or something?”
“Orsomething.” Evangeline smiles. “He was the poor son of the local carpenter that Josephine’s father hired to build this very house. It’s all in the journal.”
The journal is still sitting on the table where Laurel set it down when we showed Evangeline.
“We didn’t read it,” Laurel says.
“You weren’t tempted?” Evangeline asks.
“She didn’t say that,” I add with a chuckle.
“It’s probably for the best. Josephine was a private woman when it came to the man who stole her heart.”
“You know what happened?” Laurel asks.
“I know the broad strokes. Josephine shared her story with my grandmother after my grandfather was killed in World War I. I suspect Josephine thought she could shed some insight into what my grandmother was feeling.”
Laurel gasps next to me. “No.”
“Clever girl. You figured it out.” Evangeline leans forward and picks up the journal. Slowly she starts to unwrap it from the linen and pulls out what looks like a picture from between the pages.
She hands it to Laurel. I lean over to inspect the picture with her.
It’s a tintype photo of a Union soldier. He's dressed in his uniform, holding his musket. There's a hardness to the expression on his face that is reminiscent of the times he was living in. But there is something different in his eyes that is familiar to me. It’s the same thing I’ve seen every day looking back at me in the mirror since I met Laurel—hope.
“I took last night to travel to the university, calling in a few favors for me to get that letter you two found back. But it wasn’t there.”
Laurel and I exchange guilty looks. Laurel stands up and retrieves the letter from her bag sitting near the door, and hands it to Evangeline.
“That’s because I took it with me to show you. But you left before I could.”
We wait while she reads over the letter.
