Chapter 11 - ARTHUR'S LAST PHONE CALL
Helen went home angry.
Not at Richard.
Not Samuel.
Arthur.
Dead people are difficult to fight with.
She opened drawers.
Boxes.
Old address books.
Noah sat on the bedroom floor sorting envelopes by year because Helen needed something to do with her hands and giving him a simple task kept him close without turning him into the detective.
“Blue stamp or red stamp?”
“Blue left.”
“Okay.”
He did not solve the case.
Good.
Helen found Arthur's old phone bill.
Then a notebook from his desk.
His handwriting had become shaky after the stroke.
One page:
SAM — watch
Another:
Daniel / history display
Then:
Caroline copy?
Helen stared.
Caroline Hayes had been dead five years when Arthur wrote that.
Question mark.
Not instruction.
Below:
Call Mercer Atelier?
A watch repair shop.
Closed.
Brooklyn.
Helen called the old number anyway.
Disconnected.
She searched the paper address book.
Arthur had written:
Mercer – Jonah – 718...
Daniel ran the number through public business records.
Jonah Mercer.
Eighty-one.
Retired watchmaker.
Formerly worked at a small atelier that handled private restoration for Hayes & Reed in the 2000s.
They called.
Jonah answered.
When Daniel said:
“Pocket watch engraved Daniel,”
the man went quiet.
Then:
“Caroline's watch?”
Daniel froze.
“My mother's?”
“She brought it to me.”
“When?”
“Years ago.”
“What year?”
Jonah thought.
“2011.”
Seven years after Ashford.
Three years before Samuel returned to the U.S. watch circuit.
“What did she want?”
Jonah refused to answer over the phone.
Not drama.
Client confidentiality.
Daniel said Caroline was dead.
Jonah said:
“That doesn't make her instructions mine to ignore.”
Annoying.
Correct.
They arranged a meeting.
Before hanging up, Jonah asked:
“Is Helen Carter there?”
Daniel looked at Helen.
“Yes.”
Another silence.
Then:
“Good.”
Helen took the phone.
“Have we met?”
“No.”
“Then why do you know my name?”
Jonah answered:
“Because Caroline Hayes wrote it down.”
Helen's face changed.
“I never knew Caroline Hayes.”
“I didn't say you did.”
Then he ended the call.
Helen stared at the phone.
Noah looked up from the envelopes.
“Grandma?”
She sat slowly.
For twenty-two years, Arthur had kept one family’s secret inside their marriage.
May you like
Now she had learned a woman she believed she had never met—
had once left instructions involving Helen by name.
