Chapter 8 - THE WITNESS AT ST. AGNES|
The old St. Agnes residence stood behind a line of live oak trees, its white paint peeling and its windows covered with plywood. It had once housed elderly women who had no family to care for them. Now the building belonged to a private trust whose records were difficult to trace.
Gideon arranged for them to enter through the side door.
Camille carried the blue note in her coat pocket. She had read the words so many times that she could have recited them in her sleep.
The first witness is still alive.
“Who are we looking for?” she asked.
“Isabella Ferraro,” Gideon replied. “My brother's wife.”
“You said she disappeared.”
“She did. After my brother died, she was taken to a private clinic. The family was told she was suffering from a breakdown. When I tried to visit, the clinic said she had been transferred.”
“And you never found her?”
“I found the paperwork. I never found her.”
They walked down a narrow hallway. Their footsteps echoed beneath the high ceiling. At the end, a nurse sat behind a desk, reading a magazine.
Gideon approached.
“We're looking for Isabella Ferraro.”
The nurse looked up.
“There's no one here by that name.”
Camille noticed the small movement of her eyes toward the corridor.
She spoke gently.
“Maybe she uses another name. We're looking for an older woman who arrived here around fifteen years ago. She may speak Italian.”
The nurse hesitated.
“I'm sorry. I can't give out patient information.”
Gideon placed a business card on the desk.
“Please give this to the director.”
The nurse disappeared through a door.
A minute later, an elderly man in a brown cardigan came out. His eyes moved from Gideon to Camille.
“Mr. Ferraro,” he said. “I wondered when you would come.”
Gideon's face became still.
“You know me?”
“I knew your brother.”
“Where is Isabella?”
The director glanced down the corridor.
“She's alive. But she has not spoken about that night in years.”
Camille followed him to a small sitting room.
An elderly woman sat beside the window, her silver hair pinned neatly at the back of her head. A blanket covered her knees. On the table beside her was a photograph of a young man with dark hair.
Gideon stopped.
“Bella.”
The woman turned.
For several seconds, she only stared at him.
Then she whispered his name.
Gideon knelt beside her chair.
“I'm sorry I couldn't find you.”
She touched his cheek with trembling fingers.
“You were only a boy.”
“I should have protected you.”
“You were not the one who betrayed us.”
Camille stood near the door.
Isabella looked at her.
“Who is this?”
“Camille Tibido,” Gideon said. “Her father helped my brother.”
The old woman's eyes widened.
“Étienne's daughter?”
Camille moved closer.
“You knew my father?”
Isabella nodded.
“He came to see me before everything happened. He told me he had found the names.”
“What names?”
“The men who arranged your father's disappearance. The men who arranged my husband's death.”
Gideon's jaw tightened.
“Tell me who.”
Isabella looked toward the closed door.
“Not here.”
Camille pulled a chair closer.
“You can trust us.”
The old woman reached for her hand.
“Your father hid the ledger in a place no one would think to search. He told me the key was not metal. It was a sentence.”
Camille's heart began to pound.
“What sentence?”
Isabella closed her eyes, remembering.
“Something about the river carrying every secret to the sea.”
Camille knew it.
Her father had written the same words inside the cover of a book he used to read to her.
“The river remembers,” she whispered.
Isabella nodded.
Then she looked at Gideon.
“Your brother did not die because of a business dispute. He was going to testify. He had discovered that the Harbor Circle was planning to sell a collection of stolen documents to a foreign buyer.”
“Who led them?”
Isabella's hand tightened around Camille's.
“Someone inside your own family.”
Gideon went motionless.
“Who?”
May you like
The old woman swallowed.
“Your uncle, Salvatore Ferraro.”
