Chapter 6: The Empty Music Box
Dad called Patricia before he did anything else.
She listened to Rose explain the email, then instructed everyone to preserve the message and its attachments. She contacted the officer who had documented the earlier threat and arranged for the police to accompany the collection of my belongings.
Nobody was allowed to go back to the house alone.
I sat at Hannah's dining table, staring at the photograph of my bedroom.
The music box looked smaller than I remembered.
It was pale blue, with a silver clasp and a tiny ballerina that spun when the lid opened. My mother had given it to me on my sixth birthday, three months before the accident.
She'd sat on the edge of my bed and wound the key while the melody filled the room.
“Whenever you hear this,” she'd told me, “remember that love doesn't disappear just because you can't see someone.””
I had played that melody every night for months after she died.
Then Celia moved into our house.
At first, she pretended to love the music box.
She asked me to play the tune for her. She told Dad it was sweet that I still remembered my mother.
Later, she began calling it childish.
“You're getting too old for that thing,” she'd said one evening.
When I refused to put it away, she took it from my hands and placed it on a high shelf.
I had cried until Dad came upstairs and returned it to me.
After that, Celia stopped mentioning it.
Until the day Rose found it under my bed.
“Wren?””
Dad's voice pulled me back to the present.
I looked up.
“We're going to the house with the police,” he said.
“You can stay here with Hannah.””
“But I want to see the box.””
“I know.””
“What if it's broken?””
His expression softened.
“We'll find out.””
I shook my head.
“What if Mom's letter is gone?””
Dad pulled out a chair and sat beside me.
“Then we'll find another way to find the truth.””
“But what if that was the only copy?””
He didn't promise that everything would be fine.
Instead, he said, “Then we'll work harder.””
Somehow, that answer comforted me more than another promise would have.
Dad left with Patricia and two officers. Rose stayed behind with me, pacing between the kitchen and the living room.
At eleven twenty, Dad called.
“We're inside.””
I grabbed Rose's arm.
“What does it look like?””
She put the phone on speaker.
Dad's voice sounded distant.
“Your room is untouched, sweetheart. The music box is on the bed.””
“Is it broken?””
A pause.
“Yes.””
My stomach dropped.
“How?””
“The lid is cracked, and the clasp has been forced.””
I covered my mouth.
Dad continued gently.
“But we're going to preserve it. Nobody is touching anything until the officers finish documenting the scene.””
“Is the letter inside?””
Another pause.
“No, sweetheart.””
I felt the room tilt.
“The box is empty?””
“There's a small piece of paper under the lining, but we haven't removed it yet. Patricia says it needs to be photographed first.””
Rose closed her eyes.
Then another voice spoke in the background.
“Mr. Bennett, we need you to look at this.””
The call went quiet.
“Dad?””
He returned a moment later.
“We found something else.””
“What?””
“A loose floorboard beneath your bed. Someone has been searching under there.””
I stared at the table.
“They took my letter.””
“We don't know that yet.””
“But the box is empty.””
Dad's voice tightened.
“We're going to find out what happened.””
The call ended.
Rose sat beside me.
For several minutes, she didn't speak.
Then she said, “I should have told your father about the music box sooner.””
I looked at her.
“Would that have stopped Celia?””
“I don't know.””
“Then it wasn't your fault.””
Rose's eyes filled with tears.
She turned away, pressing a hand over her mouth.
I realized then that adults could be frightened, too. They could make mistakes, miss warnings, and wish they'd acted differently.
But I was tired of everyone feeling guilty while Celia kept getting what she wanted.
“I want the truth,” I said.
Rose turned back.
“Then that's what we'll keep looking for.””
At eleven fifty, Dad returned to Hannah's house with Patricia.
He carried a clear evidence bag containing the broken music box.
I reached for it, but Patricia gently stopped me.
“We need to keep it sealed until the examination is complete, Wren.””
“Can I at least see it?””
Dad held the bag where I could look through the plastic.
The ballerina was lying on her side. The silver clasp had snapped, and a narrow crack ran across the lid.
I started crying.
Dad sat beside me and held me while I pressed my face into his shoulder.
“I know,” he whispered.
“I'm so sorry.””
When I finally looked up, Patricia placed a photograph on the table.
It showed the small piece of paper found beneath the lining.
The writing was faded, but one sentence was legible.
The original is safe with the person who knows what happened on October 14.
Dad stared at it.
“That date again.””
Patricia nodded.
“It's the date on the original death registration.””
“What person?”” I asked.
“We don't know yet,” Patricia replied.
“But this tells us your mother may have hidden the document somewhere other than the music box.””
Dad rubbed his forehead.
“Thomas said the music box was the key.””
“Perhaps it was a clue, not the final hiding place.””
Rose leaned closer to the photograph.
“There's something else.””
Everyone turned toward her.
“When Celia asked me about the music box, she wasn't only interested in what was inside. She asked whether Wren had ever taken it apart.””
I frowned.
“Why would she ask that?””
Rose shook her head.
“I don't know. But she seemed frightened by the possibility that you'd already found something.””
Patricia examined the photograph again.
“Can we enlarge this sentence?””
She opened her laptop and zoomed in on the image.
Below the legible line were several faint marks, possibly the remains of another sentence. She adjusted the contrast, then rotated the photograph.
A second line slowly became visible.
Ask the witness who never attended the funeral.
Dad went completely still.
My mother's funeral had taken place on a rainy afternoon. I remembered the black umbrellas, the wet grass, and Dad holding me so tightly that my cheek hurt against his jacket.
I remembered Elaine standing beside Celia.
I remembered Rose, who had not yet worked for us, telling me years later that she wished she'd known my mother.
But I didn't remember any other witness.
“Who never attended the funeral?”” I asked.
Dad shook his head slowly.
“I don't know.””
Patricia took out her notebook.
“We need the funeral home's records, the original police report, and the list of people who were notified. We should also ask Thomas what he knows about October 14.””
Dad reached for his phone.
Before he could dial, a new message appeared.
It came from Thomas.
I know who the witness is. But if you want to find her, you must go to the place where your wife signed the original document.
Dad typed a reply.
Where?
The answer arrived almost immediately.
St. Mary's Hospital. Room 214.
Dad frowned.
“My wife was treated at St. Mary's.””
Thomas sent another message.
Not the room where she died. The room where she woke up.
I stared at the screen.
“Mom woke up?””
Dad's face lost all color.
He called Thomas.
The call went straight to voicemail.
Patricia immediately began contacting the hospital's records department to ask about the historical admission. Dad sat beside me, holding the broken music box in its evidence bag.
For years, I'd thought my mother had died on the night of the accident.
Now we had two different dates, an altered registration, and a note suggesting that someone had seen her alive afterward.
I looked at Dad.
“Was Mom alive when you buried her?””
His eyes filled with tears.
“I don't know, sweetheart.””
He held me close.
“But I'm going to find out.””
That afternoon, Patricia received confirmation that St. Mary's still retained archived records from the relevant period. Access would require formal authorization and verification, but the hospital had located a reference to my mother's name.
There was one detail the records clerk could confirm immediately.
My mother had been discharged from the hospital.
Not transferred.
Not pronounced dead.
Discharged.
And the person who signed the release form was not my father.
It was Elaine Bennett.
Dad stared at the confirmation until the words blurred.
Then Patricia's phone rang again.
She listened, thanked the caller, and slowly lowered it.
“What is it?”” Dad demanded.
Patricia looked at him.
“The hospital has located a photograph from the ward's archived visitor log. It shows your wife on the morning of October 14.””
“Who was with her?””
Patricia turned the laptop toward us.
The photograph was grainy, but the faces were clear enough.
My mother was sitting upright in a hospital bed.
Beside her stood Elaine.
And behind Elaine, holding a folder against his chest, was a man Dad recognized instantly.
His own older brother.
Richard Bennett.
The uncle Dad had told me was living overseas.
The uncle who had supposedly died five years earlier.
May you like
And on the back of the photograph, someone had written a message in my mother's handwriting.
If Richard comes back, don't let him near Wren.
