I couldn’t take my eyes from the woman in the shadows, couldn’t block out the symphony of past mingling with present. “Not Helena?” I asked helplessly, pointing to her.

She shook her head, vigorously this time, and leaned forward like a baby bird, trying to make a sound come out. “Mud . . . her. Mudher.”

Mother. Mother.

“Helena was . . . your mother?”

A single nod. Knowing flooded my chest so hard, I could barely keep up with the rush of it. Like twins they were, the same sweetness of spirit in nearly identical bodies. Rose was so like the portrait of Mother . . . but her own person too. My mother would always be lost to me, but she’d left behind this fragment, this small piece of herself—her eldest daughter. I took her hand, laying it against my cheek. I pointed to myself, then to her, and said, “Sister.”

A smile glowed across her face, a kerosene lamp with the wick slowly turned up to light the room with a soft glow. Her fingers traveled over my features, and I let them, enjoying the gentle feel of them. This was my sister. My sister.

“Why did you disappear? Why are you here? And why can’t you speak?” I took a deep breath. “What happened to you?”

I wasn’t certain what she understood—her lovely smile remained in place and she said nothing. Then, seeing my frown, she traced five long lines in the dirt and a treble clef. With one fingertip she colored in four notes on the lines, a single bar of music, then pointed at them.

I hummed them, but it wasn’t a familiar melody. A shrug.

Yet, how eager she looked. Her message was urgent. Something important. Shoulders tensed, she pointed at the single measure of music, then at herself. Again I shrugged, and her shoulders drooped. She drew them thicker, deeper, making each note clear as if on ink and paper, then blew out a breath, grabbed my hand, and stared hopelessly at the floor.

40

To copy the truth can be a good thing, but to invent the truth is better, much better.

~Giuseppe Verdi

Control. It was all about control, starting with one’s own expression. Superintendent Thornhill did not look up at Leizel Schumann as he casually replaced a book on his office shelf. “I regret that I cannot be of more help to you, Mrs. Schumann.” His smile was slow, untroubled. Compassionate.

Nothing like the chaos raging below the surface.

Her gently accented voice echoed through his office again. “You will search again, Herr Tornheel. I’m quite certain my husband is here. That woman . . . de patient with de red hair . . . she know my name.”

It wasn’t Mrs. Schumann’s slight frame that made his neck ache with tension—it was the four men in black suits standing just beyond her, hands clasped behind their backs. He smiled again and rubbed at the kink in vain.