“Anything more than that, like who the voices belonged to?” I asked.
“I’m just not sure. I think that the guy sounded familiar, but I can’t place how.”
“What about Orly? Did the guy sound like him?”
“No, Betts, I don’t think so. This was a younger voice, someone more my age.”
“So, the voice might have belonged to Norman?” I said.
“No, another male voice besides his,” Teddy said. “I think there were two male voices.”
“What about the girl or girls?”
Teddy shook his head. “I just can’t be sure. Maybe if I go hang out at the campsite again, I’ll hear something that clicks.”
“No!” Gram and I said together.
“I’m afraid you’re not going anywhere quite yet,” I said, though I wished it was a feasible idea for Teddy to come with us later that evening. It simply wasn’t, and it would be foolish for him to even try. He still needed rest.
“Well, I’m making you some homemade chicken soup,” Gram said as she stood.
“I’m not sick, Gram,” Teddy said.
“No? Well, you’re not well either, and chicken soup cures just about everything.” She walked around the couch and moved to the small galley area.
“I don’t know if I have all the ingredients,” Teddy said.
“I’ll figure it out,” Gram said.
Both Teddy and I knew not to mention that I’d already warmed up a can of chicken soup. Gram was going to make the soup no matter what.
Once she was mostly out of earshot, Teddy leaned toward me and said, “I remember a little of the argument I heard between Orly and Jezzie.”
I nodded surreptitiously.
“I’m pretty sure I heard Orly tell Jezzie that she’d ‘never get away with it.’ And then, Betts, I’m also pretty sure he said something about Norman. At least I think I heard Norman’s name. Would you go ahead and tell Cliff?”
“Sure,” I said. He wasn’t going to be happy that his cousin might have been involved in anything shady—a fight, a murder, whatever—but he needed to know.
“Thanks.” Teddy relaxed and closed his eyes.
My phone dinged quietly, announcing a text. I looked at the text as I stood and joined Gram in the galley.
“Jake has our contact for the new letter,” I said.
“Oh, good,” Gram said as she looked at the concoction in the pot on the stove. No matter what she’d put in it, I was sure its healing properties were stronger than the canned version I’d used. “I’ll have this done in a jiffy. Tell Jake we’ll be there soon.”
I nodded. I didn’t tell Gram the most interesting part of the text. Jake had said: You won’t believe this one, Betts, and you won’t want to follow through and talk with the descendant, I promise.
Chapter 16
“Opie! Opie’s a direct descendant of Alicia Zavon?” I said.
“Very direct,” Jake said. “It’s kind of amazing we didn’t know about it before, but I’ve never paid much attention to Alicia’s family tree.”
“But Opie lives for this kind of stuff. If she knew she was related to an infamous Broken Rope legend, she would have been shouting it from the treetops.”