Their New-Found Family Read online

  “I’m afraid they won’t give me that information without a good reason.”

  “You could tell them the truth, that you’re trying to help Uncle Tris recover his memory.”

  “That just might work. You know something, Alain? You have your uncle’s shrewd instincts. Hold on while I see what I can find out.”

  “Okay.”

  Alain sat on the side of the bed and waited. It seemed to take forever until Guy came on the line again. “The secretary said that the student in question was from Concord, New Hampshire, in the U.S.

  “I called the information operator and was given her family’s phone number. It’s different from the one on her original application to the school. Do you have a pen?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m going to give you the country and city codes, too.”

  Alain wrote everything down. “Merci, Guy!”

  “You’re welcome. Let me know what you find out.”

  “I will.”

  He hung up, planning to call the number tonight. By that time it would be late afternoon on the East Coast. Hopefully Rachel Marsden’s parents would be home.

  Just as he reached the door to go downstairs and help his grandmother, the phone rang again. He dashed across the room to answer it, thinking it might be Guy calling because he forgot to tell him something.

  “Hallo?”

  “Alain?”

  “Uncle Tris—” Guilt swept through him. “I thought you couldn’t call me until tonight.”

  “I decided to surprise you and let you know I’d arrived safely.”

  “I’m glad.”

  “Are you all right?”

  “Yes.”

  “What have you been doing so far?”

  Alain’s cheeks went hot. “On the way home from the train, Grand-pere took me to the boat show exhibit. What about you? How soon are you going to start blowing things up?”

  His uncle laughed. Though Tris and his dad were completely different they sounded a lot the same over the phone.

  “This week we’re starting out with mountain climbing maneuvers. The good part won’t come until the second half of training.”

  “I wish you didn’t have to go anywhere.”

  “Well I’m here now, and before long it’ll be over. How soon are you leaving for Lake Como?”

  “Grand-pere said early in the morning.”

  “Have you found out when Luc’s parents will be bringing him?”

  “He called me a little while ago and said the day after tomorrow.”

  “Then you don’t have such a big wait. That’ll be fun to have your best friend with you.”

  “I guess. I hope you don’t get a headache while you’re gone.”

  “I haven’t had one in several months.”

  His uncle was lying. “That’s good.”

  “You know what? You worry too much, but I love you for it.”

  Alain’s eyes smarted. “I love you, too. Please don’t get hurt while you’re climbing.”

  “I was just going to say the same thing to you. When you and Luc go out on the paddle boats, promise me you’ll wear your life jackets. Sometimes the wind comes up unexpectedly. I had a close friend die on that lake in a summer storm because he wasn’t wearing one.”

  “I promise.”

  “How are the grandparents?”

  “Fine. I’m going outside in a minute to help them weed.”

  “I’m sure they’ll appreciate your hard work and the company. I’ll phone again tonight after they’re back from their nightly walk and talk to all of you.”

  “Okay. A bientot.”

  “Thanks for the ride, Mrs. Pearsoll.” Natalie Marsden dragged her duffel bag from the trunk.

  “You’re welcome!”

  “Phone me later, Nat,” Kendra Pearsoll called from the window.

  “I will.”

  Natalie ran up the walk to the porch of her grandparents’ Georgian styled house and let herself in the front door with the key.

  “Nana?” she called out. “I’m home.” She hurried through the interior to the kitchen. Her grandmother had left a message on the fridge with one of the magnets Natalie had given her for her birthday.

  She dropped her bag, then poured herself a glass of milk. While she drained it she read the note her grandmother left.

  Natalie, I’m next door at Mrs. Bleylock’s, looking at her newest little grandson. I guess your hockey practice took longer than usual. Come on over and see how cute he is. Love, Nana.

  She grabbed an apple and started for the front door. If she didn’t hurry, her mom would be by to pick her up before she could get a peek at the new baby.

  She was halfway through the dining room when she heard the phone ring. It was probably her mom who’d left work and was letting her know she was on her way to pick her up. She retraced her steps to the kitchen and lifted the receiver.

  “Hello?” she said, a trifle out of breath.

  “Hello. Is this the Marsden residence?”

  Whoever the boy was on the other end of the phone, he sounded foreign.

  “Yes. Who’s this?”

  “My name is Alain. I’m looking for Rachel Marsden.”

  “That’s my mom.”

  “Oh. Is she there?”

  “No. Are you sure you have the right number?”

  “Did your mother once go to school in Geneva, Switzerland?”

  Natalie blinked. “Yes.”

  “Did she ever sail on the QE2?”

  The mention of the ship gave Natalie butterflies on her insides. “Yes.”

  “Then she’s the one.”

  Her hand absently fingered the end of her long, dark brown ponytail. “How do you know about my mom?”

  “By accident I found out she was on the same ship as my uncle.”

  Natalie held her breath. “What was his name?”

  “Tris Monbrisson.”

  Natalie tried to stop the gasp that came out of her mouth, but she was too late. Her eyes suddenly stung with tears. She felt like she was going to suffocate from pain…and excitement.

  Wiping the moisture from her cheeks she said, “If your uncle wants to talk to her, why doesn’t he call her himself?”

  “I’m the one who wants to talk to her. He doesn’t know I’m phoning.”

  Natalie’s breath caught. “Why do you want to speak to her?”

  “I need to tell her the reason why she never heard from him after they reached Switzerland.”

  Natalie’s heart pounded so hard, she felt sick. “That was a long time ago. I don’t think my mom would even remember him.”

  “If she married your father, then I guess my uncle was right.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He said she would have forgotten him the minute she got off the ship. I’ll hang up now.”

  “No—wait!” she cried out. Dry mouthed she said, “What were you going to tell my mom? I want to hear.”

  “At my uncle’s hockey camp, he got struck on the head by a hockey stick and went into a coma.”

  “A coma—”

  “You know. Where you sleep and never wake up?”

  “I know what it means.” Fear shot through her. “I-is he okay now?”

  “Yes. But when he woke up a month after his accident, he couldn’t remember anything.”

  “You mean he had amnesia?”

  “Yes. There are six weeks of his life wiped out of his mind. He never remembered playing hockey in Canada, or his trip back to Switzerland. Those memories are gone forever.”

  “You’re kidding—”

  “It’s the truth. You can call the Belle-Vue Hospital in Lausanne. That’s where bad head injury patients are taken. My uncle was there for a month!

  “Ever since then he’s been troubled because he doesn’t remember anything about that time on the ship. Sometimes he worries so much, he gets bad headaches.

  “I was thinking that if your mother called him to tell him about what happened while they wer
e on board together, it would make him feel a lot better.”

  “How did you learn she was on the ship with him?”

  “I was looking in an old backpack in his closet and found a note she wrote him on the ship’s stationary. She put her address in Switzerland at the bottom. The school secretary said she came from New Hampshire. That’s how I got this phone number.”

  “Oh my gosh— Listen Alain— Give me your number. I’ll tell my mom you want to talk to her.”

  “Okay. Here are two numbers. Are you ready?”

  “Yes.” She’d reached for the pad and pencil her grandmother kept on the kitchen counter.

  He gave her the information. While Natalie wrote down the digits, she could hear her mom honking out in front.

  “I’ll be at the second number for two weeks starting tomorrow. Then I’ll be back at this one.”

  “Okay.”

  “Tell her to call me at this exact same time.”

  “I will. Now I have to go. Goodbye, Alain.”

  “Goodbye.”

  She hung up and called her grandma at Bleylock’s to tell her she was going home with her mom. Then she hurried out to the car where her mom was waiting.

  “Hi, honey!”

  “Hi, Mom.” Natalie leaned across the front seat to kiss her cheek.

  “Before I left the office, Steve called,” her mother said, reversing to the street. “He’s taking us out to dinner tonight at the Brazilian Grill, so we’re going to have to hurry to be ready on time. Friday nights mean a long line. If we’re there early, there’ll be time for a movie after.”

  “I don’t want to go.”

  Her mother flashed her an anxious glance. “You look a little flushed. What’s wrong, honey? Don’t you feel well?”

  “My stomach’s kind of upset.” It was the truth.

  “Well I’m not leaving you if you’re coming down with flu. It’s going around.” She reached out to touch her forehead with the back of her hand. “You feel warm. That settles it. I’ll call Steve and cancel.”

  “Don’t do that yet, Mom. I’m not sick the way you mean, but I do need to talk to you in private before we go anywhere.”

  In a few minutes they’d reached the house. She hurried inside. Her mom followed with the duffel bag Natalie had forgotten.

  The concern in her parent’s eyes had turned them a dark green, providing a contrast with her blond hair that made her more beautiful than any of her friends’ moms.

  When Natalie first met Steve, she’d heard him tell her mom how gorgeous she was. Even Kendra’s dad had told Natalie, “Your mother’s a real knockout.”

  Tris Monbrisson must have thought so, too. He’d asked her to marry him twelve years ago. But for that accident…

  CHAPTER TWO

  “WHAT’S wrong, honey?” Rachel Marsden put the bag on the floor.

  “I have something to tell you. I think you’d better sit down.”

  At her daughter’s tone of voice, a chill invaded Rachel’s body. “Why? Does this have anything to do with your grandmother?”

  Rachel’s father had passed away two years ago. Her mother had taken it hard, but Rachel had thought she was doing a lot better these days. It would be unbearable to lose her mother, too. Rachel wanted her around for a long, long time.

  “No—this doesn’t have anything to do with Nana.” After a slight hesitation she said, “Mom? While I was over there, someone called trying to find you.”

  Her brows knit together. “Who?”

  “Alain Monbrisson.”

  Alain Monbrisson? Just hearing the name made Rachel feel faint. “That’s what Tris called his baby nephew.” She put a trembling hand to her throat. “I don’t understand.”

  “Did you once write my father a letter on the ship’s stationary?”

  A moan escaped Rachel’s lips. “Yes.”

  “Well, Alain found it in his uncle’s old backpack. He tracked you down through your school in Geneva and then phoned Nana’s house. She was next door, so I answered it.”

  “Oh, no—”

  “Don’t worry, Mom. Alain doesn’t know his uncle is my father. He thinks you’re married and I’m another man’s daughter.”

  “Honey—I didn’t mean—”

  “I know what you meant,” Natalie broke in, sounding older than her eleven years. “The reason Alain was calling was to tell you about the terrible hockey accident that happened while my father was at hockey camp in Interlaken.”

  An accident—

  “Sit down, Mom—you look like you’re going to be sick.”

  Rachel felt sick. She sank down on the end of the couch. “Tell me what he said.”

  As she listened to her daughter, she started to tremble and couldn’t stop.

  Tris had been in a coma?

  “Alain thinks that if you phoned his uncle and filled him in about your time together on the ship, it would ease his mind concerning the period of time he doesn’t remember. Hopefully it will help cut down his headaches.”

  Tris could have died and Rachel would never have known. She buried her face in her hands.

  “I was afraid to tell you about this because it changes a lot of things, Mom. I always thought my father was a horrible man to have hurt you the way he did. But now I know he didn’t do it on purpose, I want him to know he has a daughter. Maybe he’ll want to meet me. What do you think?”

  What do I think?

  With one phone call, the world Rachel had built so carefully for her and Natalie had just come crashing down around them.

  She could hardly comprehend the fact that a block of amnesia was the reason Tris had vanished from her life.

  If his nephew hadn’t found that note, they would all still be in the dark. Unfortunately Natalie had been given enough information that it would take an act of nature to stop the rising tide of hope in her heart.

  To be united with her father had always been Natalie’s dream, though she’d never expressed it verbally to Rachel.

  Before Rachel did anything about the situation, she needed clarification on one certain point. It required talking to Alain Monbrisson herself.

  She raised her head, smoothing the hair from her face. “Natalie, honey? Would you bring me Alain’s phone number please?”

  Her face glowed with excitement. “I’ll be right back.”

  Rachel reached for her purse and pulled out her cell phone. When Natalie returned with the paper and pointed to the second number, Rachel started punching the digits.

  She checked her watch. It was four in the States, making it around ten in Switzerland.

  After three rings someone picked up. “Hallo?” said a young male voice.

  “Hello. Is this Alain Monbrisson?”

  “Yes?”

  “My name is Rachel Marsden. I understand you were trying to find me.”

  “Hello, Ms. Marsden. Thank you for calling me back.”

  She couldn’t fault his manners or his English.

  “My daughter just told me of your conversation. I must admit hearing about your uncle’s accident has come as a shock. We can all thank God he survived it.”

  “Yes. He could have died.”

  Rachel swallowed with difficulty. “Tell me something, Alain. Does he know you found the note I wrote him?”

  The words she’d penned had poured straight from her heart.

  “Yes. I read it to him while he was packing this morning.”

  She clutched the phone tighter. “But it was your idea to phone me, not his?”

  “Yes.”

  His honesty came as an enormous relief. “Is he aware you phoned my parents’ house in an effort to locate me?”

  “No. He’s gone away on a trip.”

  “I think you’re a very special person to care about him. But much as I understand why you want to help your uncle, the need to talk to me has to come from him, not you.

  “It’s been twelve years. He’s a thirty-one-year-old man now. If he were still that curious about his past, he woul
d have followed up with a phone call to me.

  “But he didn’t because he’s been on the road to recovery for a long time and believes it’s better to leave things alone. I tend to agree with him.

  “Some things in life are better left alone. So let this phone call between us be the end of it. Do you understand what I’m telling you?”

  “Yes,” came the quiet answer. “I won’t tell him I talked to you or Natalie.”

  “Thank you. I’m sure if you think about it, you’ll see it’s the right thing to do. Are you familiar with the American expression, ‘Let sleeping dogs lie’?”

  “No.”

  “Well, it doesn’t matter. The important thing is that he’s alive and well today. I’m very happy for him and your family. Thank you for the call, Alain. Goodbye.”

  “Goodbye.”

  They both clicked off.

  “How could you, Mother?” Natalie cried, white-faced.

  Rachel steeled herself to stay in control. “I did what I had to do. Did Alain read you the note I wrote to your father?”

  “No,” she said, tight lipped.

  “I’ll tell you what it said.” She gave her daughter the word by word account. “Even knowing what I’d written to him, your father didn’t act on the information.

  “He could have tried to contact me, just like his nephew did, if only out of curiosity. But he didn’t. Instead—according to Alain—he went away on a trip not the least bit interested in following up.”

  Her daughter’s face crumpled before she ran into her arms. Rachel absorbed the sobs that echoed in her own soul.

  “I know this is so hard, honey.” She kissed Natalie’s hair and cheeks. “But we have to look ahead, not back. Don’t you see? Your father’s mind is a blank in regards to that period of his life. He’s moved on, and probably has a wife and family.

  “What’s done is done. Too many years have gone by. That’s how he honestly feels, otherwise he would have phoned us instead of his nephew making the call. What more proof do we need, huh?”

  “I guess we don’t,” Natalie answered in a strangled voice. She finally pulled away and wiped her eyes.

  “Come on. Let’s get ourselves ready to go out to dinner.”

  Natalie hung back. “Mom? Do you like Steve?”