Main Street #1: Welcome to Camden Falls (18 page)

Olivia brought the photo closer to her face and gazed at it for a moment. Then she screamed and dropped the picture to the floor.

“Shh!”
hissed Flora. She grabbed for the photo and turned around to look at Min and Gigi, but they were busy talking with the UPS woman who had arrived at the back door with a delivery. Then she clasped Olivia’s hand. “It’s who I think it is, isn’t it?” she said quietly.

“Scary Mary,” whispered Olivia, “wearing her star necklace.”

“What was my mother doing with Mary Woolsey? I didn’t think Mary knew my family back then.”

“I have no idea,” Olivia croaked, and she cleared her throat.

“Really? You don’t have any idea at all? You’ve told me everything you know about Mary?”

“Cross my heart. She’s, like, eighty years old. She lives alone — you saw her house. She’s possibly a witch and definitely crazy. She’s buried some kind of treasure in her garden and she keeps a child hidden in her basement.”

Flora narrowed her eyes at Olivia.

“Okay, those are just rumors. But they might be true.”

“What else?”

“She catches rats in her attic and fries them up for dinner?” suggested Olivia.

“Come on. Tell me something that will help.”

“I don’t know anything more. I mean, anything more than you do. She comes here three times a week to take in people’s mending and stuff, and to return it to them when it’s finished. She’s been doing that ever since the store opened, I think, and that’s how she earns her money, thanks to Gigi and Min.” Olivia looked at the photo again and shuddered. “I really don’t know what she would have been doing with your mother.” She paused. “Maybe your mother had a secret past.”

Flora was about to reply when Ruby entered the store, holding aloft a paper bag from Ma Grand-mère. Flora stuffed the picture back in her pocket and whispered to Olivia, “We can discuss this later.”

Now she had even more questions … and no answers. Although she did like the idea of someone, anyone, having a secret past.