Chapter 3 - Beneath Saint Michael
Arden Vale did not appear on most road maps.
It sat between two forested ridges three hours beyond Albany, where the pavement narrowed, phone signals disappeared, and old wooden houses gathered around a white church with a crooked bell tower.
Nora had not been there since her grandmother’s funeral.
The memories arrived before the village did.
Her grandmother making apple cake.
Her grandmother cursing at baseball games.
Her grandmother switching into the old dialect whenever she was frightened, angry, or telling a story she did not want children to understand.
Beside Nora, Samuel slept beneath a wool blanket.
Lucas sat across from them in the modified SUV.
He had spent most of the drive answering silent messages on two phones.
Nora watched him for several minutes.
“Does your company collapse if you don’t answer an email?”
“No.”
“Then put the phone down.”
Lucas looked up.
“You are remarkably comfortable giving me orders.”
“You’re remarkably uncomfortable receiving them.”
Samuel stirred.
Lucas immediately put the phone away.
Nora noticed.
She said nothing.
When they entered Arden Vale, Samuel woke.
His face changed.
He pressed a trembling hand to the glass.
“The maple.”
There was a massive red maple beside the church.
Samuel whispered another word.
“Home.”
Lucas leaned forward.
“You were here before?”
Samuel didn’t answer.
The church caretaker was a seventy-three-year-old widow named Margaret Ellis who remembered Evelyn Blake and had absolutely no interest in being impressed by Lucas Mercer.
“You’re Samuel Mercer’s boy?” she asked.
Lucas, who controlled assets across four continents, nodded.
“Yes, ma’am.”
Margaret looked him over.
“You’re thinner on television.”
Nora covered a smile.
Lucas did not.
“Thank you.”
“It wasn’t a compliment.”
Margaret turned toward Samuel.
Her expression softened.
“Oh, Sammy.”
Samuel stared at her.
For a few seconds, nothing happened.
Then he whispered, “Maggie?”
Margaret’s eyes filled.
“You remember me?”
Samuel lifted a trembling hand.
“You pushed me in the creek.”
“You deserved it.”
A tiny smile appeared on Samuel’s face.
Lucas stared at them.
“You knew my father?”
“Everybody knew Sammy.”
Margaret looked at Lucas.
“He lived here until he was fourteen.”
Lucas’s brow furrowed.
“My father told me he grew up in Brooklyn.”
Margaret laughed once.
“That man didn’t see Brooklyn until 1957.”
Samuel lowered his head.
Lucas went pale.
“What else did he lie about?”
“Maybe you should ask him.”
“I have.”
Margaret’s expression hardened.
“And how’s that working out?”
Nora stepped between them before Lucas answered.
“Samuel said there’s something beneath Saint Michael.”
Margaret stopped.
The church behind her suddenly seemed much older.
“Who told you that name?”
“Samuel did.”
Margaret looked at him.
He reached into his coat pocket.
The brass key.
Margaret inhaled sharply.
“I thought Evelyn had destroyed that.”
Nora frowned.
“My grandmother?”
Margaret unlocked the church.
Inside, dust floated through bars of morning sunlight.
The sanctuary smelled of pine, candle wax, and a century of winters.
Behind the altar stood a wooden carving of Saint Michael.
Samuel pointed toward it.
“Below.”
Lucas and Nora moved the heavy pedestal.
Underneath was a narrow iron door set into the floor.
The brass key fit perfectly.
Lucas pulled it open.
Stone steps descended into darkness.
Margaret remained upstairs.
“I was never here,” she said.
Lucas glanced at her.
“You’re standing right there.”
“I’m seventy-three. I can forget whatever I want.”
Nora went first.
The room beneath the church was barely larger than a pantry.
Shelves lined the stone walls.
Most were empty.
At the far end sat an old metal document box.
Samuel stopped at the bottom step.
He began to tremble.
Nora touched his shoulder.
“You’re safe.”
He shook his head.
“No.”
He looked at Lucas.
“He isn’t.”
Lucas opened the box.
Inside were photographs, letters, immigration documents, a pocket watch, and a thick ledger wrapped in oilcloth.
The first photograph showed several families standing outside the same church.
A date was written on the back.
1.
Samuel, perhaps nine years old, stood near the center.
Beside him was a thin dark-haired girl.
Nora knew that face.
“Grandma.”
Lucas looked over.
“Evelyn?”
Nora nodded.
The children were holding hands.
Underneath them, someone had written:
Samuel and Evie, Arden Vale school picnic.
Nora looked at the old man.
“You knew her.”
Samuel’s lips trembled.
“She saved me.”
“From what?”
Samuel pointed toward the ledger.
Lucas opened it.
The pages were filled with names.
Dozens.
Then hundreds.
Beside each name was a dollar amount.
At first Nora assumed they were donations.
Then she saw the heading.
Resettlement Trust.
Lucas read aloud.
“Families arriving from Europe deposited cash, jewelry, bonds, property certificates…”
His voice slowed.
“Custodian, George Mercer.”
Samuel’s father.
Lucas turned another page.
Withdrawals began two years later.
Large withdrawals.
None contained signatures from the original families.
Lucas stopped breathing.
“No.”
Samuel covered his face.
Nora understood before Lucas did.
“The money was stolen.”
Samuel nodded.
Lucas stared at the pages.
“My grandfather stole refugee money?”
“Yes.”
Samuel’s English had suddenly become clear.
The past was closer than the present now.
“People came here with everything they had left in boxes and coat linings. My father told them he would keep it safe. He spoke English. He had a bank account. They trusted him.”
Lucas’s face hardened.
“And he took it.”
“He invested it.”
“That’s a polite word.”
Samuel flinched.
Lucas slammed the ledger shut.
“How much?”
“In 1954? Maybe eighty thousand dollars.”
Lucas laughed bitterly.
“That became Mercer Industries.”
Samuel nodded.
The company Lucas now controlled was valued at more than eleven billion dollars.
The silence in the underground room became unbearable.
Nora looked at the photographs.
“My grandmother’s name is here.”
Samuel nodded.
“What did your father take from her family?”
Samuel closed his eyes.
“A deed.”
“To what?”
“Land in France. Then compensation bonds after the war.”
“How much?”
“I don’t know.”
“You do know.”
Samuel looked at her.
His face crumpled.
“Enough.”
Nora stepped back as if he had struck her.
All her grandmother’s life, Evelyn Blake had worked.
First in a textile mill.
Then a school cafeteria.
Then cleaning motel rooms.
She had died with $4,200 in savings and a mortgage she never finished paying.
Nora thought of the electricity being shut off one winter because her grandmother had been too proud to ask for help.
She looked at Samuel.
“You knew?”
Lucas turned sharply.
Samuel began crying.
“Did you know?” Lucas demanded.
May you like
Samuel nodded.
The answer seemed to hit Lucas harder than the theft itself.
