Grandma looked toward the bank vault door.
"The airline lawyer who came to my house two weeks after Thomas disappeared."
Michael went still.
"Robert's father was Walter Haines."
The room became silent.
Lena wrote the name down.
"Now we have a connection."
The bank manager returned.
"We found the access record."
He turned the tablet toward us.
The screen showed a scanned signature.
Evelyn Walsh.
Grandma stared at it.
"That's not mine."
I knew it was not hers either.
Grandma's handwriting was round and careful.
The signature on the screen was angular and hurried.
The manager scrolled.
"The person presented an older passport and the original box key."
Grandma's eyes widened.
"Original key?"
"Yes."
"I have my key at home."
The manager looked confused.
"There were two registered keys."
Grandma whispered, "Thomas's."
Lena leaned toward the screen.
"Was anything removed?"
"We don't inventory box contents."
"Can we open it now?"
The manager nodded.
"With Mrs. Walsh's authorization."
Grandma signed the form.
The manager led us through two security doors into the vault.
Rows of metal boxes lined the walls.
He stopped at 6113.
Grandma held the replacement bank key the manager provided.
Her hand trembled.
I covered it with mine.
"You don't have to do this alone."
She looked at me.
"I wasn't planning to."
We turned the keys together.
The manager slid the long metal box out of the wall and placed it on a private table.
Then he stepped back.
Grandma lifted the lid.
Inside was almost nothing.
A faded photograph.
A cassette tape case with no cassette.
And a white envelope.
On the envelope were two words in Grandpa's handwriting.
FOR EVELYN.
Grandma stared at it.
Michael whispered, "The recording is gone."
Lena picked up the empty cassette case with gloved hands.
"Maybe."
Grandma opened the envelope.
Inside was one sheet of paper.
She read silently.
Her face changed line by line.
I could not wait anymore.
"What does it say?"
She handed it to me.
The note was short.
Evie,
If you are reading this, somebody found the box before you did.
Do not trust the person who brings you the story first.
The real recording is not here.
Look where we watched the planes without buying a ticket.
T.
I read it twice.
Michael looked at Grandma.
"Where did you watch planes without buying a ticket?"
Grandma's face went pale.
"There was an observation deck near the old airport."
Lena asked, "Still there?"
Grandma shook her head.
"No."
"Then what did he mean?"
Grandma looked at the photograph from the box.
It showed her and Grandpa as newlyweds, standing beside a chain-link fence with aircraft behind them.
On the back, Grandpa had written one line.
OUR BEST VIEW WAS NEVER AT THE AIRPORT.
Grandma suddenly looked at me.
"I know where it is."
The bank manager asked Grandma whether she wanted to file an immediate fraud complaint.
"Yes."
Her answer came before he finished the question.
"Against whoever used my name."
The manager nodded and began preparing forms.
Lena examined the photograph from the box under a desk lamp.
"There's something written along the edge."
Grandma leaned closer.
A series of tiny numbers had been printed almost invisibly beneath the white border.
Grant photographed them and enlarged the image on his phone.
They appeared to be coordinates from an old street grid, followed by the letters O.D.
"Observation deck?" I asked.
Grandma shook her head slowly.
"Maybe."
Michael pointed to the background of the picture.
Behind young Grandma and Grandpa was a water tower with a distinctive checkerboard pattern.
"Could identify the exact location."
The bank manager returned with another surprise.
The person who opened the box three months earlier had not only used a forged signature.
They had requested a private room and remained inside for forty-seven minutes.
"Forty-seven minutes to remove one cassette?" Lena said.
The manager looked uneasy.
"There may have been more in the box at that time."
Grandma stared into the nearly empty container.
"So we don't even know what else was taken."
"No."
She looked at the note from Grandpa again.
Do not trust the person who brings you the story first.
Then she looked at Michael.
He understood immediately.
"You think someone expected us to find the wrong story."
Grandma nodded.
"Thomas certainly did."
Chapter 9 - THE HOUSE UNDER THE FLIGHT PATH
The place was not an observation deck.
It was a house.
Or rather, it had been.
When Grandma and Grandpa were newly married, they rented a tiny bungalow beneath the approach path to the old airport.
Planes passed so low that the windows rattled.
They could not afford entertainment, so they sat on the back steps with coffee and watched aircraft descend over the rooftops.
"Thomas used to identify every model by sound," Grandma said as we drove through a neighborhood that had changed beyond recognition.
"He'd hear an engine and tell me what was coming before we could see it."
Michael sat in the passenger seat.
"My father said he could do that."
Grandma looked out the window.
"Patrick knew a lot about him."
The resentment had not disappeared.
But it was quieter now.
Lena and Grant followed in their vehicle.
The old bungalow no longer existed.
In its place stood a small auto-parts shop and a fenced storage yard.
Grandma stared at it from the curb.
"That's the lot."
I looked at the building.
"What exactly are we looking for?"
"I don't know."
Michael studied the photograph.
"Maybe the fence line."
Grandma shook her head.
"The fence was replaced decades ago."
Lena approached with a flashlight.
"Let's start with what hasn't moved."
The concrete foundation of the old rear steps still existed along one side of the property.
Most of it had been buried under newer pavement.
But a narrow strip remained exposed beside a drainage channel.
Grandma walked toward it slowly.
"Thomas poured that step himself."
I looked at her.
"You're sure?"
"I remember because he mixed the concrete too wet and complained for a week."
Michael crouched beside the old slab.
Something metallic was embedded near the edge.
A small brass ring.