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Over dinner, Amanda explained everything. Sam listened intently, ate his salmon, and nodded; his eyebrows furrowed. When Amanda said she’d already reached out to Cynthia, he raised his lips into a near-smile. It was the first Amanda had seen in days. It felt like the sun.
“It seems like it really was used for the Underground Railroad,” Sam admitted, wiping his mouth with a napkin. “The guys downstairs finally showed me some photos when they finished up today.”
Sam had taken photographs of their photographs. They showed the dark room with its two beds, bunk bed, cabinets, the baby crib, and trunk from numerous angles, plus personal items: a very old comb, a home-made teddy bear, and a few other items that, apparently, were used as “baby supplies.” Amanda didn’t recognize them as anything used today.
“It seems likely that Wes’s great-great-grandfather was instrumental in setting up this safe room for the Railroad,” Sam explained, parroting what he’d learned.
“My great-great-great-great-grandfather, you mean,” Amanda said with a smile.
“Exactly.” Sam swiped through his photos to show an old black-and-white family portrait of a man, a woman, and four children. The man had a thick black beard and kind eyes, and the children looked to be between the ages of one and seven. The wife was stern and sad-looking. Amanda could only imagine why. One baby was no picnic, so four, far before the era of microwaves and baby monitors, must have killed her.
Amanda was living in the easiest era it had ever been to be a woman, and she still struggled to survive.
“This is him,” Sam explained. “Matthew Sheridan, his wife Wendy, and their children, Randolph, Anna, Henry, and Nadia. It seems like he bought a camera around 1862 or 1863 and really enjoyed taking portraits. Many of the ex-slaves stayed with him, which was really risky if you think about it. He was literally recording his crime.”
Sam brought up several more photographs. They were all of the Black people who’d fled the South and sought freedom in the North. The Black women and men looked far skinnier and gaunter than the Sheridan family. Their eyes were sorrowful, and their clothing was often torn and ratty.
One thought rang through Amanda. In taking their photograph, Matthew Sheridan had given them a place in history. He’d made it known that they mattered to him as people.
In all, thirty individual photographs were discovered in the trunk downstairs. Mr. Sheridan had apparently hidden them.
“But something else was in the trunk,” Sam declared. “A diary.”
Amanda’s eyes widened.
“Unfortunately, it’s way too delicate to handle on-site,” Sam said. “One of the historians is taking it to a lab to read over it and record everything he finds. It’ll open the window to that time period and into Matthew Sheridan’s life. It’s astonishing.”
It truly was. Amanda collapsed back in the chair beside Sam, reeling. The past felt like a tremendously heavy thing. Her plight as a “new mom” seemed so laughable now.
More than that, thinking of a young mother—or multiple young mothers—in the basement floored her.
“None of the photos had babies, did they?”
“None that they showed me,” Sam said.
Amanda chewed her lip. “I’m sure Cynthia will want to know all about this. I’ll email her right away.”
But when Amanda pulled up her email, Cynthia had already written back. She’d already heard about the discoveries beneath the Sunrise Cove and had been thinking of reaching out to Wes Sheridan. “Are you related to him?”
Amanda wrote back immediately to say that she and her husband were now more or less in charge of the inn. She didn’t want to burden her grandfather with the horror of their current expenses. She wanted to sweep this stress under the rug and plunge into HISTORY Channel wealth.
“Let’s set up a call,” Cynthia said in her email. “I hope we get to work together again!”
Upstairs, Genevieve woke up again and rattled with cries. Amanda bolted to tend to her, feeling stronger and more awake than she had all week. When Genevieve saw her, Amanda half imagined that she smiled at her—a real smile that was definitely not possible this early in Genevieve's life. But real smiles were coming. Amanda couldn’t wait.
Chapter Eighteen
From the Diary of Martha Smith
April 1, 1864
Mrs. Sheridan just shared a wonderful truth with me. The island—this island—has a name. And that name is my name. It’s Martha. Martha’s Vineyard. Truly, this made me laugh for so long and so hard that I thought the slave owners in the South would hear me and send their dogs after me. But when I calmed down, it was just me, Mrs. Sheridan, and baby Mary in the basement. It was just us, same as it usually is, on this island that has borne my name for longer than I’ve been alive. A lot longer.
It’s hard to believe so much time has gone by. I can smell the difference; I can practically hear the trees and flowers and grass growing outside, stretching up to what must be the bluest of blue skies. Mrs. Sheridan keeps saying we need to find a way to get me and the baby out there; that it’s not good for a baby to be cooped up inside her whole life. But we both know it’s too risky. In fact, in order to protect me, Mr. and Mrs. Sheridan stopped accepting new escapers. They don’t put the lantern out anymore. I feel complicated about this. But we have to keep the baby safe.
April 3, 1864
I had another dream about Virgil and Jane. They were safe in Canada, and they knew they needed to reach out to me. But when Jane sat down to write a letter, she remembered she didn’t know how to write. There was no way to contact me. She wept.
