“Well, that’s the thing-- I’m not sure of all the specifics. I don’t know their names, but I need to find the records of four people; two males, one female and an infant. I can’t even tell you the sex of the infant.”

“Not much for making things easy, are you?” Gretchen asked, with a smile. “Okay, let’s take it from what you know and go from there. Do you know when these events took place?”

Susan pulled some papers from her briefcase and sat down in the offered chair next to Gretchen. Over the next hour the ladies worked together, first at the computer and then heading to the bookcases full of paper records. During that time, Susan relayed the information that she had and when she explained the older husband had died shortly after his young wife, Gretchen scrambled from the floor to her feet. “I just remembered something.”

Without further explanation she rushed from the room. “Are you coming, Susan?” she called over her shoulder.

“I’m coming,” Susan said, as she gathered their notes from the floor.

When she walked into the hallway, the other woman was just disappearing into a room at the very end of the corridor. She walked in that direction and nearing the room, she could hear Gretchen complaining from within. “Oh, darn. Where is that book? I know it’s here somewhere. AHA! Susan, I found it, hurry.”

Susan found her sitting on the floor peering into a large, black, leather ledger book. When Gretchen turned to face her, she couldn’t help but think she looked like a child on Christmas morning. “It’s not the actual certificates, but this is the ledger for 1900 to 1910. We can find the actual documents quicker now. What you said reminded me of a story my grandmother told me when I was younger. Lets take this ledger to my office, get some coffee and I’ll tell you a story.”

§ § §

Once they were settled into Gretchen’s office, with the open ledger on her lap and a tape recorder between them, she began her tale. “You know this town is called Burnsville; well, it’s named for the founding family, the Brackleburns. They were the wealthiest family in this county. Well, the family line ended shortly after the turn of the century. The last Brackleburn, Archibald Brackleburn, died without an heir. He had married quite late in life and turned fifty-six just eight weeks before his wedding.” Looking down at the ledger page, she traced her finger along to the bride column. “He married a Miss Emma Rothfield, who was twenty-one the day after the ceremony. GramGrams always said she was a lovely young woman, so full of life, until her father, Buford, sold her into that marriage. They were married in June of 1902. According to GramGrams, the town did not see much of Emma after the wedding; Brackleburn always had some excuse as to why she didn’t travel into town with him. One day in September of 1905, Archibald came into town saying that his wife had died. No one in town ever knew why he waited until after he buried her body before coming to town, but apparently, no one questioned him about their suspicions. He died mysteriously a short time later, and wasn’t found for months.” Susan turned off the tape recorder when Gretchen closed the ledger.