SHAKESPEARE’ SECRET Read Online Free Page B

again, “Why would they pretend the diamond was stolen?”
    Mrs. Roth sighed. “They were very good friends of mine,” she said finally.
    Hero glanced at her. She fiddled with her shoelaces, waiting for a response. Why wasn’t she answering? And then she thought she understood.
    â€œYou can tell me,” Hero said slowly. “I won’t tell anyone. There’s nobody I could tell anyway.”
    â€œNo?” Mrs. Roth turned to her, and her gaze was steady. “You’re like me, then. There’s nobody I can tell either. Eleanor was my closest friend. Isn’t it strange? She’s the one I’d most like to talk to about it, and she’s gone.” Her lips twitched. “There’s a wonderful Emily Dickinson poem:
“I’m Nobody! Who are you?
    Are you — Nobody — too?
    Then there’s a pair of us?
    Don’t tell! they’d advertise — you know!
    How dreary — to be — Somebody!
    How public — like a Frog —
    To tell one’s name—the livelong June—
    To an admiring Bog!
    â€œDo you know that one?”
    Hero shook her head, smiling. “If anything gets quoted at our house, it’s usually Shakespeare. But I like that.”
    â€œI do, too,” Mrs. Roth said. She rested her head against the post again and looked out into the garden. “All right, then. Why would Arthur and Eleanor Murphy hide a diamond?”
    Hero waited in the warm silence, eager for her to continue.
    Finally she spoke again. “Two years ago, Eleanor became ill. It was cancer, very advanced; no one had any hope. But there was a treatment in Mexico, something experimental and very expensive. It wasn’t covered by their health insurance. Arthur was certain it was the only thing that would save her.”
    Mrs. Roth seemed to be talking to herself now. “They couldn’t afford it. Arthur wanted her to sell the necklace. Eleanor refused. She thought the necklace might have some sort of historical importance. The Vere family was descended from British nobility apparently.”
    â€œBut if it was the only way to pay for the treatment she needed,” Hero protested, “wouldn’t she do it to save her own life?”
    â€œI don’t think she had any confidence she could be saved,” Mrs. Roth said. “She wasn’t a young woman. She seemed to accept it, that she was going to die.”
    â€œReally?” Hero couldn’t imagine that. “She just gave up?”
    â€œI don’t think it was giving up. Her health declined noticeably about a year ago. It was a terrible thing to watch. She’d always been such a vibrant person, full of interests and curiosities. She became very weak. She couldn’t read. We couldn’t do the crosswords anymore. Arthur was just desperate. I’d never seen him like that.” Mrs. Roth hesitated.
    Hero sunk her chin into the hollow between her kneecaps, breathing the salty, grassy smell of her own skin. “So you think he did it? You think Mr. Murphy took the diamond himself?”
    Mrs. Roth nodded. “I do, yes. I think the police were right. I think Arthur reported the diamond stolen for the insurance money. He thought it was the only way to save his wife.”
    â€œDid he get the money? Did he take her to Mexico?”
    Mrs. Roth straightened, seeming to come out of herreverie. “No, not in time. Because of the investigation, the insurance people delayed payment for months and months. Eleanor died last fall. So it was all for nothing. And Arthur couldn’t bear to live here without her.”
    Hero stared at the ordinary shingled profile of her family’s house. It looked so much like the other houses on the street, with its peaks and dormers, its aging shutters and bay windows. Who would have thought it had such a history?
    â€œBut why does anyone think he hid the diamond in the house?” she asked. “It would make more