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Page 228
stuffed in kettles, pans, and other cooking utensils in abundance, but no silver tea set.
Unless . . . Abby stood and pulled Mike to the corner of the room. She kept her voice steady despite the thrill coursing through her. "Mike, we had a silver tea set. It had been our mother's, and when we lost her it belonged to Lucy. If Lucy married Arlenoh, Mike, it was as dear to her as her journals. Perhaps they were passed along together."
He glanced at her, his face an impassive mask. Nothing less than the journals would convince him.
Abby approached Mike's great-aunt. "Jess, what did the tea set look like? Might it have had an embossed pattern of tiny violets set in a nest of swirling leaves?"
Jess's cloudy eyes opened wide. "Why, yes, I believe it did."
"And was there a matching teapot, tea caddy, sugar, and creamer?"
Jess clapped her hands together in delight. "Then you found it? How wonderful! It's been years. May I see it?"
Abby glanced at Mike for help, but he apparently waited to see how she reacted to Jess's request.
She could not tell them where these items were. Would they assume she had found them, studied them, then hidden them once more?
Even worse, if they did not turn up, might Jess think her a thief? Oh, dear lord, might Mike believe that of her, too? He already mistrusted her.

 
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