Chapter summary: It's amazing what one can dig up in archived newspapers! Unfortunately for Bella Swan, the news doesn't answer questions about their new residents, it uncovers even more of them. Just when her life is interesting enough, Edward visits the courthouse to ask Sheriff Swan if he may call on Bella some evening. Bella seems willing enough to allow this.

Well, I had my answers. But that didn't mean that they made sense. That also didn't mean I had to like them.

January 7, 1934, New York Times, front page:
"Banking Magnate Heir Brutally Murdered"

The article went on to explain how one Royce King II, Rochester's most eligible bachelor and the person in question, and two body guards were found mutilated in a destroyed bank vault. Four of his companions had been previously killed in similarly gruesome fashions. Police were "investigating theories" as to how the bank vault door, fully 12 inches thick constructed from solid steel meeting Underwriters Laboratories stringent specifications, could have been forced open. This tragedy was all the more powerfully felt as it followed on the heels of an aborted marriage to the belle of Rochester, Rosalie Lillian Hale, who died just before the ceremony was to occur nearly eight months ago to this day of mysterious causes.

Rosalie Lillian Hale. So I had some context for the familiarity of the name. I dug back to the prior year's archived papers and stumbled across this death notice:

April 3, 1933, New York Times, death notices:
"Rosalie Lillian Hale, 18 years of age, suspected foul play,
closed casket, memorial services to be held at ..."

The article mentioned that she preceded her parents in death, but made no mention of any twin sister named Lillian. The article did mention other younger siblings, but did not mention an older brother named Carlisle who practiced medicine. Could Carlisle and Lillian be estranged from the rest of the family? In what possible world could that happen? Perhaps this announcement was about entirely different Hale family that just happened to have a daughter about the same age with the same name? I looked for the wedding announcement:

January 15, 1933, New York Times, wedding announcements:
"Mr. and Mrs. Walter Hale of Rochester are pleased to announce
the engagement of their daughter
Rosalie Lillian Hale
to banking magnate Royce King II ..."

The announcement included a picture. There was no mistaking that face: Lillian looked at me out from the photograph. There could be no one else that looked like her, unless she were a twin. I clipped out the article with the photograph.

I admitted to myself, looking at her photograph, that she was much more terrifying in person. Perhaps it was because she was engaged that made her demeanor more pleasing in the picture? If so, she didn't photograph well, because the picture didn't do justice to her beauty — belle or no belle of Rochester the photograph lacked that ineffable essence of her beauty that had transfixed me in real life. Thinking about our visit sent a shiver down my spine.

It was odd that the announcement did not give the honorific title for her father. Was her brother the first doctor in the family? Wait a minute: it said her father was in banking, like the Kings, and usually, son followed in his father's footsteps. The Hales were an unusual family, to be sure, but still, why would Carlisle take up the medical profession during these hard times, when he would be sure to have work in banking with his own father's influence? I took all three articles with me. I planned to have a little chat with 'Lillian' about all this. Was her marriage arranged? Did she fake her death to escape an unwelcome marriage and her parents' disapproval? Where did she hide for ten months? Was that when she ran off with Dr. and Mrs. Hale? And who were they? Sympathetic cousins?

Questions kept swirling around in my head. I loved Pa dearly, Ma, too — she raised me right and with love ... while she was here — so I could never imagine leaving my folks. But then I was blessed with a happy family, and I'd never be forced into an undesirable marriage. After all, I'm not the 'belle of Rochester', I'm just Bella. I never quite cared about my looks, and if all those strings came attached with good looks — well, much more than good looks in this girl's case, I reflected looking again at the picture — then I didn't envy her, whatever her name was. Nosiree, not one bit.

I was interrupted from my ruminations by the clock chiming 8 bells: it was already late. Time to close up; so I headed back upstairs to the office. What do you know! The courthouse had an unexpected visitor.

Edward was talking with Pa at his desk. This could be interesting.

"Hello, Edward." I could be bright and cheerful, if the situation called for it.

He smiled. Hey, it worked! His smile, on me, that is. I had to lean against the wall to appear casual. Otherwise a feather would've knocked me over. "Bella." His voice felt like velvet caressing my skin. I was going for casual. Right.

"I was just thanking Sheriff Swan," he continued, "for your visit to our house. It was so kind of you both to extend the hospitality of your town to us, seeing that we're new here."

"Ummm." Hmm, it seemed I had a problem with my elocution around more than just Edward's sister-in-law-by-marriage ... I had to recover fast, because the good Sheriff Swan was taking an interest. Casual, remember? "That's quite all right, it's not often we get newcomers into town; we just wanted to make you feel welcome, is all." I got all that out in one breath. I hope it made sense. I looked down at my hands, which were busy trying to twist themselves together into knots.

It looked like he understood. I peered at him. It looked like he was looking at me. He was looking at me. So I helpfully pushed the visit along: "Ummm, so..."

See, I knew there was a reason he couldn't stay away from me. It had to be that conversations were so dull for him, and he lacked the necessary number of "umms" and the necessary number of dangling sentences to require the full force of his mind to decipher the meaning thereto. He liked me so much because I gave him something to occupy his free time.

I reviewed what I had just thought. I realized I was starting to lose the ability to make sense even to myself in my own thoughts. Great. Just great.

"So," he supplied, helpfully, "I was asking your father if I may be able to call on you after dinner some day, and he allowed that there was an availability Tuesday next, but he said that this matter was entirely in your hands. I wouldn't dream of imposing ..."

Okay. Wait. Edward Platt was asking me if it was all right for him to visit? The strange house-warming cum convalescent visit at noon followed by the damning newspaper articles in the archives topped by this bizarre request from Edward proved just one thing: I had entered the twilight zone.

So, I was living in a topsy-turvey world. I could play along with aplomb, I guess. "That would be fine, I suppose." Imposition, indeed! If he was imposing on me by visiting, then I hoped I would find myself frequently put out. "I was going to reread Silas Marner for the fourth time, but I suppose you could show me a reason that you find Shakespeare worth reading. Not his plays, so much: I don't like tragedies for my romances. But maybe his histories or sonnets?" I never had the impetus to read them before, but I was sure Edward would warm to the challenge.

He did. "Yes, of course, no plays; Austen suits you, then. That's a shame, because some of his greatest writing can be found in his tragedies, but an introduction to some sonnets sounds excellent." Just like his voice. He took his leave: "Sheriff Swan, Bella, I'll see you Tuesday evening." With that, he left the courthouse and got into his own car, that dripped "speed" and "money" like a foot-high stack of griddle cakes slathered with butter dripped maple syrup.

"Wow, Pa, what kind of car is that?" I gasped as I watched it disappear down our town's one road.

Pa shrugged. Now I knew where I got my eloquence from.