Page 32 of The Last Letter of Rachel Ellsworth

Chapter Twenty-Five

The next morning, they packed their bags and headed to the train for the journey to Paris. Veronica tried to veil her excitement, but inside, she was a fourteen-year-old bouncing up and down. She texted Jenna: We are going on the Chunnel train today!

It was, of course, the middle of the night in Colorado, so there was no response.

Mariah seemed much better today. Henry carried her backpack and his camera bag, leaving Veronica with only her own backpack and suitcase.

It had given her pause momentarily to carry such a plain bag to the City of Light, but she didn’t have anything else.

She tried to make up for it with a weightless scarf in an abstract pattern to dress up her jeans and sweater and simple down jacket, because it was definitely cold and gray.

On the train, Henry sat next to her, Mariah across the table.

They played cards and games while Veronica watched the landscape out the window, feeling a simple quiet unfold as the houses and businesses of the city gave way to fields, still green even in December, and the shapes of bare trees.

Every so often, they stopped in a village and picked up a handful of new passengers.

A woman carried a big cat in a basket, murmuring to him every so often.

Mariah curled up to sleep. Henry tugged a book out of his bag, the same one he’d picked up at the bookstore. “Any interesting commentary today?” she asked.

“I’ll let you know.” He held up earbuds. “Do you mind?”

“Not at all.” She pulled her own out, and scrolling through her phone, pulled up a Leonard Cohen playlist. She thought about showing it to Henry, but he’d already gone under, and she felt silly anyway.

After the moment in the car, things had returned to their former friendliness. Which was probably better anyway.

A second group of Rachel’s letters had come in from Jill, so she spent her time reading and digesting them, collecting notes on her phone. Money had also landed in her account from Mariah, and she’d sent half to the rent, hoping it would be enough to prevent her landlord from evicting her.

She was going to have to figure out something better, but not from the train.

Instead, she focused on the letters, parsing out the time flow.

What she could make out was that Rachel had gone to India to study .

.. something ... and became friends with a small group of local people, some of whom were connected to a Parsi café run by a family that seemed to have three daughters and a son.

The café was called Café Guli, like the one in England. A Google search showed it had closed in the mid-nineties, but she was able to find a few old photos of it. Need to find a place to do some printing, she wrote, and underlined it twice.

The café was run by proprietor Farroukh Irani, a heavily mustachioed man who stood before the café, smiling broadly.

His grandfather had opened the establishment in the 1920s.

One of the daughters must have been Zoish, already mentioned.

Had one of the others been Hufriya, the woman from the café in London?

Mostly the letters were chatter about things she explored, places she went. She described food in quite a lot of detail.

The food is a total revelation. You think you know about Indian food, but there are so many layers and styles and kinds of cooking, it just blows my mind.

Muslims cook different things than Hindus, and Parsis are in a world of their own, but even though they’re all different, there are some cornerstone ingredients—mango and rice and peas and certain spices.

I love the spices so much, so many different kinds.

We went to a spice wallah, and there were little mountains of everything—cinnamon and mace and cloves and curry leaves and bay leaves and turmeric powder—and I wanted to buy every single thing, just to sample it.

I’m learning so much about cooking, the styles of cooking that are based in one thing or another, the rules about halal, the strictures against meat, the goat and lamb and mutton, the forbidden things like cows (who really, truly do wander around all over the place, as if they’re just your neighbors).

It’s so funny how my mind coughs up recipes and combinations to try—just like when we went to France when we were kids.

I mean, I think I’ve always done it, but it’s louder here.

I write them down in my journal and can’t wait to try them when I get home.

Veronica paused, excited to see an origin story in progress. The trip had shaped Rachel’s delight in the food world, and it had obviously been her calling. She wanted to ask Mariah and Henry more about that, but she should also read Rachel’s books, get a feel for her approach.

The young Rachel had also spent a lot of time talking about a boyfriend named Alex, who wasn’t a student, but an Englishman traveling in India.

Upon meeting Rachel, he’d decided to stay in Mumbai for a few weeks, and they spent a lot of time together, visiting temples and taking weekend trips to various places.

Alex and I took an overnight train up to Rajasthan.

I only had a week off for the holidays, so it was a very fast tour of the main sights—we spent a day in Delhi visiting both the big mosque there and a giant Sikh temple where they feed hundreds of people every day.

I loved both of them so much—the eagles that the imams feed at the mosque, the view of the city from the courtyard.

I ate jalebis from a street vendor, even though Alex warned me not to, but I had to try.

And maybe I’m getting a cast-iron stomach, or I’m just getting used to things around here, but I was fine.

The Sikh gurdwara blew me away. The whole idea of feeding people as an act of service touches me.

What if that was standard practice everywhere?

If every church, temple, mosque in the world just . .. fed people? Can you imagine?

And ta-da! We saw the Taj Mahal. It’s just so beautiful I can’t even tell you.

You think you know what something looks like because you’ve seen a million pictures, but a picture can’t show you scope.

It’s huge. Inside, it’s so quiet, their bones resting together forever.

I cried, which Alex thought was silly, but I don’t care.

A picture of Rachel was starting to emerge, a vivid girl with big emotions and a headstrong streak that could be a bit reckless. She’d run off to Delhi with her new boyfriend and nobody else? Veronica would kill Jenna if she did that.

She looked at Mariah, sleeping with her head nestled against the wall. This was Rachel’s beloved daughter, or at least Rachel was a beloved mother. Was her daughter like her? She must look like her, or the woman at Café Guli would not have recognized her so definitely.

Casting a vision of Mariah over the young Rachel helped bring her into focus. She must have stood out, with her blond hair and very American ways.

With a frown, Veronica wondered what the Paris connection was. Why were they going there?

She referred back to the notes. The Paris list included Angelina, which had to be one of the most famous cafés in the world, but hardly Parsi or in any way related. The other place seemed more likely, Café Farroukh.

The name rang a bell. She frowned and looked back at the notes on the Mumbai cafe. Yes, the proprietor was Farroukh Irani. Another solid connection.

Maybe they were getting somewhere.

As they emerged from the train, gathering coats and hats and gloves, Mariah’s cane and the books and notebooks they’d used on the way, Veronica received a series of texts, each buzzing as it came in. She recognized the pattern as Jenna’s so didn’t open it until she had a chance to read all of it.

Their hotel was nearby, and Mariah pleaded to go there first. “I don’t think we can check in yet,” Henry said.

“Maybe we can at least drop our bags?”

“We can ask.” Veronica held out a hand. “What can I carry for you?”

“I’m good. I’ve only got my coat.”

Henry was overloaded. He had his own bag, with at least one heavy book, his camera bag, and Mariah’s bag. “Let me take hers,” she said.

“Sure?”

She nodded and flung the pack over her right shoulder. “Now I’m balanced.”

They stood outside the station awaiting a taxi, and Veronica took a deep breath.

It was chilly but sunny. She absorbed the scene with a sense of happiness, taking in the traffic, the tourists pouring out of the station, young people in knots of three and four, families dressed up nicely, a group of children around ten or eleven years old, clearly on a school trip.

They wore cranberry sweaters and plaid lowers.

“Five Guys!” Mariah exclaimed. “Let’s go there first.”

“Really?” Veronica said. “All these amazing places to visit, and you want a hamburger you can get in all fifty states?”

She shrugged. “I’m hungry and tired. Would it be so terrible?”

Henry touched Veronica’s back. “We’ll have other experiences. We can try Five Guys, too.”

Veronica looked up at him, laughing. “You traitor! You want it, too.”

“I’m hungry,” he said. “Aren’t you?”

She allowed herself to be led inside. She’d never actually been to one—so she couldn’t tell if it was the same as all the others.

It smelled good, of grilled onions and beef.

The music overhead was some kind of pop.

They scooted into a booth, Mariah by herself so she could stretch out her leg. She rubbed it absently.

“Does it hurt more in the cold?” Veronica asked.

“Yeah, I think it’s the metal. But I’m all right. I can’t wait to go to Angelina. That was one of my favorite places when I was a little girl.”

“Is that why it’s on the list?”

“I don’t know. She had a thing for all kinds of cafés, and she had a couple of favorites in Paris, and New York, and Marrakech.”

“And that Greek place in Colorado Springs, remember?” Henry said.

“Oh, yeah! I forgot about that one. Michelle’s. The ice cream, oh my God.”

“Did you know that the first café to open anywhere served ice cream?” Henry said, clearly parroting.

“And did you know the butterfat at Michelle’s is the richest in the city?”

Veronica listened to them trade memories, scanning the menu, trying to calculate the incalculable calories on a menu like this. Cheeseburgers and french fries and fried everything. And they’d be eating again a couple more times while they were here. She’d have to be careful.

Her stomach growled in protest.

“Somebody is hungrier than they admit,” Mariah said, and slapped her menu down. “You need a real meal. Actual food, with no diet stuff.”

Veronica flushed, ears hot over addressing food and diets in front of a man. “I’m a grown woman. I know how to feed myself.”

“You know how to starve yourself, babe,” Mariah said, sliding out of the booth with her cane. “I’m ordering for all of us,” Mariah said. “Cool?” She looked at the other two. “Three cheeseburgers with everything, fries, and ... what? Cokes, you guys?”

“Ugh. No Coke,” Veronica protested. “ Café, s’il vous plait. ”

“Same,” Henry said. “ Et eau gazeuse, aussi, s’il vous plait. ”

When Mariah went to the counter, Henry said, “I worked in a burger joint when I was a kid. My uncle owned it, out on the highway to the shore, and it was always busy.”

“What did you do?” Mariah asked.

“Everything. Flipped burgers, washed dishes, waited tables, all of it. Whatever he told me to do.”

“Same, at the Blue Dog,” Veronica said, and she was surprised to remember it without sorrow this time.

Mariah returned, sliding in next to Henry.

“It was old-school Mexican, so cute,” Veronica said.

“I’m talking about the Blue Dog, the place I worked when I was a teenager.

Your mom would have liked it. The walls were painted bright colors, and we wore uniforms with embroidered flowers around the neckline, and a fake flower on a barrette. It was an institution.”

“No way! Did you hate it?”

She let the door swing open, visuals spilling into view.

“No, I loved it. My mom was sick, and I really wanted to be busy.” She paused, feeling the noise and cheer and camaraderie she’d felt spill into her memory.

“It was kind of magical, you know, the things you had to learn to be good at it, the way to serve sopapillas and how to gauge the heat of the green chile and how to serve from the right side of the table, and the language of orders.” A memory of Tomas flashed through her mind, his big dark hands, his smile.

It arrived vividly, laced with both longing and guilt.

She’d been besotted. She pushed that part of the memory out of view.

“It’s hard work, but it’s fast paced, and if you get it right, people are happy. ”

“Did your mom get better?”

Veronica shook her head. “She died of breast cancer when I was sixteen.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“It was a long time ago.”

“Still.” Mariah inclined her head, measuring. “It’s hard, you were really young.”

Veronica nodded, shrugged. True and true, but what was there to say?

“You still like feeding people,” Mariah said, spilling salt into her palm. “You offer me food all the time.”

“I do like to feed people,” she said, thinking of that big farmhouse table, her dining room filled with light. “Or I did. That might be part of my old life.”

“Your mom life.”

It stung in some uncharted region of her chest. The sting was a hard truth she was still grappling with. “Yeah, I guess so.”

Next to her, Henry said, “Wonder what the new chapter will bring.”

She peered into the future, and although she couldn’t see very far, the road definitely had different features from the one she’d been walking for over twenty years.

She looked up at him. “Good question.”