The letter said that Edwin Vale had resigned voluntarily. His daughter had read it often enough to remember the position of the staple. At the public copying room, an assistant turned the file over and found a thin blue sheet stuck to its back.
The carbon ended differently. Beneath the formal paragraph was a sentence asking that the night staff keep their jobs. On the signed white sheet, that space was empty. The daughter assumed someone had removed a condition after her father died.
The assistant held both pages beside the window. On the carbon, the added sentence crossed the impression of an earlier fold. It had been typed after the copies separated. Her father had apparently tried out words he never sent. The discovery explained the difference without explaining his silence.
She ordered copies of both sheets. At home, she placed them together instead of choosing the version she preferred. Her father's departure had left two records: what he had agreed to say, and what he had wanted someone to hear.