The End of The Road (20 page)

“Notice anything else?”

“Yes. There were a few things moved from where I keep them—a plant, kitchen things, a book I had left on the sofa was moved to the fireplace hearth, the television had been moved. I think it was a woman, but am not absolutely sure.”

Nelson had taken out a notebook and pen and was taking notes. At that suggestion he paused and held up a hand to stop me.

“What makes you think it was a woman?”

“There was a perfume scent that wasn’t mine in the bed and in the bathroom—where she used my toothpaste, as a matter of fact. I tossed it out. It was the kind of scent that no guy would use as aftershave—very flo ral. It’s gone down the drain now and the sheets and pillowcases are back on my bed. But I think I’d be able to identify it, if I smelled it again.”

“You’re probably right,” he said, and went back to writing. “Then what?”

“Nothing from that direction. Whoever it was didn’t come back, but probably wouldn’t have if she saw my car parked here and knew I was home, would she?”

“Not if she had any sense,” he said with a grin, giving the shotgun a glance. “But I’m glad to hear you had the lock replaced. Go on.”

So I told him about Andy giving me the picture of John’s wife, having found it in one of the books.

“And you say you didn’t tear it up.”

“I didn’t. His sister did that, while I was gone to the police station, calling you. Last night she showed up at my door.”

“Andy’s sister?”

“No. John’s.”

That stopped Nelson’s note taking. He raised his head with a jerk and looked at me, wide-eyed.

“Really!
How did you know she was his sister?”

“Amy Fletcher is her name. And she told me she was, but she knew so much about him that I believed her. We talked a long time and she told me how she had been following and searching for him since sometime after the Twin Towers fell in New York. He and his wife, Marty, both worked in the second tower. She evidently died in it, like so many others, when it fell. He, obviously, didn’t.”

“That may explain that belt buckle Stretch found.”

“Yes. But I don’t understand why Amy disappeared while I was gone to give you a call—or why she tore up this picture. It doesn’t make sense to me. She had another picture, one of John when he was younger. There was no mistaking that it was him.”

“Amy Fletcher. Was Fletcher her given or married name?”

“She didn’t say, but I got the feeling that she was single and it was her maiden name because she’s been searching for him by herself for a number of years and didn’t mention leaving a husband or family in order to do it. She was picking up jobs as she traveled when she needed to.”

Nelson frowned. “Interesting,” he said thoughtfully. “Do you know of anything that she may have left prints on? We can now check him out by the name she gave you—Fletcher. But we might find her prints in a search, if we had some.”

“I thought back to what Amy had handled. “The mug she drank coffee from this morning is in the dishwasher, but it’s only half full, so I haven’t run it yet. I’ll get it for you.”

“Let me, so her prints aren’t smudged. You’ve already handled the mug, so I’ll take your prints to eliminate them from the search.”

He did both of those things, carefully wrapping the mug in a paper bag to carry to the crime lab, and taking my prints before he left.

I told him everything I could think of that would be of help and he left, pleased with the progress he felt we had made.

“I’ll be sure you get the mug back when they finish with it and will let you know if we find out anything new. Please call the number on the card I gave you if that woman, Amy, comes back, or if you find out where she is.”

I thanked him and promised I would, then stood in the doorway and gave him a wave as he backed out of the drive onto East End Road and was quickly gone.

After feeding Stretch, I ate another bowl of soup and a tuna sandwich for dinner, not wanting to go to the trouble of making anything that required more effort. When I finished, I rinsed out the bowl and spoon I had used and set them in the dish drainer beside the sink.

It had been a stressful couple of days and I could feel a headache coming on, so I took some Tylenol and went to have a lie-down on the sofa, after building a small fire in the fireplace.

Stretch watched from where he was on the hearth rug and laid his head back down when he saw me settle with a light blanket over me. As he grows older he naps more and isn’t as active as he was in the past. But isn’t that true for us all?

As I dozed off, I wondered again fleetingly why Amy had left in such a hurry. It didn’t seem much like what I had learned of and from her, but then how much did I actually know about her anyway?

I was asleep in minutes, refusing to wear myself out with more speculation on the past week’s events and puzzles, good or bad.

I wound up sleeping there all night.

It was still dark when I woke, disoriented and yawning, wondering what time it was.

That time of year, when it gets dark earlier in the afternoon and stays dark until later the following morning, it’s difficult to tell the time by the amount of light and dark, so we Alaskans do a lot of clock-watching. Having spent the last few winters in the southwest ern states, where it gets dark later and light earlier, I was still feeling a bit out of sync and found myself taking naps at odd times.

I got up, took a look at the clock, and, finding it was five thirty in the morning, went straight back to sleep for another couple of hours.

When I finally woke for good at just after seven o’clock, I felt much better. I let Stretch out and back in, then fed him before going upstairs, where I took a long, hot shower, washed my hair, brushed my teeth, and felt ready for whatever the rest of the day might bring, hopefully something good and ordinary.

I have never suffered from underconfidence, you understand.

TWENTY

PEACE AND QUIET WERE A GOODLY PART OF THAT MORNING. I made and ate breakfast as I watched the rising sun make sparkles on the waters of the bay and gild the mountaintops on the other side.

Clean, well rested, and ready to take on whatever the day might have to offer, I found my outlook had shifted, as it often does when I stop focusing too much on anything or one side of a question. I told myself to stop worrying about defending my territory from an unknown someone who had trespassed, though I still wondered why they had picked my house in particular.

With no way of answering that question, I decided to let it go completely for the moment. My defense had confined me to my house, however much I valued it and resented the intrusion. Was I going to allow myself to be a prisoner of my own worries and anger, or not? I resolved that I was not.

I would take Stretch and leave the house—go somewhere else for a while.

I would have headed for another of my walks on the beach of the spit, but had no desire to wade through snow and knew it wouldn’t be any fun at all for my low-slung dachshund.

Then I remembered that I had forgotten to pick up the mail on my way back from the airport on Sunday and that became my goal for the moment.

First I went around and made sure that the doors to the deck and windows were locked and noticed that in the sunshine the snow was beginning to melt and drip off the roof. I put on a warm coat, boots, and gloves, and used one of the new keys to lock the front door as I went out.

Stretch, wearing his red sweater, I carried to the car, so he wouldn’t get his feet wet, and deposited him in his basket.

I backed out of the drive and headed for the post office, where I found a handful of mail waiting in my box—several bills, two mail-order catalogues, and a Hallmark card from Sharon. In bright colors it read:

She had added a note to say that it matched her mood of the moment as she hadn’t realized just how much stuff they would want to take along in their temporary move to Portland, that they were both busy packing, but would call me soon.

Good choice, Joe,
I thought, not for the first time. She has a healthy sense of humor and I’m going to enjoy having her as a daughter-in-law.

From the post office I headed to the grocery store that is almost next door, where I parked, and left Stretch in the car once again. There I picked out a small pork roast to put in the oven for dinner and added a couple of baking potatoes to my cart, along with a jar of applesauce, and some greens and tomatoes for a salad. Living alone, I seldom do much baking anymore, so I went to the bakery for half a chocolate cake that I knew from past experience would be an indulgent dessert addition.

Having paid for the groceries, I was looking over the rack of new movies for rent in the front of the store when someone laid a hand on my shoulder.

“Hey,” said a familiar voice, and I turned to find Harriet Christianson smiling at me.

“You’re home again, I see. Tried to call you the end of last week, but all I got was your machine. You missed a good evening with the quilting ladies. They were disappointed when you didn’t show.”

“Oh, Harriet,” I said, remembering the quilting party I had skipped out on in order to get away to Anchorage. “Will next meeting do?”

“Of course,” she told me. “We’d love to see your treasures anytime you can make it. Did you have a good trip?”

“I did. I got a little Christmas shopping done and had a two-day visit with some old friends.”

We talked a little longer before I took my groceries out to the car, where Stretch was watching the people coming and going. I put the sacks in the backseat before returning the cart.

“With this melting snow it’s a bad day for a walk, lovie,” I told him as I slid in behind the wheel. “How about we stay warm and dry in the car and just take a drive out to the end of the spit and back?”

He never disagrees.

So that’s what we did. We stopped in a pull off to watch the tide slowly coming in from Cook Inlet, splashing its lacy edges up a little farther with each wave. The beach was empty of people, except for one lone walker who I didn’t recognize. He was strolling along with his hands in his pockets, cap flaps pulled down around his ears, rubber boots on his feet.

I watched him go casually out for a walk, snow or no snow, though the incoming salt water was doing its best to melt and erase as much as it could reach, wave by wave, each a little higher than the last.

We drove back to town and on impulse I pulled in to Ulmer’s to pick up some red, white, and green yarns, thinking that, as she and Joe were coming for Christmas, I’d knit Sharon a stocking to match the one I made for him years ago when he was small. I could use it as a pattern if I could find where I had packed it away with the holiday decorations and ornaments in the attic.

It would be a good project to keep my hands busy in the next week or two. I decided that I’d go up soon, find it and my knitting needles, and make a start.