A House by the Side of the Road (24 page)

“It wasn't a woman.”

“Because?”

Meg couldn't articulate why she was so sure. It seemed insane to say, “Because I wouldn't have been so scared.” She shrugged. “Because it just wasn't.”

“Lock your doors.” Both detectives stood. “We'll file the report,” the woman said. “I'm sorry you were startled.”

Meg's mouth tightened. Sorry she'd been
startled?
It sounded as if someone had knocked unexpectedly at her door.

“Thank you,” said Meg coldly. She had hoped for a team with fingerprint powder and the ability to locate a single dropped hair. She had hoped for far too much.

“No checking for fingerprints? Like on the doorknob after I was so careful not to touch it?”

Detective Stanley closed her notebook and tucked it into her pocket. She smiled suddenly, which made her immensely more appealing. “You'd be surprised how infrequently we look for fingerprints,” she said. “I assume there are a number of people who have been in the house with your permission? And, in this case, well … you don't know who had legitimate reasons to be here before you moved in. Unless you've scrubbed every surface in the place since then…?”

Meg didn't bother to respond.

“Feel free to call us if you have any more trouble.”

“Can I ask you a question?”

“Of course.”

“Did the woman who used to live here, Angie Morrison, have a record? Did the police ever deal with her?”

Detective Schultz smiled self-consciously. He had obviously dealt with her, and not minded. “She tended to ignore the posted speed limits,” he said. “She got some warnings, which didn't do any good, and some tickets, which did a little.” He shook his head and smiled. “She's somewhat noticeable,” he said, then blushed suddenly. “I mean, her car is.”

“I want to find her,” said Meg. “Do you have any suggestions?”

The woman frowned. “You want to find her?”

“Yes,” said Meg, using the story she'd told Mike. “She left a valuable bracelet in a drawer in the bedroom. Really valuable. I need to send it to her. Could you maybe look up one of those tickets she got and get her license plate number and see if she's changed her address with the DMV? Or gotten another ticket somewhere? I'd really appreciate it. So would she.”

Detective Stanley nodded. “Sure. I'll check.”

*   *   *

The Chopin sonata was as incongruous as the shining sun and the breeze that gently lifted Meg's hair as she sat on the porch. None of the details of the day matched the mood that enveloped her.

“Feel free to call us if you have any more trouble,” she mimicked bitterly. The dog got up, stretched, and walked over to her. Meg had phoned Christine, explained her car trouble and asked her to let the dog out. There would be time later to describe her night in the tree. The dog had shown up ten minutes later, leaping on her with gratifying delight.

“I wasn't actually talking to you,” said Meg. “But who else is there to talk to?”

The dog's interest was caught by a sound or smell undetectable to human senses. “So, go,” said Meg. “Just be sure to come back.”

*   *   *

She stood looking out the kitchen window while she tried to eat a sandwich. Maybe it had been a woman in her house after all. Who besides Angie would have been looking for the tape? But that didn't make sense, not if Meg's suspicions that someone had been in the house before then were accurate. Angie wouldn't have come into the house, gone through the medicine cabinet, removed dresser drawers, and searched the pantry. She would have gone directly to the toolshed, days before Meg discovered the tape there, and there would have been no tape for Meg to find. But if not Angie, then who? And why? The tape contained no useful information. What made it worth stealing?

The dog scratched on the door. “Want a sandwich?” asked Meg, opening the door. “I thought I did, but I don't particularly. We'll share.”

She put half of her lunch in the dog's bowl. Crouched on the floor, she thought of why the tape had been taken. Only she and the person who made it knew what was on it. Someone else knew only that it existed and feared it contained more information than it did. It was that someone else who had searched so diligently and, eventually, successfully.

The man on the tape had responded angrily to a suggestion that he had not waited for someone's death before helping himself to her property. He was probably angry because the suggestion was true. And the husky-voiced woman was not letting her suspicion of that fact stop her from benefiting from it.

One of two people—the unknown man or the unknown woman—had been in the house. At least, Meg thought, getting to her feet and leaning against the sink, whoever it was had no reason to bother with her or her house again. Luckily, she had hidden the tape in one of the few items of furniture that had been in the house all along. Only Angie herself would suspect that Meg even knew it existed. She let out her breath, aware of the luck involved in having hidden the tape in the couch, of having kept the couch in the first place instead of banishing it, with so many other things, to the Salvation Army store.

The Salvation Army store. The tape explained the break-in there, too. Her intruder had been looking for it before she ever moved in. Other than her uneasy feeling that it might have been her friend's husband who had frightened her in the night, the tape and whatever it suggested had nothing to do with her. Nothing at all.

Forget about it, she told herself, gazing across the driveway into the distance where the low mountains began. It's over. The worst part is the damage that's been done to a friendship, but maybe someday … Maybe someday Christine would tell her who Leslie McAlester was, and she'd be someone who dealt in intricately carved finials, not a husky-voiced conspirator, not a criminal of any sort.

*   *   *

“If your car's getting fixed today, I could run you over to Allentown after the game to get it.” Christine's offer was a friendly one, but her tone was distant, and her eyes were strangely flat. “Are you coming to the game?”

Meg held the kitchen door open. “Come in,” she said.

Christine shook her head. “No, thanks.”

“I'm coming to the game since I'm here after all, but the car won't be ready until near the end of the week.”

Christine nodded. “I'll be teaching, but if you need a ride, I'll work something out. Let me know.” She turned away, walked around her car to the open driver's door, and stood there with her hand on the frame. She looked back at Meg. “Why were the police here?” she asked. “And were you really not going to tell me about it?”

Meg stepped out onto the stoop and let the screen door bump shut behind her. She should have realized that a police car in a neighbor's driveway would cause comment.

“Of course I was going to tell you.” As soon as I decided it wasn't your husband in my house, she thought. “I had to call Sara and tell her I wasn't coming and call about the car and check to see if anything was missing and—”

“Why would anything be missing?”

“Somebody was in my house last night. I woke up and somebody was there.”

Christine lost her irritated look. “Who?”

“I don't know. I didn't ask. I just ran out the door and climbed a tree. Eventually he left and I came down. The police are sorry I was ‘startled.' They say if I lock my door, I won't be startled again.”

Christine rested her elbows on the roof of the car and looked stricken. “That's awful. I'm sorry I was pissy. So,
did
he take anything?”

“Not that I know of,” lied Meg.

*   *   *

The
Eroica
might help, especially the third movement. Meg inserted the cassette into the player and sat down with her feet on the coffee table. She leaned back and tried to stop moping. She closed her eyes. It was early in the evening, but she was so tired her bones felt heavy.

She'd stayed in the dugout for most of the afternoon's game, trying to remember to call out who was on deck and in the hole in time for them to quit swinging their heels against the fence behind the bench and get their helmets on. She wouldn't have had to go, having arranged for Suzanne's father to help out while she was in New York, but she'd thought it would be good to have something to think about besides odd noises in the night and the feeling of bark against her skin. It had helped, but not much. She knew her team had lost and that the score had been close, but she couldn't remember what it was. She was too tired to remember much of anything.

She would sleep better tonight. The hardware store in town had sent a man out to change the locks on both doors. The dog was at home. Whoever had broken in had no reason to come back.

Think about the music, she told herself. Pay attention to how inevitable each note seems to have been, once you've heard it. Don't think about the husky voice on the stolen tape, or what she said, or what she hinted at. There is nothing to be done about any of that, and it has nothing to do with you anyway.

It was useless. She could not concentrate on the music. What if she hadn't been so clumsy? What if she hadn't erased those few minutes? Could there have been something telling on that section, something that was now gone forever?

She opened her eyes and stared blankly at the opposite wall, a realization forming whole in her mind. The problem was not what she'd erased. The problem was that what replaced it was the sound of a coffeemaker and her own irritated, confused voice. Anyone who listened to the whole tape would know she had too.

The world shifted a few crucial degrees. It may have been true that the tape and what it suggested had only to do with her house, not with her. But it was no longer true. And the safety she'd been trying to convince herself she now enjoyed had fled.

Meg was frightened. She could wait and wonder how threatened the thief would be by realizing she had heard the tape. Or she could try to figure out who that person was.

*   *   *

People are likely to be home in the evening, thought Meg. So Leslie McAlester, whoever she was, might be at home, wherever that was.

She looked at the names on the computer screen, from the national directory on the Internet. There were only two McAlesters with the first name Leslie. She had printed out the longer list of those listed only as
L.

She pulled the phone toward her. The dog pushed against her leg and whined. “Do you want to go out?” asked Meg. “Or are you just trying to tell me you disapprove? I realize that loyalty is big with you. But if I don't do this, I can't live here anymore.”

Her tone was light, but she was sickeningly afraid that she was telling the literal truth. She began to dial, hoping she could pull off the deception she needed. Christine's the one who can lie so well on the phone, she thought, not me.

A woman answered.

“Is this Leslie McAlester?” asked Meg. It was. “Is this the Leslie McAlester connected with the, uh, Ruschman matter?”

She had no trouble believing Leslie McAlester's denial of any knowledge of what Meg might be talking about. This Leslie was at least seventy.

Meg apologized and hung up, then went through the same steps for the other name. Although the second Leslie's voice was that of a more likely candidate, she was mystified by Meg's inquiry. More indicative of true ignorance was the fact that the question seemed to bore her.

Meg started on the
L
's. She had made four calls before there was a positive response to her first question.

“Yes, speaking,” the woman said.

“Is this the Leslie McAlester involved in the Ruschman matter?”

“Excuse me, but who is asking?” replied the woman. Her voice was annoyed.

Meg spoke as coolly as she could. “This is Florence Harding,” she said. “Dan Ruschman's attorney. I wondered if I could talk with you about the situation.”

Leslie McAlester was brisk. “Why are you bothering me at home?”

Talk more! thought Meg. “I am ‘bothering you' at home because I work very long hours,” she said, letting irritation tinge her voice. “I'm sorry if it's inconvenient.”

The woman sighed. “Oh, never mind,” she said. “Ask away, though I really don't see how I could be any help. The situation has been taken care of, and I do not intend to take it any further. However, I don't care if you're Sandra Day O'Connor, neither you nor anyone else can make me do business with a thief, which Mr. Ruschman most certainly is. And tell your client that, if I have to put up with any more of this, I will reconsider my decision to drop the matter.”

Meg had heard enough. “Mr. Ruschman did not ask me to call,” she said. “I'm very sorry I bothered you. Thank you for your time. I won't call again.”

She hung up and looked across the room at the dog, who was lying in the corner watching her. “Don't look at me like that,” she said. “She lives in New York. That's close enough to visit here. It
could
have been her.”

But it wasn't. Leslie McAlester was not the woman on the tape. Did that mean Dan was not the man? Not necessarily. He was mixed up in something illegal, that much was clear. Did the illegal something involve Mrs. Ehrlich's estate?

“Oh, Christine,” she said, sighing heavily. “Where did Dan get fifteen thousand dollars?”

*   *   *

She sat in bed, reading and rereading the same page of
Dombey and Son.
There was too much conflict in the story; she needed something that would keep her from thinking about conflict. She got up and went into the kitchen, with the dog pattering behind her, let the water run into the sink until it turned cold, then bent her head and drank from the faucet. She pushed the curtains aside and opened the window, breathing in the cold night air and shivering. She closed the window. The curtains fell back into place, and she went to bed. It was hours before she slept.