Homicide My Own - Anne Argula [44]
“Yes, of course. I’m sorry. I’m a little…”
“I understand. You weren’t expecting this.”
“No…I wasn’t.”
She opened the door wide, holding back a little black and white terrier. We went into her house.
“You caught me by surprise,” she said, “the house is a mess.”
“Are you kidding?” I said. “You should see mine. You’ve got a lovely house here.”
“Thank you. Please, sit down.”
She sat on the edge of the settee, a little nervous, and with some difficulty. She was in her early seventies and might have had some ostioporosis, but her eyes were bright and she had a healthy complexion.
Odd sat in a wide-armed tattered overstuffed chair, which had to have been the favorite of the man of the house, now deceased, and he smiled a broad smile that neither he nor any of his Swedish forebearers had ever even known was possible. Had I seen it on the streets of Spokane I would have thought someone was trying to start something.
He was home again.
The old lady smiled back at him.
The terrier jumped up on Odd’s lap and snuggled in.
“Oh, Otis,” she admonished the dog. “Just shoo him if he bothers you.”
“It’s all right.”
“Dogs like him,” I said.
“Some people have that,” said she. “Jeannie was that way, dogs, cats, fawns… Would you like some cocoa?”
“Maybe later,” said Odd.
Do the math. He had it all right, batting a thousand.
“Well, then…” She waited for us to explain ourselves, but Odd seemed content just to sit and look at her. I would have to start the ball rolling, and of all places to start, I don’t know what possessed me to ask, “Mrs. Olson, did your daughter Jeannie ever have trouble sleeping?”
It startled her.
“Yes, especially the last few years…we were worried about it. When she was twelve she started thrashing in her sleep. Her bed in the morning was a tangle of sheets and blankets. But she never seemed aware of it when she awoke, so I thought maybe she was going through a growth spurt or something and it would pass. It was about the time her periods started.”
“”Really?”
“Why in the world do you ask?”
“If you could just indulge us…”
“I really don’t understand why you’re here,” she said.
I told her, in broad strokes, why we had come to Shalish Island, and how we came to stay longer than we had anticipated. How Odd was drawn to the picture of Jeannie and James on the wall of the tribal police headquarters, and how one question led to another, until we began, that is, Odd began to have certain insights into what might have occurred, that is, details about how it occurred. I didn’t tell her what those details were, or how he came to have insight into them, or that we had a perp and a perv outside in our car. I had to leave something for Odd to tell her.
“Daddy took it hard, didn’t he?” Odd asked her.
“Daddy?”
“Jeannie’s daddy. He took it very hard.”
“He was the third victim of that, really,” she said. “Every evening he would wash the car, treat the rubber, the leather, polish the chrome…every evening. It’s all he could do. It was a ‘65 Mustang that he had planned to give to Jeannie for her graduation, that she could take with her to college. Then he would pull it into the garage and hose down the driveway until not a leaf or a pebble or a twig remained. We had the only spotless driveway on the island. One evening after he did all that, he sat down on the wet driveway and died.”
“I’m sorry he had to go through so much suffering,” said Odd. “But it’s over now.”
“Yes, yes, it is.”
“Jimmy’s parents think Karl Gutshall is responsible,” I said.
“I know they do, but I just can’t imagine Karl doing such a thing. He was broken hearted when Jeannie broke up with him, yes, but he would never hurt her like that. If you ask me, he’s another victim.”
“Do you have any ideas who might have done it?” I asked.
“No, none at all. Everyone just loved to be in her presence. She had a glow that everyone wanted to be within. This island has never been the same without her, and that’s not just because I was her