Old World Murder - Kathleen Ernst [72]
No luck.
A passing car sprayed a fan of water over the lawn. Chloe retraced her soggy steps and frowned at the front door indecisively. Should she leave? But what if Mr. Solberg was ill? I take seven different medications, he’d said. She suddenly felt a chill that had nothing to do with the rain.
She put a tentative hand on the doorknob. It turned easily. She cracked the door open. “Mr. Solberg?” she hollered. “It’s me, sir. Chloe Ellefson.”
No answer but rain drumming on the roof. She pushed the door open wider, called again. No response. She imagined him lying on the floor, paralyzed by a stroke or fall, alone and unable to call for help. “Oh, God,” she whispered, and stepped inside.
“Mr. Solberg?” she yelled. “Mr. Solberg!” No answer but the muffled raindrops. She quickly scanned the living room: floor lamp burning by an easy chair, a Zane Grey novel left open on the floor, what looked to be a talk show flickering in black and white on a small television.
Chloe hurried from room to room. Dining room: table piled with old magazines and a half-finished jigsaw puzzle. Kitchen: dirty saucepan waiting in the sink, porcelain canisters shaped like Dalmatian puppies. No Mr. Solberg.
Calling his name, her wet sandals slapping, she ran up the stairs. One bedroom: neatly made bed, large photograph of a gray-haired woman on the dresser. No Mr. Solberg. Second bedroom: a lifetime’s accumulation of stuff crammed in bushel baskets and suitcases and old beer cartons. No Mr. Solberg. Bathroom: blue towels and shower curtain. No Mr. Solberg.
Don’t over-react, she told herself as she slapped back down the stairs. The man probably went to visit a neighbor.
And left his television on? I never turn the darned thing on during the day, he’d said when she’d called.
Oh, God.
Chloe plunged back into the streaming gray afternoon. She ran down the steps and across the yard to Mrs. Lundquist’s house. Her shorts plastered themselves to her thighs and her bare arms prickled with goose bumps. She slowed to climb the front steps, past the geraniums in their tubs. They were almost dead now, brittle skeletons bobbing angrily from the force of the rain.
Chloe shivered as she put her palm on the doorknob. It too turned easily. She eased it open, moving slowly now, silently. She stepped inside—and staggered backward from the slam of negative energy that had replaced her earlier perceptions of quiet calm in this house. “Oh, God,” she whimpered, her heart thumping beneath her ribs.
She took one step and looked first to her right, into the kitchen. Nothing. Then she looked to her left.
It was the soles of his shoes that caught her eye, scuffed and oddly visible. The soles were attached to sturdy black lace-ups, the kind elderly men wear. Chloe took another step and she saw ankles in dark socks. Then gray trousers.
Legs, she told herself numbly. Legs jutted from behind the desk.
Two more steps and she shuddered violently, pressing a hand over her mouth. She closed her eyes, but it was too late; she’d already seen Mr. Solberg lying on the floor, the back of his head a bloody mess.
Three hours later, Roelke found Chloe sitting in the lobby of the Dane County Sheriff’s office. She’d pulled her heels up and wrapped her arms around her legs and rested her cheek on her knees. Roelke felt something give way inside, something he’d have to think about later.
“Chloe,” he said. She lifted her head. “You’re all through here?”
She nodded.
“Then let’s go.” He took her hand and led her to his truck. The rain had given way to a muggy afternoon.
“Thank you for coming,” she said, as he pulled out of the parking lot.
“I’m glad you called.”
“My parents