Chương 6
“Dad.”
Michael crouched.
“What?”
“The lady wasn’t tall.”
“Grandma isn’t tall.”
“Celia is.”
Margaret said, “Celia and I are almost the same height.”
Ethan considered her.
“No.”
“What?”
“You’re bigger.”
A dangerous silence followed.
Michael looked at the ceiling.
Claire stared at the carpet.
Margaret’s eyes narrowed.
“Do you mean taller?”
“Yes.”
“Then say taller.”
“You knew what I meant.”
Michael made a choking sound.
Margaret pointed toward the hall.
“You are going to breakfast.”
“I already had breakfast.”
“You drank half an inch of orange juice.”
“How do you know?”
“I know everything in this house.”
The statement settled strangely.
No one laughed.
Margaret heard it too.
Her hand fell.
“Apparently,” she said, “not everything.”
The police arrived at eight fourteen.
Two uniformed officers came first, followed by Detective Lena Torres from the county property-crimes unit because Daniel had reported a suspected theft involving foundation records and possible impersonation. Torres was in her forties, wore a charcoal jacket over a pale blue shirt, and had the calm, faintly impatient manner of someone accustomed to wealthy people explaining why ordinary procedures should not apply to them.
She took one look at the locked-down mansion and said, “Open the exterior doors.”
Margaret objected.
Torres looked at her.
“Unless someone is under arrest, nobody is being detained in your home.”
Margaret’s face hardened.
“Someone who may have committed a felony is inside.”
“Maybe. And if I want someone prevented from leaving, I’ll handle it.”
Michael watched his mother lose that argument.
Claire suspected he enjoyed it slightly.
Margaret suspected the same.
The doors were unlocked.
People were told they could leave after providing names and contact information, although most staff remained voluntarily because their belongings and cars were still being checked for the missing folder.
Torres separated the witnesses.
Claire hated that part.
She sat in the library while an officer asked her to repeat exactly what had happened. The story sounded less convincing each time it became sentences.
There was a shoe.
A child claimed his grandmother had worn it.
The grandmother denied it.
A folder was missing.
A wig was found.
An assistant had been fired.
A secretary had disappeared.
Claire could hear how neatly suspicion arranged itself around the wrong facts.
When the officer asked about her employment, she answered.
Eight months.
Live-out.
Five days a week.
Occasional evenings.
Access to most ground-floor rooms, not Margaret’s private office or west study unless instructed.
No criminal history.
No relationship with any foundation employees beyond work.
“Any financial problems?”
Claire looked at him.
“Compared to Margaret Hale?”
He did not smile.
She rubbed her forehead.
“Sorry.”
“Do you have financial problems?”
“I have bills.”
“Anything urgent?”
“Everybody’s bills are urgent when they arrive.”
“Ms. Bennett.”
“No.”
That was mostly true.
Her car needed a new transmission sooner than she could afford one. Her rent had risen eighty dollars in January. She had seven hundred and twelve dollars in savings and a dental appointment she had rescheduled twice.
None of that made her a thief.
But she could feel the shape of how such facts might look inside someone else’s notebook.
“Did you know about the contents of the west-study safe?”
“No.”
“Did you know there was a safe?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“I’ve been in the room.”
“When?”
She explained.
He wrote.
“Did you know the service passage connected to it?”
“No.”
“Did you know Margaret Hale owned multiple similar burgundy dresses?”
Claire almost laughed.
“I knew she owned burgundy dresses.”
“How many?”
“I don’t inventory her clothes.”
The officer finally smiled.
Then he asked, “Why did Ethan Hale trust you when he was frightened?”
Claire’s humor disappeared.
“I don’t know.”
“Does he usually?”
“He’s six.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
She looked toward the closed library door.
“He trusts whoever listens at the right moment.”
The officer studied her.
“Did his father listen?”
“Eventually.”
“His grandmother?”
“Eventually.”
“And you?”
Claire thought of Ethan telling her twice not to clean the shoe.
“No,” she said. “Not at first.”
Across the house, Ethan was being interviewed with Michael present.
Torres insisted on keeping the questions simple and avoiding repetition.
Michael discovered, to his discomfort, that his son remembered far more than anyone expected.
The person in the burgundy dress had come downstairs at approximately six forty because Ethan had heard the grandfather clock strike once after “the cartoon with the blue dog ended.” Michael checked the streaming history on the breakfast-room television. The episode had ended at 6:37.
The person carried something black.
“Bag?” Torres asked.
“No.”
“Folder?”
“No.”
“Phone?”
“No.”
“Can you show me the shape?”
Ethan held his hands roughly twelve inches apart.
“Like this.”
“A box?”
“Flat.”
“A tablet?”
He shook his head.
“Book?”
“Maybe.”
“Did you see where it went?”
“Under the dress.”
Michael looked at Torres.
She kept her face neutral.
“You saw the person put it under the dress?”
“No. It was there when she came out.”
“Where?”
Ethan touched his side under the suspender.
Torres wrote something.
“What happened next?”
“She saw me.”
“How do you know?”
“She stopped.”
“Did you see her face?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Hair.”
“The wig?”
“Hair was here.”
He placed both hands beside his cheeks.
“Covering the face?”
He nodded.
“What did you do?”
“Nothing.”
“Were you scared?”
“No.”
Michael watched his son’s fingers twist together.
Torres saw it too.
“You don’t have to be scared.”
“I wasn’t.”
“Okay.”
“She was scared.”
“Who?”
“The fake Grandma.”
Torres leaned forward.
“How could you tell?”
“She dropped the shoe.”
Michael straightened.
“You said you didn’t see it come off.”
Ethan looked at him.
“You asked if I saw it come off by the table.”
Michael stopped.
Torres glanced between them.
“Where did it come off?”
“By the little door.”
“What happened to it?”
“She picked it up.”
“Then how did it end up in the foyer?”
“I don’t know.”
That seemed to frustrate him more than any question so far.
Torres said, “That’s fine.”
May you like
“It’s not.”
“It can be. You’re allowed not to know things.”
