Chapter Seventeen #2
“I think the consensus is that the baby was your aunt’s, but they need to rule out all other possibilities.
” He seemed to be choosing his words carefully.
“I think the true picture won’t begin to focus until the DNA results are back.
They are going to put a rush on those, so hopefully, it won’t be too much longer. ”
“So they think if I leave and go home I might not come back?”
“It just simplifies things if you’re already here. Once the results are back, I’m sure there will be more questions.”
“I appreciate your attempt at being diplomatic.”
Hal smiled. “I’ll let you know as soon as I hear something. It won’t be much longer, then you can go back to Pennsylvania.”
“Thanks for letting me tag along with you on your tour of the cabins.”
“What did you think of them?”
“I think they’re rustic and gave the campers that camping-in-the-wilderness feeling they were seeking.”
“Now who’s diplomatic.” He laughed. “I’ll call you as soon as I hear anything from Doc Steele. I don’t expect to have DNA for at least another week, but they might surprise me if things are slow at the lab this week.”
“You think things might be slow?”
“Not a chance. I was just trying to leave on a high note.”
Kit stood in the doorway and watched Hal until he was in his car and the car disappeared from view. She went inside and called, “Greta?”
“Be down in a minute.”
Kit’s boots were heavy and muddy, and now that she was inside, they were too hot.
She walked to the stairwell, sat on the bottom step, and untied the boots.
She silently apologized to Maxine for the muddy floor, which she promised she’d clean up before she left.
Better to let the mud dry than to smear it while it was wet.
Behind her, Greta clumped down the steps. “Well, things don’t look too bad up there, if you can overlook the powder they used to dust for fingerprints on everything.”
“Wonder whose they’ll find besides yours and mine,” Kit said. “And Maxine’s of course, but there’s no way of getting her prints to compare.”
“I think it’s safe to say that if the majority of the prints match, they’re Maxine’s. I did polish the furniture and generally clean up, but she lived here for so many years and touched every surface probably a thousand times.”
“I’m sure the techs who were here were smart enough to figure that out.”
“Well, this has been a week and a half, hasn’t it?”
Kit laughed and pointed out, “It’s been less than twenty-four hours.”
“Seems like a week. More than a week. I’m still not over it, Kit. Finding that poor thing wrapped up like that.” Greta sat next to Kit on the step, her eyes filled with tears. “It’s just wrong, whatever the reason it was left there.”
“I doubt we’ll ever know for certain what happened. But it was a pretty rough day.”
“Unless you want me to stick around to keep you company, I’m going to head home.”
“No, no. You go on. I’ll be going back to town soon myself. I appreciate that you were here with me through this. It would have been so much worse had I been here alone.”
“If I hadn’t been here, you’d have had no reason to be going through the blanket chest.” Greta frowned. “You know they wouldn’t let me take my quilt with me? The detective said she’d let me know when I could get it back. Why would they want that quilt?”
“I think they just want to keep everything that was in that chest together until they can figure things out.”
Greta snorted. “Yeah, well, I wish them well with that.”
“Why do you think my aunt wanted me to come here?”
Greta raised her eyes toward the ceiling. “Maybe to find what you’ve already found.”
“You mean the baby?”
“And whatever story it has to tell.”
Kit’s eyes narrowed. “Do you know more than what you’re saying?”
“I swear I do not. But maybe when the DNA results come back, we’ll get some answers.”
“You never knew Maxine to be pregnant?”
“No. But then again, I didn’t see her for months at a time, remember. Especially when I’d just had a baby of my own or when my mom got sick. But after Miles died, she got very strange. I told you, she only wanted to be with Barbie.”
“Are you sure you don’t know what happened between them?”
Greta shook her head adamantly. “Maxine never told me that she and Barbie had a falling-out.”
“Would you tell me if she had?”
“Not sure.” Greta got off the step and brushed the dust from her rear end. “I guess I’d have to decide if it would be good news or bad news for you. If it would hurt you—maybe not. But since I don’t know, I guess it’s moot.”
Greta put on her coat and looked around. “I didn’t have anything with me when I got here, did I?”
“No, but don’t you want to take that book you were reading with you? And the sweatshirt with the sailboat.” Kit found both in the living room.
“Thank you, honey. I’d have left them both.” Greta buttoned up her coat and took the book and the sweatshirt. “You be sure to call me if you hear anything from Hal or the state, okay?”
“I will. Promise.” Kit walked Greta to the door and opened it.
“You sure you don’t want me to wait for you?”
“Thank you, but no. I’ll be right behind you.”
Greta gave Kit a long hug, then toddled down the steps and made her way to her car. She waved after she opened the driver’s-side door, and again after she turned the car around to leave. Kit watched her drive away much as she’d watched Hal earlier.
Kit closed the door and stood in the quiet house that, just a few hours ago, had been the hub of so much activity. So many different law enforcement people had been coming and going all night, the silence was almost overwhelming. She could almost feel the house exhale.
She tried to remember what she’d been doing before the world went haywire.
Feeding Greta and trying to gain what information she could, but of course, that endeavor had ended in near chaos.
But she had come to understand why her aunt had liked Greta so much.
Once you got past her love of gossip and her fondness for a little drama, she was a warm and caring person.
In one sense, Kit had been sorry to see the woman leave.
The boxes of Maxine’s clothes were still in the front hallway, so she tucked them along the wall and looked at the stack of folded-up boxes leaning against the wall under the windows.
She grabbed one and went into the dining room, where she opened one drawer after another.
There were tablecloths and napkins stuffed in each one.
She realized she was not the right party to deal with all that.
The table linens, by rights, should be left to Beth, who loved creating tablescapes with pretty cloths and napkins and china, and Lord knew there was plenty of all that.
She should be given the opportunity to decide what she wanted to keep.
Kit closed the drawers and went into the kitchen.
There were used dishes on the counter, so she filled the sink with hot water and dish soap and began to wash what was there.
She’d poured in too much soap, so there were mounds of suds, so high and thick she couldn’t see beneath them.
For a few moments she played with the soapy drifts much the way she had when she was a child and her mother had let her wash a few dishes.
For those few moments, the unknown child and her problems with her husband disappeared.
When she realized the water had cooled, she finished the job she’d started out to do, then drained the sink.
She was almost finished drying the dishes when she realized she was exhausted. She’d hardly slept all night, having read for hours before nodding off briefly. Now would be a good time to go back to the inn and sleep off the horror of the previous day.
Miles’s book was where she’d left it, as were her bag and her coat. She bundled up and found the house keys at the bottom of her bag.
For a moment, she could swear she felt Maxine’s presence for the first time since she’d been there. It was almost as if finding and removing the child’s remains had unsettled her and set off a terrible disturbance in her spirit.
Kit stood in the open doorway, the key in her hand. “It’s all right, Maxine,” she called. “We’ll figure it out. I’ll make sure they bring back . . . whoever that is. I promise you.”
She locked the door and went down the steps and headed toward her car, not permitting herself to turn around or look in the direction of the house. The feeling of being watched was so strong, Kit was afraid she’d see Maxine’s face in an upstairs window.