Maybe she had a boyfriend who didn’t like her messing
around with him.”
“What about Mrs. Harris?”
“What about her? They split up, but that doesn’t mean
she hated him enough to do something like that.”
231
MARGARET MARON
“When did you last see her?”
“Maybe Christmas?” The housekeeper got up and
used a paper towel to clean a smudge on the window
glass over the sink. With her back to them, she said,
“She brought some presents for the children here and
she always remembers me at Christmas, too.”
“She was the one who actually hired you here, wasn’t
she?”
“That’s right.” A fingerprint on the front of the
stainless-steel refrigerator seemed to need her attention,
too.
“Mrs. Samuelson.”
“I’m listening. I can listen and work, too.”
He got up and went over to look down into her face.
“She was here the day he went missing, wasn’t she?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“A bunch of people saw her.”
She took a deep breath and came back to the table.
“All right. Yes. She was here that Monday, but there is
no way under God’s blue sky that she could have done
that awful thing.”
“She came to the house?”
Mrs. Samuelson gave a reluctant nod.
“What time?”
“I don’t know. He wasn’t in the house when I came
in that morning and I didn’t see his car, so I thought
he’d taken off. I figured she’d be coming over to bring
some stuff for the camp when the trucks came to move
most of the crew back to New Bern, and I reckon he
did, too. For all his big talk, she could always get the
best of him in an argument and anytime she was coming
to check up on things, he’d clear out.”
232
HARD ROW
She gestured to a door off the kitchen. “There’s a
little room in there with a television and a lounge chair
so I can take a rest without going out to my apartment.
I fixed lunch and then I went in to put my feet up for
a few minutes. Only I went to sleep. And when I woke
up, she was upstairs taking a shower.”
“She came all the way from New Bern to take a
shower?”
