Tips for Living(72)
“Those boxes aren’t difficult to open. Any one of a number of basic tools can do it.”
He looked at the Swiss Champ in my hand. We both did. I slipped it into my robe pocket.
“Ms. Glasser, you’re trembling.”
“Am I? It is chilly in here. I need to light the woodstove,” I said, and wrapped my arms around myself.
“We wondered if you’d seen or heard anything unusual on the property between say October eighteenth, the last meter reading, and November fourteenth, the night before the murders.”
As far as I knew, there hadn’t been anyone else on the property besides the mailman and me.
“No.”
“Since you’re the closest neighbor, I was hoping you might have seen something.”
Roche’s eyes bored into mine. I blinked first, and he cracked a triumphant smile.
“Well, thanks for your time. Give me a call if you have second thoughts. Even the smallest detail can be helpful.”
He rose from the chair and started for the door.
“Detective?”
He stopped.
“If possible, I’d like to have my phone and computer back, please.”
He didn’t even bother to turn.
“We’d like to hold on to them.”
As soon as the police car was out of the driveway, I unpacked my new pink Acer Aspire computer, set it up and did a Google search. There were at least fifteen entries on the subject. Turns out you don’t even need a tool to open a lockbox. One video on YouTube showed how to pop it with a paper clip in less than a minute.
Chapter Seventeen
“Yvonne!”
I sprinted down the hall, dodging the empty wheelchairs and gurneys lined up against the wall. A bright-yellow-and-black-striped turban bobbed near the nurses’ station like some sort of cartoon bumblebee.
“Whoa. Put on the brakes, girl,” Yvonne said, raising her palm traffic-cop style as I closed in on her.
“How is she?” I said between huffs.
“She okay. The doctor’s gone, but he says your auntie gonna be fine. No worries.”
She wrapped herself around me in a big bear hug, and my nose bumped one of her bracelet-size hoop earrings. After a few pats on the back, she released me. I must’ve still looked shell-shocked because she grabbed my shoulders and shook.
“She be fine. You hear?”
I nodded. “So, what happened, exactly?”
Yvonne took my arm and headed for the row of plastic chairs across the hall. She plunked herself onto one and patted the seat next to her. I sat down.
“It was eight o’clock when I went up to give her your number like I said I would, I hear her yelling inside. But she don’t answer the door. I get security to open up, and we find her in the tub shakin’ from cold. Too weak to stand up. ‘Why you don’t let out the cold water and fill it with hot?’ I ask her. But her mind not thinkin’ right. So she freezin’ in there. Doctor says she had a ministroke. Lucky she didn’t catch pneumonia, too. The doctor be here in the morning.”
I leaned back and blew out a long breath. “The stroke. How bad?”
“Not so bad. I say three out of ten, if ten be dead.”
I prayed “three out of ten” didn’t translate into a permanent disability.
“But she also dehydrated. That’s why her mind fuzzy.” Yvonne shook her head in disbelief. “She sittin’ there in a tub full of water, dehydrated.”
“Thank you for staying, Yvonne. Let me pay you something, please.” I fumbled for my wallet, but she put her hand on mine.
“You goin’ through bad times. Spend it on yourself or your auntie.”
She gathered her black patent leather coat and matching purse from the chair on her other side and stood up.
“Show this girl some love, Marie,” she instructed the young night nurse who’d been eavesdropping from behind the counter. “She gettin’ beat up by the world this week.” She turned back to me and tilted her head. “You have somewhere to go for the holiday?”
Thanksgiving. I hadn’t given a thought to Thanksgiving. It was coming up the next week. Between Lada’s condition and my precarious legal situation, I couldn’t imagine making plans for the holiday. I might be spending it in the hospital or in jail.
“I haven’t figured that out yet.”
“You both welcome at my house,” Yvonne offered.
“Thank you. That’s very kind. Can I let you know?”
“No worries. Unless you’re one of those Tofurky people. I can’t help you with that. But we ordered a big bird. We got enough to feed Macy’s parade, the New York Knicks and whoever. You just call me.”
She squeezed my arm and then sashayed down the hall toward the exit door. I looked after her, touched that she would offer to share her holiday with us. The harsh reality I was facing softened for a moment.
Night nurse Marie gave me a sympathetic look and directions to Lada’s room. Finding it was easy—the clinic was small—only ten rooms to a floor. The top of a medical chart labeled “Levervitch” stuck out of the plastic holder outside on the wall. I opened the door a crack, hesitating. The overhead lights had been turned off and the curtains drawn. What shape would she be in?
My stomach rolled as I stepped cautiously into the darkened room, leaving the door half open so I wouldn’t have to turn on the lights. Lada had fallen asleep propped up on her pillows. A beeping monitor tracked her vital signs. She looked like Yoda—the bald spots on her scalp showing through unkempt wisps of hair. They’d clipped an oxygen tube under her nose, and she had a bruise blossoming on the pale, thin skin around the IV stuck in her skinny forearm. The bones in her wrist seemed as delicate as bird bones.