they were really starving, and it couldn’t be more’n a day since the old lady died.”
“What happened to her?”
He shook his head. “Ah, it’s a sad story, sad indeed. Mr. Iannou was telling me.” He nodded toward the other old man who was now arguing with Mrs. Robinson and the cop. “He found her, you know. Lives next door, has lived there fifty years, and I daresay she’s never said more’n two words at a stretch to him. ’Good day’ — you know. Or Tine evening.’ But he kept an eye out for her, specially once that woman moved in and started on about the cats. Anyways, he realized he hadn’t seen her for two days. Regular as clockwork she was, letting the cats in and out, once in the morning, once in the evening. And today was her church morning. She never missed a morning service, not even in winter. But today, nothing. So he knocks on the door and all he hears is them cats squalling. So he calls the cops.”
Mrs. Robinson stamped past us back to her house. She was muttering, but I couldn’t quite hear what she said. I didn’t want to hear it.
“And?” I prompted the old fellow.
“And they break down the door. And they find her, at the bottom of the stairs. Fell she had, and died. Funny, though.”
“What?”
“Them stairs. Been years since those windows on the top floor been boarded up. Can’t imagine what she’d been doing going up there. Even I have some trouble with stairs these days. Moved my bed down to the dining room. Granddaughter says it’s a good thing I put in that first floor toilet when Martha took ill. Martha was my wife. Fifty-two years together we had. Fifty-two wonderful years. Are you married?”
“Granddad, what are you doing?” A young woman thrust herself in between me and the old man. In spite of her designer jeans and tailored cotton shirt, she was disheveled, almost frumpy. “It’s not just the boys I have to watch, but you too, is it?” she whined. “I go to lie down for just five minutes, and off you go. I’ve been looking all over the house. I should have realized you’d be out here with all the ghouls.” She sniffed angrily and glared at me. “Who are you? What do you want with my grandfather?”
“We were just talking,” I said.
“That’s no way to be speaking to a stranger, a lady at that,” the old man grumbled. “Didn’t your mother teach you better manners, girl?”
“Spare me the lecture.” She tugged at his arm. “And put that damn dog down. You’ll strain your back carrying him around.”
“He don’t weigh hardly anything,” the old man protested. He sighed, then did as she said.
“You’re coming home with me this minute. I bet you forgot your pills again, too, didn’t you? You know you’re supposed to take them at exactly three p.m., and it’s half-past already. You’re worse than the boys. A grown man you are, you ought to know better.”
“Don’t worry, girl, I’ll be all right this once. I had to say good-bye to Mrs. Baker now, didn’t I? She’s the last of the old ones to go. ’Cept me, of course, and with you looking out for me, I got no worries about that happening too soon, eh?” He chuckled, and gently patted her shoulder.
She flushed. “Oh, you.” She pushed his hand away and then clutched it. “You’ll be the death of me, you know.”
“Come on, then, let’s go take those pills. See what those scallywags of yours are up to.”
“Oh my god, the boys.” She dropped his hand and ran off, her sandals slapping the pavement.
“Your granddaughter?” I asked.
“She loves me.” The old man shook his head. “Don’t know why, but there it is. I let her boss me round some, but don’t take much notice of her tone. She can’t help it. She had bad luck with that man of hers, left her with two little ones and a third on the way. The baby’s two now, sweet little thing. She needed a home and I had that big old place, too big for me to keep up myself after the wife died. Family should stick together, eh? Well, I best be going before she’s out here after me with a frying pan.” He chuckled. “Got a temper that one has, just like her grandma. Come on then, Winston, old boy. Time to go home. Good-day.”
I was ready to leave as well. I turned to find my way blocked by the plainclothes officer with the scratched palm.
“Excuse me.” He was very polite. “May I have a word with you, ma’am?”
It was too late to pretend to be uninvolved, a passerby. Once again, my curiosity, like a cat’s, had caught me.
TWO
The cop smiled and flipped his badge. “I’m Detective Joe Gianelli. And you are?”
“Rosalie Cairns,” I said. “What happened in there?”
“You live around here?” he asked.
“I hate people who answer questions with questions,” I retorted.
“It’s my job,” he shrugged. “Let’s get the preliminaries over with, okay?”
I sighed and gave him the address, not just of my apartment here in the city, but of my house in the town where my husband lives and has his business.
“You’re separated?” He looked me up and down. From the way his eyes shifted from belligerence to attentive friendliness, I realized he must like what he saw. I wasn’t wearing my usual graduate school uniform of jeans and bulky sweater, but had dressed up for tea in my one good outfit: burgundy suede jacket over a white silk blouse and black linen slacks. He and I were about the same age, in our early forties, but he used dye to keep his thinning hair black while I ignore the gray that streaks through the mass of curls I still wear long and loose in spite of the aggravation it causes. I took up swimming this past year, an hour a day in the university pool. Trying to stuff all that hair into a bathing cap almost ruins the pleasure of competing against myself for more and more laps.
“No, not separated.” I answered curtly.
“Divorced, then?”
“No.”
“You work here? You commute?”
“It’s too far to commute. That’s why I have a place here. I’m in graduate school at York.” I searched in my bag for my spectacle case and switched from the oversize dark prescription lenses to my wire frames. The sudden brightness made me blink.
“What does he do? Your husband?”
“He’s a carpenter/contractor, renovates old houses, that kind of thing. He’s just started his company and can’t leave the business. I go home most weekends.”
“Who takes care of the kids? I assume you have kids.”
“I thought cops didn’t make assumptions,” I snapped. “And no, we have no kids.”
“So you’re all on your own here.”
My hand itched to slap the smirk from his face. I counted to ten — slowly. Losing my temper would only worsen matters. I took a deep breath
