TWO
DESPITE THE SHERIFF’S repeated reference to Lorena Bedford’s “big ole house,” Susan’s first sight of it through the trees was a shock. Classic Greek Revival in style, its graceful columns soared from the porch to the roof of the second story. The structure was situated at the end of a long, unpaved driveway, bordered by two perfectly spaced rows of oaks, strands of picturesque Spanish moss hanging from their low branches.
She slowed the car as she made the turn onto the property. The rays of the dying sun touched the white paint with gold and shimmered off the glass of the front windows. The house looked like some Hollywood producer’s fantasy of the antebellum South.
As she approached, reality was less kind. There were areas of flecked paint on the Doric columns, and the side veranda was devoid of furniture. The foundation plantings were neatly trimmed, however, and the grass, although not closely mown, was still, despite the season, thick and green.
The driveway circled around a garden, which had been planted directly in front of the steps leading up to the front door. A few of the small old-fashioned roses that comprised most of it were, surprisingly, still in bloom.
She pulled her car parallel to the steps and shut off the engine. Before she got out, she sat a moment in the twilight stillness. The murmur of insects could be heard from the surrounding woods. There were no other sounds. No traffic out on the two-lane she’d followed here. Not even the small-town noises she’d been aware of in the hours she’d spent in Linton.
She opened her door, stepping out again into the heat and humidity. She had discarded the jacket to her navy linen suit before she and Adams had gone down to the river. She thought about retrieving it from the back seat and then decided the temperature should preclude any such attempt at formality.
She brushed her hands over the wrinkles on the front of her skirt, deciding that, too, was a lost cause. Miz Lorena would just have to take her—or leave her—as she was.
Her keys still in the ignition, she walked around the front of the car and climbed the steps. Her heels echoed as she crossed the wooden boards of the porch.
The front door was open, probably as a concession to the late-afternoon heat. She tapped on the molding of the screen door, the sound echoing down the inside hallway she could see only dimly. She waited, politely looking at the roses beyond her car rather than watching for someone to answer her knock.
After a few moments without any response, she turned back to the door. She could hear no movement from inside the house. She cupped the outside of her hand against the screen, peering in under her arched palm.
Was it possible no one was home, despite the open door? Of course, the screen might be latched. Maybe this far out of town that was considered protection enough against intruders. She touched its frame, pulling the door toward her just enough to determine that it wasn’t fastened.
She let the screen slip back into place and again tapped on its molding. Although she tried to apply more force than before, the resulting sound didn’t seem appreciably louder.
This time she watched the hallway as she waited. Again there was no response.
She should have phoned before she drove out. The sheriff hadn’t suggested that, and, as he apparently had, she’d assumed the old woman would be home.
Despite the fact that the hotel in town had closed, she had noticed a café on the square. She could drive back into Linton, look up the Bedford number and place a call from there. Actually, she would probably be wise to have dinner in town, she realized. Even if Miz Lorena agreed to rent her a room, the sheriff hadn’t said she would also be willing to provide meals.
Decision made, Susan crossed the porch and descended the front steps. Her hand had already closed around the handle to the car door when a creak announced the opening of the screen.
Her eyes were drawn back to the porch. Since her arrival the daylight had faded enough that, under the overhang of the second-floor balcony, the area was now as dark as the interior hallway had been. She could see a figure in the open doorway, but little else.
“Mrs. Bedford?”
“She’s not here.” The voice was masculine, its accent not local, and its tone decidedly unwelcoming.
“Could you tell me when she’ll be back?”
The pause after her question stretched far past politeness. So much for Southern hospitality.
“That depends on who wants to know.”
Susan controlled a spurt of anger at the man’s rudeness, acknowledging most of that was due to emotional exhaustion rather than his treatment of her request. After all, she’d shown up here without so much as a phone call asking permission.
Mrs. Bedford’s house was no longer a commercial establishment. It was someone’s home. And she needed a favor from the owner. Whoever this was, he might be able to exert some influence in that direction.
“My name is Susan Chandler.” She tried to make her voice as pleasant as possible, considering the circumstances. As she talked, she walked back around the front of the car and headed toward the steps. “I had hoped Mrs. Bedford might rent me a room for a few days. I’m aware she’s no longer in business—”
“Then why ask to rent a room?”
He had apparently turned on a light in the front of the house as he’d come to the door. His body was silhouetted against its glow, wide shoulders almost filling the frame.
Looking up at him from the foot of the steps, Susan’s impression was that he was also taller than average. In spite of the width of his shoulders, his torso narrowed to a lean waist and slim hips. She could still see nothing of his face.
“Because Sheriff Adams suggested I ask her. It’s…”
She let the sentence trail. She might have been willing to try and explain her compulsion to stay in town to another woman, but something about this man’s attitude made her doubt he would sympathize with anything she might say.
“It’s what?”
“Are you a relative of Mrs. Bedford’s? Or…”
A guest? The yardman? As she tried to settle on a second option, he made the process unnecessary.
“You seem to have a proclivity for unfinished sentences.”
Obviously not the hired help. Not unless handymen were better educated down here than she was accustomed to. And just as obviously determined to be rude.
“My husband’s body was pulled from the river here two days ago,” she said, deciding she had nothing to lose by a matching bluntness. “I need a place to stay until the coroner can tell me how he ended up there.”
The silence stretched longer this time. In the few minutes she’d been here, the night creatures had joined the insect chorus, the combined noises the only sound for several seconds.
“I’m Jeb Bedford. Lorena is my great-aunt,” he said. “At the moment I’m also her guest—a paying one, in case you were wondering.”
She hadn’t been. She didn’t give a damn about whatever arrangements he had with
