Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 122, Nos. 3 & 4. Whole Nos. 745 & 746, September/October 2003

At one o’clock, Mary brought him sandwiches and a bottle of beer. “Thanks,” Thomas said. He had taken his shirt off again. Dirt was embedded in the cracks of his hands, and concrete dust around his nails. He could have washed up with water from the hose, but he figured this was part of what Mary wanted to see: dirty, sweaty man eating lunch. It was something for her to chew on while the old man was away — or three feet under. Thomas still was not sure what to think.

Mary sat with him while he ate. “You’re coming along well,” she said. “Although it doesn’t look like you had to move the holes around much.”

“It wasn’t as bad as I thought.” Then Thomas decided to try a risky gambit. He figured when he asked her this, two things could happen: She would tell him a lie, or she would tell him to get off her property. Thomas was not averse to gambling. “So how long will your husband be gone?” he asked.

She surprised him. When she started standing up, he figured that was the end of the job. But all she said was, “I’m not sure. He tends to get buried in his work.” Then she went inside again.

The sandwiches stoked Thomas up for the afternoon. In all the holes but one, he filled the Sonotubes three feet deep with concrete. The one with the body at the bottom he just filled with loose earth and put a skin of concrete on top, about two inches thick and easy to lift out. Then he set carport saddles in each of the footings, using a length of two-by-two to make sure they were level. That done, he cleaned up the site again and went to tell Mary he was going.

“And you won’t be back tomorrow, you said.”

“Right. Till it cures. I’ll start building on Friday.”

“Would you like some supper?” she asked.

That took Thomas by surprise, but he made a decision then and there. If that was her husband’s body positioned to support part of the deck — and Thomas had no reason to think it wasn’t — then he had no reason to fear that their meal would be interrupted.

He smiled at her. “Sure,” he said. “I could use a bite.”

The conversation over dinner covered all the bases Thomas had expected. His plan had been to reveal as much truth as seemed prudent and to make up the rest. It was strained at first. Thomas was not used to sitting on a carved wooden chair in a fancy dining room, dealing with more than one fork, drinking wine from cut glass.

“It’s been some time since I saw a tablecloth that wasn’t plastic,” Thomas said. He’d meant it to sound joking, but from Mary’s reaction it must have come out wrong.

“Relax,” she said. “There’s nothing to worry about now.”

Gradually, he did begin to feel easier. He found himself telling more than he had intended about his life and the many things that, like napkin rings and champagne flutes, he had left behind.

Some of her questions bordered on rude, but Thomas had learned long ago not to take things personally. “You’re not a derelict, though?”

He laughed. “I suppose I could have been. But I don’t drink enough for that, I’m not crazy, I bathe regularly, and I shave most mornings. I have a fixed address, even if it’s only a rooming house.”

“How would you like to change that?” she asked. It took a moment for her meaning to sink in.

The next morning, Thomas went out back to check his work. The concrete was curing nicely and all the footings were still level, even the fake one. He had been concerned about how that might fare, but it looked as good as the rest.

Thomas was surprised by how the night had gone, though less by Mary’s invitation that they spend it together than by the things he had told her. In the darkness, more small truths long held private had slipped free.

At the same time, he had not been able to get much information from Mary about her life. He had learned that her husband’s name was Dennis Cuthbertson, who had inherited a lot of money and made still more with some on-line ventures. Right now, Mary claimed Dennis was away exploring the possibilities of a gold mine in Malaysia. Thomas figured that was as good a story as any.

The amount of Dennis in the house was what struck Thomas most as he sat in the dining room — or, for that matter, any other room. Dennis’s presence could be felt everywhere. There were pictures of him in every room, on the mantel above every fireplace, on every bookcase, on every dressing table and nightstand. In all the framed images, there was something artificially sleek about Dennis, and Thomas wondered if he’d had face work done.

In one large room with floor-to-ceiling windows on three sides, the photos of Dennis sat on a baby grand — or, anyway, what Thomas took to be a baby grand. He was not sure he had ever seen one. The house was full of things like that: things that poor people did not own and rich people probably did not use — at least not for anything more than a fancy picture stand.