Full dark,no stars

Not that anything had gone wrong; far from it. She didn’t think things could have gone better if she had planned her husband’s murder for months. If she had done that, she probably would have screwed it up by complicating things too much. Unlike for Bob, planning was not her forte.

There had been no hard questions. Her story was simple, believable, and almost true. The most important part was the solid bedrock beneath it: they had a marriage stretching back almost three decades, a good marriage, and there had been no recent arguments to mar it. Really, what was there to question?

The minister invited the family to step forward. They did so.

“Rest in peace, Pop,” Donnie said, and tossed a clod of earth into the grave. It landed on the shiny surface of the coffin. Darcy thought it looked like a dog turd.

“Daddy, I miss you so much,” Petra said, and threw her own handful of earth.

Darcy came last. She bent, took up a loose handful in her black glove, and let it fall. She said nothing.

The minister invoked a moment of silent prayer. The mourners bowed their heads. The wind rattled the branches. Not too far distant, traffic rushed by on I-295. Darcy thought: God, if You’re there, let this be the end. – 19 -

It wasn’t.

Seven weeks or so after the funeral-it was the new year now, the weather blue and hard and cold-the doorbell of the house on Sugar Mill Lane rang. When Darcy opened it, she saw an elderly gentleman wearing a black topcoat and red muffler. Held before him in his gloved hands was an old-school Homburg hat. His face was deeply lined (with pain as well as age, Darcy thought) and what remained of his gray hair was buzzed to a fuzz.

“Yes?” she said.

He fumbled in his pocket and dropped his hat. Darcy bent and picked it up. When she straightened, she saw that the elderly gentleman was holding out a leather-cased identification folder. In it was a gold badge and a picture of her caller (looking quite a bit younger) on a plastic card.

“Holt Ramsey,” he said, sounding apologetic about it. “State Attorney General’s Office. I’m sorry as hell to disturb you, Mrs. Anderson. May I come in? You’ll freeze standing out here in that dress.”

“Please,” she said, and stood aside.

She observed his hitching walk and the way his right hand went unconsciously to his right hip-as if to hold it together-and a clear memory rose in her mind: Bob sitting beside her on the bed, her cold fingers held prisoner by his warm ones. Bob talking. Gloating, actually. I want them to think Beadie’s dumb, and they do. Because they’re dumb. I’ve only been questioned a single time, and that was as a witness, about two weeks after BD killed the Moore woman. An old guy with a limp, semi-retired. And here that old guy was, standing not half a dozen steps from where Bob had died. From where she had killed him. Holt Ramsey looked both sick and in pain, but his eyes were sharp. They moved quickly to the left and right, taking in everything before returning to her face.

Be careful, she told herself. Be oh so careful of this one, Darcellen.

“How can I help you, Mr. Ramsey?”

“Well, one thing-if it’s not too much to ask-I could sure use a cup of coffee. I’m awfully cold. I’ve got a State car, and the heater doesn’t work worth a darn. Of course if it’s an imposition…”

“Not at all. But I wonder… could I see your identification again?”

He handed the folder over to her equably enough, and hung his hat on the coat tree while she studied it.

“This RET stamped below the seal… does that mean you’re retired?”

“Yes and no.” His lips parted in a smile that revealed teeth too perfect to be anything but dentures. “Had to go, at least officially, when I turned sixty-eight, but I’ve spent my whole life either in the State Police or working at SAG-State Attorney General’s Office, you know-and now I’m like an old firehorse with an honorary place in the barn. Kind of a mascot, you know.”

I think you’re a lot more than that.

“Let me take your coat.”

“No, nope, I think I’ll wear it. Won’t be staying that long. I’d hang it up if it was snowing outside-so I wouldn’t drip on your floor-but it’s not. It’s just boogery cold, you know. Too cold to snow, my father would have said, and at my age I feel the cold a lot more than I did fifty years ago. Or even twenty-five.”

Leading him into the kitchen, walking slowly so Ramsey could keep up, she asked him how old he was.

“Seventy-eight in May.” He spoke with evident pride. “If I make it. I always add that for good luck. It’s worked so far. What a nice kitchen you have, Mrs. Anderson-a place for everything and everything in its place. My wife would have approved. She died four years ago. It was a heart attack, very sudden. How I miss her. The way you must miss your husband, I imagine.”

His twinkling eyes-young and alert in creased, pain-haunted sockets-searched her face.

He knows. I don’t know how, but he does.