and she knew that the girl had hated it and would not have placed it here herself. In it she was pretty and honey-skinned, her brushed hair catching the light. Bright-green eyes and a young woman’s mouth of glossed lips and white teeth, and nothing in that face to convey a heart with so much in it, so bursting and hungry and bruised and defiant, so alive!
The brush and comb set were not silver as in her dreams but fake tortoiseshell and when she lifted the brush she saw no hairs and when she put it to her nose it smelled of nothing but the synthetic bristles. Brand-new.
Inside the wooden box was a stash of jewelry: silver and gold and colored stones all in a rich jumble. She chose an antique-looking silver ring and slipped it over her knuckle, admired it against the pale skin, slipped it off again and lowered the box lid without a sound.
The floorboards popped and the door hinges creaked and she stepped into the hallway and stood at the head of the stairs looking down, listening. He would’ve heard the floorboards, the hinges, would’ve come to the stairs and called up to her, or by some other means let her know of his presence, but he did not and she knew she was alone in the house.
The bathroom looked like a bathroom in a hotel: not a thing in it to indicate a man had used it even once. Pale-blue towels folded and stacked largest to smallest on the counter. A new tube of toothpaste and a toothbrush still in its packaging placed beside an empty glass. A pink razor in its packaging next to ladies’ shaving cream. Ladies’ deodorant. New bar of soap in the wire rack under the shower head, matching bottles of shampoo and conditioner.
There was a bolt on the door and it popped cleanly into its socket.
She pulled the flannel shirt over her head like a dress and stripped off the heavy socks and stepped out of the panties and stood looking at the creature in the mirror. White as bones. Thin as bones but for the fat purple club at the end of one arm.
She’d have stood under that showerhead forever, just forever, but she didn’t want to use up his hot water, and at last she shut off the valves and ran the largest towel over her skin and made sure the bottoms of her feet were dry before she stepped on the bath mat. Then, with the towel wrapped around her, she peered into the hallway and listened again—not a sound, not even a light on downstairs that she could see—and then she scooted back to the bedroom, her dirty clothes clutched to her chest, and shut the door behind her.
42
He crossed into Iowa on the 52 and twenty minutes later he found the building on Main Street and there was an open space out front and he took it. It was just 2:15, a cold and gray Wednesday afternoon in Iowa, as it was in Minnesota.
Her fever had broken and she’d opened her eyes long enough to see him sitting there beside the bed, and he’d told her he’d be back in a couple of hours, and she’d nodded and shut her eyes again and was asleep before he’d stood up. He didn’t like leaving her alone in the house like that, but the fever had broken and she was going to be all right and he couldn’t wait any longer.
He went up the steps and opened the glass door and stepped into a large room. There were four wooden desks and only one of them manned—a young deputy on the phone, looking Gordon over and holding his forefinger in the air.
“Yes, ma’am,” the deputy said into the handpiece. “I don’t blame you one bit, ma’am.”
Gordon stepped up to the desk.
“Yes, ma’am, I’ll let him know the second he gets back. You have a good day, ma’am.” The deputy hung up the phone and shook his head and looked up at Gordon. “Afternoon, sir. What can I do for you?” The ID on his pocket flap said dep. kurt short. Gordon read it twice to be sure.
“I need to speak to the sheriff.”
“All right. I bet I can help you out. Did you want to report something?” He fetched a form and readied his pen.
“No, I just need to speak to the sheriff. Is he here?”
“’Fraid not. He’s out on a call.”
“How long.”
“Sir?”
“How long will he be