asks.
‘About what you’d expect,’ the other says. ‘We got quite a few white hairs from the tub, not unusual considering that’s where the old lady highsided it. There was also excrement in the tub, but just a trace. Also as you would expect.’ Off Hodges’s questioning look, the tech adds, ‘She was wearing continence pants. The lady did her homework.’
‘Oough,’ Holly says.
The first tech says, ‘There’s a shower chair, but it’s in the corner with extra towels stacked on the seat. Looks like it’s never been used.’
‘They would have given her sponge baths,’ Holly says.
She still looks grossed out, either by the thought of continence pants or shit in the bathtub, but her eyes continue to flick everywhere. She may ask a question or two, or drop a comment, but mostly she’ll remain silent, because people intimidate her, especially in close quarters. But Hodges knows her well – as well as anyone can, at least – and he can tell she’s on high alert.
Later she will talk, and Hodges will listen closely. During the Saubers case the year before, he learned that listening to Holly pays dividends. She thinks outside the box, sometimes way outside it, and her intuitions can be uncanny. And although fearful by nature – God knows she has her reasons – she can be brave. Holly is the reason Brady Hartsfield, aka Mr Mercedes, is now in the Lakes Region Traumatic Brain Injury Clinic at Kiner Memorial. Holly used a sock loaded with ball bearings to crush in his skull before Hartsfield could touch off a disaster much greater than the one at City Center. Now he’s in a twilight world the head neuro guy at the Brain Injury Clinic refers to as ‘a persistent vegetative state.’
‘Quadriplegics can shower,’ Holly amplifies, ‘but it’s difficult for them because of all the life-support equipment they’re hooked up to. So mostly it’s sponge baths.’
‘Let’s go in the kitchen, where it’s sunny,’ Pete says, and to the kitchen they go.
The first thing Hodges notices is the dish drainer, where the single plate that held Mrs Ellerton’s last meal has been left to dry. The countertops are sparkling, and the floor looks clean enough to eat on. Hodges has an idea that her bed upstairs will have been neatly made. She may even have vacuumed the carpets. And then there’s the continence pants. She took care of the things she could take care of. As a man who once seriously considered suicide himself, Hodges can relate.
6
Pete, Izzy, and Hodges sit at the kitchen table. Holly merely hovers, sometimes standing behind Isabelle to look at the collection of photos on Izzy’s iPad labeled ELLERTON/STOVER, sometimes poking into the various cupboards, her gloved fingers as light as moths.
Izzy takes them through it, swiping at the screen as she talks.
The first photo shows two middle-aged women. Both are beefy and broad-shouldered in their red nylon Home Helpers uniforms, but one of them – Georgina Ross, Hodges presumes – is crying and gripping her shoulders so that her forearms press against her breasts. The other one, Yvonne Carstairs, is apparently made of sterner stuff.
‘They got here at five forty-five,’ Izzy says. ‘They have a key to let themselves in, so they don’t have to knock or ring. Sometimes Martine slept until six thirty, Carstairs says. Mrs Ellerton is always up, gets up around five, she told them, had to have her coffee first thing, only this morning she’s not up and there’s no smell of coffee. So they think the old lady overslept for once, good for her. They tiptoe into Stover’s bedroom, right down the hall, to see if she’s awake yet. This is what they find.’
Izzy swipes to the next picture. Hodges waits for another oough from Holly, but she is silent and studying the photo closely. Stover is in bed with the covers pulled down to her knees. The damage to her face was never repaired, but what remains looks peaceful enough. Her eyes are closed and her twisted hands are clasped together. A feeding tube juts from her scrawny abdomen. Her wheelchair – which to Hodges looks more like an astronaut’s space capsule – stands nearby.
‘In Stover’s bedroom there was a smell. Not coffee, though. Booze.’
Izzy swipes. Here is a close-up of Stover’s bedside table. There are neat rows of pills. There’s a grinder to turn them to powder, so that Stover could ingest them. Standing among them and looking wildly out of place is a fifth of Smirnoff Triple Distilled