thoughtfully. “Hank and Mary were never ones to throw money around. They were pretty frugal. But I do remember they’d always talked about moving away to Florida or someplace warm after he retired, and that never happened. But Mary got sick not long after Louise shot Walter, so I’m sure she decided to stay for Barbara and Seth, even though I’m sure she would have gotten better healthcare down there. Hank gave up the business nearly ten years ago. Sometime after Louise went away. Seems to me he would have stayed in it if he was havin’ money problems.”
Unless he’d needed the lump sum Bingham had offered to buy the business.
“Do you know if Louise had any friends?” I asked. “Any close family?”
She stared at the wall for several seconds. “She was friendly with Walter’s sister’s girl, but they had a falling-out.” Her eyes lit up. “Her name was Cassie Carpenter. Cassie hung around with Barbara Chalmers too, if I’m remembering right.”
“Wait,” I said. “Louise was friends with Walter’s niece?”
“Walter was a change of life baby,” Thelma said. “So he was twelve years younger than his sister and nearly ten years older than Louise, which made his niece and Louise nearly the same age.”
It took me a moment to take that in. “Wow.”
Marco grimaced, then shifted his weight off his left leg. “Did the falling-out with Cassie occur because of Walter’s murder?”
“Long before,” Thelma said.
“No other friends that you can remember?” I asked.
“Louise wasn’t the friendly type,” Thelma said. “At least not with the womenfolk, if you know what I mean.”
“Know any men she might have been friendly with?” Marco asked.
She pulled a face. “None that I can recall.”
I suspected we weren’t going to get much else on that front.
“What do you know about Louise when she was growing up?” I asked. “Is she from around here?”
“Oh, yeah. She was born in that shack out on her land.” She nodded her head toward me. “That property was hers, not Walter’s. Her family was as poor as dirt. I think several generations have lived on that land. They all seem to die young.”
“It’s not surprisin’,” Marco said without judgment. “There’s no electricity or running water on that property. The house looks like it’ll collapse with the next big thunderstorm. If they were livin’ in those conditions, they didn’t have money for necessities like food or medicine.”
Thelma nodded. “A lot of kids used to die around these parts. Especially a hundred years or so ago.” She released a chuckle. “Not that I’m old enough to remember all that. But my mother told me. She used to remind me how good we had it. That we didn’t have to suffer in the Great Depression.” Her hands twisted in her lap and the corners of her mouth twitched with a frown. “There’s been a lot of pain and misery in this area.”
“But some good too,” I said softly. “You loved your husband, and you love your nieces, and I know they love you. That means something.”
She looked up at me with a grateful smile. “Yes. You’re right.” But the happiness dimmed in her eyes. “But maybe I was too wrapped up in my own business to care enough about the misfortune of those around me.”
“I know for a fact that’s not true, Miss Thelma,” Marco said, taking a step closer to her. “I talked to my mom about you, and she said you used to do all kinds of things with the church. Coat drives. Food drives. You used to even gather school supplies for children whose parents couldn’t afford them. She said you got people to make care packages for children going into foster care.”
She swiped a tear from her cheek. “For a time, there were far too many children going into that program and not comin’ out.”
“Doesn’t sound like someone too busy or selfish to care about others,” Marco said.
She nodded but didn’t look convinced.
“It’s hard not to feel regret when you look back at all the things you didn’t do or know,” I said. “We weren’t early enough. We didn’t give enough. We didn’t care enough. Sometimes it’s best to take a step back and realize you did what you could at the time. Maybe you could have done more, but you can’t go back and change it. All you can do is move forward.” As the words came spilling out, I realized she wasn’t the only one I was trying to convince.
Marco rested his hand on my shoulder and squeezed.
Thelma