A Short Time to Die

by Susan Alice Bickford

  Charlene finished the last saucepan. “And what about Mom? She needs the money Del used to give her.”

  Marly thought of the money she’d stolen and how she mentally counted it every night to lull herself to sleep. She pushed away the guilty twinge. No turning back.

  “I don’t know. They’ll come talk to you. Don’t ask for much but ask them to treat Denise like Del’s widow and make sure they keep up the payments for Beanie. I think these things take a long time to settle without a will. Tell them you will not make any claims if they just do the right things and that includes Denise.”

  Charlene gave Marly a black look and went upstairs. Marly had a sinking feeling that her sister had not changed her plans.

  * * *

  After a few nervous days, Marly was pleased with the initial assumptions published by the police. Pending the official autopsy, it appeared that Zeke had succumbed to a heart attack and that Del had died from an arterial bleed caused by a bullet wound. They also verified that the bullet had been shot from a gun in the truck with Zeke’s fingerprints on it. There was evidence that the men had been climbing around in the potato field based on the mud on their boots and clothing, and to a limited extent based on footprints they could find near the field.

  No explanation was offered as to why Del and Zeke were near the field or if there had been another party involved.

  * * *

  There was no avoiding the funeral service for Del and Zeke a week later.

  Denise was allowed to sit in the front pew with Rosie. Marly’s diminutive mother was barely visible, squashed between the gigantic Harris family members.

  Marly, Charlene, and the kids were relegated to the back. Attendance was spotty, Marly noted. Aside from family members, most in town avoided the service. She was surprised to see Mrs. Haas, the librarian. As usual, she was impeccably attired, this time in a charcoal-gray wool suit, pearls, and pristine cranberry-red pumps that matched the reading glasses she used to study the flimsy service agenda.

  Marly stared at the hymnal and tried to avoid looking at the huge photos of Zeke and Del over their closed caskets.

  She wondered who had chosen the pictures. Zeke was smiling and looked twenty years younger and downright avuncular—the kind of guy you could have asked for a cookie or talked to about how much you missed your daddy. Not the kind of guy who could turn on a dime and knock you off the porch because you spilled lemonade.

  And Del. There was no question he had been “a specimen,” to quote Claire. Her classmates had always glanced at her when his name came up, even in Avalon. Del was gorgeous. Marly could see that. Most Harris men tended to be tall and barrel-chested, with reddish hair and hazel eyes. Del liked to wear pale blue to highlight his eyes, and tight-fitting shirts, even in winter, to show off his broad shoulders and flat belly. He was meticulous about his haircuts—not too long, not too short—so that his blond waves would bounce just so.

  He had been smart, too. Marly had underestimated him more than once. He was unpredictable when drunk, but he was careful not to show when he’d been drinking. He ran Zeke’s snotty empire like a little Swiss watch, according to Paul Daniels. Now that watch showed signs of poor timing. Events had spiraled out of control.

  Marly kept a careful eye on Rosie during the service. Denise bowed her head and bobbed in time to the music, but Rosie stayed stiff and upright the entire time. Reverend Rick spoke in glowing tones about the virtues of both men. There were no other testimonials.

  Once the singing and praying were done, they rode to the cemetery behind the outdoor hockey rink. The weather was still too warm for ice, and the rink sat empty. In a few weeks it would be filled with children and the sounds of skates on ice, and slap shots.

  Marly bobbed Alison on her hip and watched the two caskets lowered into the ground.

  “Good thing they turned up when they did,” Charlene muttered under her breath. “Otherwise the ground would have been too frozen and we’d have had to wait until spring for this.”

  Marly suppressed a grin. “Too bad there are only two holes,” she said into Alison’s neck.

  Charlene buried her face into her scarf, pulling it up to her nose to hide a snicker.

  Carl was right, Marly thought. I am the lucky one.

  13

  Vanessa: The Snow Man

  January 30, 2013

  The snowstorm tapered off by the time Jack and Vanessa pulled into Denise Harris’s driveway, allowing Vanessa to appreciate the transformed landscape. Dark evergreens were white, a stack of snow perched atop every twig on every tree and along the power lines. The half-plowed driveway surface appeared to be covered with thick, lumpy oatmeal, a mix of snow on top of sand and salt.

  “We can’t stay long, Jack. We could have a hard time getting out if the snow starts up again.”

  “Got that,” Jack said. “Stuck in Hades.”

  Beneath the gloss of the Marlyfication Paul had mentioned, Vanessa thought she could see the bones of the old, run-down farmhouse this must have once been. Snow slid smoothly off a metal roof, and the clapboard siding looked freshly painted. The windows boasted they were new, showing manufacturer stickers here and there. Off to one side, a small barn had been painted the same antique yellow with white trim as the house.

  A figure exited the rear of the house onto an ample deck and waved them up.

  Denise’s mudroom sat off the back deck, next to a spacious laundry. Vanessa felt she was becoming a connoisseur of mudrooms.

  Denise Harris hovered as Jack and Vanessa removed their boots and jackets.

  “Hello. Hello. I’m Denise. I’m Denise. How about tea? I’ll get you tea.”

  It was evident that Denise had once been quite pretty, and she still could have been if she had relaxed into a more natural look, Vanessa decided. Once a natural blond, the older woman’s hair was now bleached and the texture of dry straw. Her face showed blackheads and rough areas that indicated neglect the heavy makeup could not hide. In spite of those signs of a hard life, Denise’s figure was lithe and attractive, and she dressed to show that off in tight jeans and a form-fitting, fuzzy pink sweater. Her blue eyes brightened at the sight of Jack, as if he were a new kind of candy she’d like to taste.

  Jack blushed and stood behind Vanessa as they moved into another part of the house—a large family room with a gas stove.

  “I hear Marly fixed this place up for you, Mrs. Harris,” Vanessa said.

  “Oh, yeah.” Denise turned around and waved her hands toward the new appliances and the open-kitchen format attached to the family room. “The house used to end right there.” Denise drew an imaginary line across the floor. “Can you believe that we all used to eat around a tiny table in that kitchen? Now I’ve got a breakfast bar and a nice big dining table and this sitting area with a gas fire. No wood required. And there’s a master bedroom and huge bath through that door there, plus the original living room in front.”

  “She’s been very good to you,” said Jack.

  “She’s been a pain. I’m worth a lot of money now on paper. Can you believe it? But it’s in a trust and she has me on an allowance. A drip. I need to ask for extra money when I need it.”

  Jack picked up the ball and turned to Denise with a big smile.

  “This is a gorgeous place, Mrs. Harris. As we mentioned on the phone, we’re here to try to figure out how Louise and Troy Rasmussen died. We’d like to ask for your help.”

  Denise directed a coquettish grin at Jack. “Oh, but they died in California, n’est-ce pas?”

  Jack raised his eyebrows and laughed. “Mais oui. But they started out from here. We hear you are something of an expert on the Harris family. We’re hoping you can provide some background.”

  Denise waggled her shoulders and pouted. “I never cared for Louise or Troy. I didn’t socialize with them any more than I had to. Once my Elliot passed, I hardly ever saw them.”

  “Do you remember the last time you saw them?” Jack’s voice was smooth and soothing.
<
br />   Denise put a finger to her lips. “Let’s see. I’d say that was about a month before Rosie died. Rosie was Louise’s mother, you know.”

  “I don’t suppose you’d remember the occasion?”

  “Rosie had a birthday party for Del. He would have turned forty-five if he had lived. It just broke her heart when he died.” Denise’s lips quivered and she dabbed at her eyes.

  “You must miss him a great deal,” Jack said.

  Vanessa tried to keep her expression neutral. What a pair of ham actors.

  Denise sniffed. “I’ve had bad luck with my husbands. First Beanie ran off, then Del ended up in that ravine, and Elliot died from cancer. They were all so sudden. Even Elliot. He started throwing up and just couldn’t stop. So he went to the doctor and two months later he was dead.”

  Vanessa resisted the temptation to look at Jack. Tough luck indeed.

  “But Del had his flaws,” Vanessa said. “He did molest your daughter Charlene for several years, isn’t that right?”

  Denise squirmed. “Charlene led him on.”

  Vanessa felt a surge of heat ripple through the muscles of her back. “She was twelve or thirteen when that started, I hear. He was a grown man. In your heart, do you believe that Charlene seduced him?”

  Denise sat up straight and gave a snort. “Well, he stopped. And I don’t like to speak ill of the dead.”

  “Why did he stop?”

  Denise simpered and sniffed. “She should have talked to me first. I’m her mother. She went straight to Zeke. Rosie was furious.”

  “Charlene did that?”

  “No, no. Charlene’s a good girl. That was Marly. She’d gotten it in her head from school that she should say something. She told Zeke that someone would bring this to the attention of the authorities sooner or later and Del would be in big trouble.”

  “That was brave.”

  “That was stupid is what that was. Del swore that it was all Marly’s imagination and Marly got a proper touch-up over that.”

  “But he stopped.”

  Denise turned her face away from Vanessa.

  Vanessa studied her notebook to calm down. She rather doubted that Marly hadn’t raised the issue with her mother.

  “The word is that Charlene’s children were Del’s,” Jack said. “They came along several years later.”

  “Rosie liked to believe that Mark and Pammy were Del’s,” Denise said in a stage whisper. “We humored her when she was alive. But Charlene said they were Johnny’s and as they got older it was clear they looked just like Johnny.”

  “Rosie didn’t like Charlene very much, did she?” Jack asked in his own stage whisper.

  Denise gazed out the windows and spoke in a normal tone. “She blamed Charlene for leading Del astray, of course. But Charlene kept her mouth shut and moved on with Greg. And Charlene did her time in prison for Greg and didn’t say anything about the family. But Marly. She sure did dislike Marly. I could never quite figure that out. Of course Marly had complained to Zeke that once, but she was punished for that. And Marly never blabbed to outsiders. She attended family events and meetings, and she was even more polite than Charlene.”

  “She got along with Del?”

  “Oh, so-so. Del told me that he felt that Marly was always sneaky and he said she’d been listening in on his conversations. Business conversations.”

  “What about Carl’s sons, Judson and Jason? What did Rosie think about them?” Vanessa asked.

  Denise scowled. “Judson and Jason? They haven’t been around for years. Jason is a bit older than Charlene. Judson was not an easy boy. Carl had to send him away.”

  “He lives in California, correct?”

  Denise’s eyes shifted away. “I guess so.”

  “You don’t see him when you visit Charlene and Marly in California?”

  “Sometimes. When Betty comes out, she wants to see all the California grandchildren,” Denise answered.

  Vanessa continued to stare at Denise, but she mentally clapped her hands.

  “Of course they’re a little farther away. Sacramento,” Denise said.

  “Who did Rosie think Del and Zeke were chasing when they died?”

  Denise wet her lips, as the question appeared to rattle around in her vacant brain.

  “Oh. Well, it’s hard to say. When Del and Zeke disappeared, Rosie was like a crazy woman. Every day she had another person to blame.”

  “Was Rosie mad that Marly had made friends with Elaine?” Vanessa asked.

  “Sure. That was another slap as far as Rosie was concerned. But Marly had reached that age where you can’t tell them anything. Lucky for her, Rosie and Louise and Troy all got scooped up and sent to prison for a while. When they got out, Marly was long gone.”

  “In your opinion, why would Rosie have sent Louise and Troy to California? A drug deal?”

  Denise made a tsking sound. “I certainly do not know. I could never figure out what ran around in their heads and I never meddled in their business.”

  “Did Carl get along with Rosie?”

  “Carl tried to keep things cordial, I guess you’d say. There was some bad blood because he wouldn’t give work to Louise or Troy. But they all got along good enough.”

  “What if Rosie wanted to punish someone? Like Charlene? Or Judson? Or Elaine?” Jack asked.

  Vanessa held her breath.

  Denise squinted at her hands. “No. Charlene was still in prison and Marly was long gone when Rosie died. She had lost interest in all of them as best I could tell. She was real sick from that chemo. Lung cancer.”

  Vanessa had one more line of questioning. “Mrs. Harris, on the night Del and Zeke died, where were you?”

  Denise flushed. “I was right here, of course. I had Charlene and her three kids living here, plus Marly, and Del, and the house was much smaller, mind you.”

  “Was Charlene here all night?”

  “Yes. Marly was the only one who went out. She went to the high school Halloween dance. It was the last Friday in October, I remember that so well.” Denise dabbed her eyes again.

  “Did you see Marly when she returned?”

  “Of course. She always came in and told me if she got home after I was asleep. She would have told me if anything was wrong.”

  Vanessa forced what she hoped was her most charming smile. “You know, Mrs. Harris, I’ve seen mug shots of Louise and Troy but no personal photographs. Do you have any family pictures we could see?”

  Denise stood up and laughed. “Oh, yes. I’ve got lots of photo albums in the living room.” She waved them through the kitchen to the original front of the house.

  This was where all the old furniture went to die, Vanessa decided. Musty loungers and a tired old couch crowded the room. A wood-burning fireplace with a scorched mantel sat at the far end, surrounded by bookshelves. Denise was not a big reader—the shelves were filled with the plastic binders of photo albums.

  Denise pulled down selected binders. “Marly says she’ll have these moved to the computer but she still hasn’t done it.”

  She studied the labels on the spines and grabbed one album from thirty years before.

  “This was Beanie, my first husband. He was a sweet man, but he couldn’t read very well. Learning disabilities. That made it hard to make money. Thank God my girls got their smarts from me.”

  Vanessa stared at the photos of the young man in his teens and early twenties. He was just shy of handsome, with regular features, a wiry build, wavy red hair in a classic mullet, and a warm smile. Even in the somber pictures, she could detect a certain humor behind his eyes. Two little girls, Marly and Charlene, held their dad’s hands, sat on his lap, opened presents.

  Denise paged through a different album. “Here. This is one you’ll like. This is me and Del.”

  A youthful Denise smiled into the camera with a handsome man at her side.

  “Wow,” Vanessa said, caught by surprise.

  “Yes. We were young and beautiful. Del was just wonder
ful. Here are some family pictures. These were from about six to eighteen months before he died.”

  Vanessa and Jack studied several pages and paused on a large family group, posed in front of a pond or lake.

  “That’s Carl, and Zeke next to him, and that’s Larry.” Denise pointed. “That’s Louise and Troy, just to their left.”

  “Yikes,” Vanessa said. “Talk about land of giants.”

  The Harris clan seemed to have two body types—big and bigger. Carl, Zeke, Larry, and Troy were all tall—six foot four or more—with beefy shoulders and potbellies. Zeke was downright obese. Louise had a similar build but appeared small by comparison. Del was almost as tall as his father, but more muscular and lean. A tall, skinny woman with lank black hair glared at the camera from the center of the scene.

  “That’s Rosie, I assume.” Vanessa pointed.

  “Oh yes. She never took a good picture. And there’s Elliot. He became my third husband. That’s his father, Vernon, next to Del and Greg. Greg’s my son-in-law. Married to Charlene. That’s me, of course,” Denise said. “That’s Charlene and her kids, and there’s Marly.”

  Vanessa and Jack leaned in.

  Denise flipped the page. “Here’s another picture, a bit closer up.”

  “Charlene looks just like you,” Vanessa said, focused on Marly.

  “My spitting image. Marly takes after her dad—red hair, greenish eyes. But you know, I always told Marly she could be just as pretty as Charlene if she just smiled.”

  Vanessa flipped through the binder. There was handsome, confident Del, radiating crafty intelligence. Here was sweet, oblivious Denise. Charlene always smiled and appeared happy, if a bit blank. Rosie glowered. Zeke seemed half asleep. Larry’s eyes were full of implied menace. Troy postured and showed off his tattoos. Odd. She hadn’t thought about Troy’s skin until that moment.