Chapter Twenty-seven
I'd lied to Gabriel. I couldn't just drop this. Not yet. I needed to know more. I was sure I could get more. My dad used to give me every problem-solving task that could arise in a department store, from shoplifting to public relations. That did not give me the skills to investigate murder, but if I had more details, maybe I could interest one of those innocence projects, which--unlike Gabriel Walsh--wouldn't charge me for its efforts. I still wanted these answers, needed these answers. Which meant I had to do what it took to get them.
After leaving Gabriel, I stopped back at the apartment to grab my memo pad and headed to the library.
My research did not go well. The only mentions I found of Christian Gunderson were newspaper accounts dramatically labeling him another victim of the killers. Unable to cope with the horrific death of his sister, the sensitive soul took his own life. If that was his epitaph, no one was going to appreciate me suggesting he may have been her killer.
The articles had mentioned a younger sister, Anna. I could speak to her ... if I could find current contact information. I couldn't. I did find something on Christian's mother, though. An obituary. She'd died three years ago. The only address I found for a living, close relative was for Niles Gunderson--the mentally unstable father who'd mistaken me for Pamela and attacked me.
Definitely not.
Sunday morning I was in a cab, taking the first step in my investigation. Ida and Walter had offered me the use of their car anytime I needed to make a trip "to the city," but I didn't feel comfortable taking them up on that offer. Not yet.
So I was footing the big bill for a cab to Chicago. And where was I going? To pay a visit to Niles Gunderson.
Madness, of course. But it was the only avenue of investigation I could see. He must have been off his meds when he came to the house. By now he'd be back home, on his regime and lucid. With my new look, a little role-playing, a few shadows, and a lot of luck, I might be able to convince him that I was an old friend of Anna's looking for her phone number. I'd tried calling of course but he wouldn't answer. Maybe because he didn't recognize the number.
When I reached the apartment, I knew the "few shadows" part of the equation would be easy. A week ago, I'd have said Gunderson's building was little more than tenement housing. Now, having seen actual tenements, I knew better.
It was just a tired building on a tired street, filled with people who looked equally tired, trudging along without even a glance my way. Inside, the building was quieter than I might have expected. Darker, too. Hence the shadows. It was like walking into a tunnel, gray and gloomy and empty, with dark walls and irregular lighting.
As I made my way up to Gunderson's fifth-floor apartment, I began to think that maybe this desolate place wasn't exactly where I wanted to meet a man who'd tried to kill me.
This was crazy. Bat-shit crazy. With every step, I thought of new and more colorful descriptions of my decision to visit Niles Gunderson. But I kept walking.
His door was at the far end of the hall. I gathered my courage and knocked. As I did, I noticed something on the floor. A splash of red.
Blood.
It took only an eye-blink to tell me it was just a plastic poppy, the kind you wear at Remembrance Day, though we were about as far in the calendar as you could get from November 11.
I made a face and rubbed my nose. The building smelled of garbage and cooked food, but I'd just caught a whiff of something worse.
I knocked again, louder now. Still nothing.
My gaze tripped back to the poppy and stayed there, as if glued to the sight.
It's a damn poppy. So what?
But even when I looked away, I could feel the poppy niggling at me. A clue? I snorted. If a dropped poppy could tell me anything, I'd need to be Holmes himself to figure it out.
I rapped again, but by now didn't expect an answer.
There wasn't a dead-bolt keyhole. I looked down the hall. All clear. Couldn't hurt to try. As I reached for the knob, my gaze caught on that damned poppy again. I stopped and pulled my sleeve over my hand. Then I turned the knob, testing the door before I...
It opened.
I glanced around. Then I pushed open the door and slipped inside. As I did, the smell hit me.
Death.
It smelled like death.
I chastised myself for being overly dramatic. No matter how sheltered one was, it was hard to reach the age of twenty-four and not know the smell of decay, if only a dead mouse in the basement. Judging by the state of Niles's apartment, a rotting mouse or two would probably go unnoticed for a while.
Yet I knew the smell didn't come from dirty dishes. Or even dead mice.
When I walked into the kitchen and saw Niles Gunderson--slumped back in his chair, mouth open, eyes closed, two flies feasting on an open sore on his chin--I didn't think, Oh my God, the poor man is dead. I thought, Shit, there goes my only source.