Purgatory, West Virginia
April 4
Charlotte knocked on the door of the stately colonial home. A man of about sixty with tired eyes and a stained shirt opened the door.
“You from the nursing service?”
Charlotte hesitated. Finn thought the same thing. It could be a nifty lie to get them in the door. But Charlotte, as he knew she would, went with the truth. “No, we were hoping to speak with your aunt.”
It was a safe guess. The man had the same bird-like, wide-set eyes and pointed chin as the woman they sought.
The man squinted. “What about?”
“It’s about her old friend, Annabeth Moss.”
The man scratched his ear. “Now, there’s a name I haven’t heard in a coon’s age. Come on in. Aunt Fern loves reminiscing these days. Not much else to do in bed.”
Finn stepped up next to Charlotte. She took his hand, and Finn felt his chest expand. “Is she sick?” he asked.
“She’s in hospice,” the man replied. “Pancreatic cancer. She’s at the end of it, thankfully. Or not.” He shook his head. “I never know what the right thing to say is. Hell, I never know what the right thing to feel is.”
Charlotte squeezed his forearm. “I’m sorry.”
The man nodded and led them down a hall to a small bedroom. “We had to move her downstairs a few weeks ago,” he explained. He started to lead them into the room when Charlotte halted him.
“Why don’t you take a break. I imagine you’re exhausted.”
“Thanks. The nurse didn’t show up for the shift today, and it looks like his replacement is ditching out on me too. I’ll just go get a bite to eat while you all catch up.”
Fern Jacobs was a shadow of a woman. She sat propped up in the hospital bed, flipping through channels with the remote, her two Bulldogs lazing at her feet. The room was spartan and colorless. Finn thought how different May’s room had looked on that last day, filled with photographs, mementos, and cheery pillows. May was a woman without regrets. Quite unlike the woman in this bed.
She spoke without looking away from the television. “When I was a kid, we had five channels: the Big Three, PBS, and this local UHF channel that was usually a preacher blathering on about eternal salvation. Or damnation. Depended on the day. Now I’ve got seven hundred channels, and there’s nothin’ on.”
Finn placed a chair by the bedside, and Charlotte took a seat. “Fern, we’re here about Annabeth.”
The old woman stilled. “Well, that’s… unexpected. A little late, don’t you think?”
Charlotte gentled her voice. “Did you know Venable had been looking for her locket?”
Fern shrugged and changed the channel.
Finn watched Charlotte lead Fern along. Definitely not the “bad cop” strategy he would have used, but she seemed to be making progress.
“I found a grocery list in Annabeth’s kitchen. A forty-year-old grocery list, if you can believe it.”
Fern clicked off the television and turned an impassive face to Charlotte.
“The thing is, some items on that list caught my eye. Saltines and camomile tea.”
“Do you have a point?” Fern asked.
“I know you don’t have children, so it’s understandable that those things wouldn’t mean anything.”
Finn saw the older woman bristle.
Charlotte continued, “Those both help with morning sickness. I might not have even noticed, but my grocery list looks pretty much the same.” She rubbed her baby bump.
Oh, his clever girl. Charlotte was pushing this woman’s buttons, and Fern didn’t even know it.