Chapter Seven
I may have been dreaming of that weekend away with Mike. Whatever. The dream vanished, because I woke to a lot of noise in the early morning hours. At first, I couldn’t figure out what disturbed me. Then I heard banging that sounded like it came from the front door—good thing it was a solid wood door with a deadbolt. And yelling, cursing. I could make out, “Goddamn it, Claire, come out here.”
Claire! It was Jim Guthrie. I reached for my robe and struggled into it, tying the belt around me, and stumbled into the living room, only to meet Claire.
“I heard him,” she said tersely. “I’ll take care of it.”
I looked at her and saw a gun in her hand, held down at her side. Lots went through my mind, like didn’t the police confiscate the gun she used to shoot Jim and wasn’t it a violation of her bond to possess a gun? “Claire, the gun…should you….” I hated myself when I was so wishy-washy. Why didn’t I just tell her to put the damn gun down? And then, I thought of my girls, and I said in a firm tone of voice, “Claire, put the gun away. Go back to the girls’ rooms and comfort them. But hide the gun first. I’ll take care of this.”
Claire stared at me. “You don’t know what he’s like….I bet he has a gun.”
“He won’t use it on me, and I won’t have guns around my girls. Now go do what I told you. And call 911.” I was on a roll.
Claire gave me a long look—dare I say it an admiring look? No, I’m not sure. But she laid the gun on the table by the couch—not what I meant when I said hide it!—and turned toward the bedroom hall. I went to the door. Jim Guthrie kept yelling and pounding.
I didn’t open the door, but I looked through the window in it and yelled, “Shut up! You’re scaring my girls, and I’m calling the police!”
“Police be damned! Open this door or I’ll shoot it open.”
He was drunk. I didn’t see bloodshot eyes or a staggering walk or any of those things. I just knew, maybe because the few times I’d met him he was always so controlled that I never would have expected him to go berserk as he apparently now had.
“She shot me, the bitch, and I’m going to shoot her. It’s my turn.” He waved his arms and gestured wildly, all the while with the pistol in his hand. I hoped the safety was on—for his sake as well as mine.
What was this—a game of my turn, your turn? I thought about picking up that pistol on the table and then discarded the idea. Instead, I flung the door open.
Jim Guthrie almost fell through the open door into the living room, but I was ready for him. I put my hands on his chest and shoved. Already off balance, he went backwards and landed halfway down the front steps. The gun flew out of his hand into the bushes. He was not the well groomed man I was used to seeing—his shirt tail hung out of his pants, shirt sleeves rolled up, collar open. And his hair was a mess, as though he kept running his hand through it the same irritating way Anthony did.
He lay there, so quiet I wondered if I’d killed him. Then he began to stir, struggle, trying to sit upright, but it was hard because he was on a downward angle—and he wasn’t very coordinated. “Claire,” he gasped. “I got to see Claire.”
“Not tonight, you don’t,” I said. “Get up, go home, sober up, and maybe she’ll talk to you.” Just then I heard a siren and realized Claire called the police as I asked her to.
The police officer, one I didn’t know, cuffed Guthrie, and gave him a field sobriety test—no, he could neither walk a straight line nor touch his nose with his eyes closed. He also found the gun in the bushes. All the while Guthrie babbled that he just wanted to talk to Claire, he didn’t mean any harm, and so on.
Claire appeared at the front door. “Jim Guthrie, you’re a sorry piece of work. I hope they book you and keep you overnight, so you’ll know what it feels like.”
He managed a bit of indignation. “You shot me!”
“And I’d do it again.”
I thought she shouldn’t have said that.
After talking to Claire, the officer took Guthrie away. As I closed the door, Claire looked at me with new eyes and said, “You really are something, aren’t you? You weren’t protecting me, you were protecting the girls.”
“Yes,” I said. “You’ll be asked to press charges in the morning. Will you?”
She shook her head.
“Then I will. For attempted breaking and entering of my home and endangering my girls.”
Claire stared at me. “Please don’t. My negotiations with Jim are delicate. I’m fighting a real battle here. In the morning, when he’s sober, he’ll realize he was a fool. If he doesn’t, I’ll let him know. But I don’t want to complicate the divorce by having him charged.”
Inside I seethed. My home, my refuge, was breached, and she asked me to do nothing about it. “I’ll see,” I muttered. “Get rid of that gun. Don’t ever bring it in my house again, and don’t keep it outside if Em is visiting you. I’m sure it’s illegal for you to have it.” My voice remained harsh, and I turned away from her to go to the girls.
Claire let herself out without another word, taking the gun with her.
The girls were huddled in my bed. I gathered them in my arms and said, “Your mom did a brave thing tonight. And you know what I learned?”
Maggie just hugged tight to me, but Em asked, “What, Mom?”
“Take the offensive. Grab the bull by the horns.” In retrospect, I’m not sure that was a good lesson for them.
Em looked very solemn. “What does that mean, Mommy?”
“Em, let’s just go to sleep and worry about it tomorrow,” Maggie said, and they both burrowed into my bed.
The phone rang not twenty minutes later, and I knew who it was before I answered. “Hi, Mike. Let me call you back from the other phone. The girls have just gone back to sleep.”
“I’m not asleep,” Em said indignantly.
“No, but you will be in a minute.” I kissed her and left the room.
I didn’t even have to say hello or anything. Mike began right away, “Kelly, you’ve got to get Claire out of there. You’re all in danger. You just can’t expose yourself and the girls to this kind of stuff. Tell her tomorrow she has to find another place.”
Okay, I knew he was worried, but I don’t react well to being ordered about, especially when it has to do with my own life. My back stiffens, and it did this time. “The problem wasn’t Claire, it was her husband. I told her I would press charges but she asked me to hold off because of the divorce negotiations that were sure to come. I agree, Mike, the whole thing stinks, and I feel caught in the middle. But I won’t abandon her at this point.” I took a deep breath. “And besides, I think I handled the situation very well, thank you.”
“Yeah, I heard.” Was there grudging admiration in his voice? “I don’t want you having to push belligerent drunks down your front steps.”
Oops! Had he gone from one isolated instance to making it a regular occurrence? “That’s unreasonable, Mike, and you know it.”
He was silent for a long minute. Then, “I need to come live with you and the girls.”
All I could think of for some idiotic reason was that bad line from some old western movie—”Well, shiver my timbers…” I didn’t even remember the last of it. But shiver I did.
“Mike,” I said, watching my tongue this time, “I think that’s where we’re headed, and I like the idea. But I don’t think it’s something we can rush into after one unpleasant incident. We have to plan. We have to think about the girls, my mother, your colleagues….there’s lots to consider.”
“And no couch for me to sleep on.” He sounded grumpy.
“There’s a couch, but I don’t know how comfortable you’d find it. Besides, I don’t think that’s what either one of us want.”
“If you’d kick Claire out, I could live in the guest apartment.”
“And sneak in at night when the girls were asleep? I don’t think so. Besides, with all that cooking equipment and exercise stuff and computer arrangement? You’d never fit.” I laughed just a bit, but behind that I thought,
Omigosh, when he does move in how will we fit all his stuff into this already overcrowded house?
Note it was not IF he moves in, it was WHEN!
“Don’t laugh. I’d find a way,” he said.
“Mike, can we talk about this tomorrow night? Maybe begin to think ahead?”
“Yeah. You sure you’re okay tonight?”
“Sure. Claire’s gone to bed, the girls are sleeping, the alarm is on, and Jim Guthrie is in jail—unless he’s already out on bond.” I was careful not to mention that Claire had a gun, and I don’t think the responding officer saw it, so he couldn’t have reported to Mike.
“This will sure change that trial,” Mike muttered and then, “Okay, Kelly, night. I love you.”
And he was gone before I could say “I love you too,” but the words were on my lips and in my heart.
****
By the time Mike called about eleven the next night, I already knew that another old woman was killed in Fairmount. It was on the neighborhood e-newsletter by five o’clock but not on the local news channel. Florence Dodson died more than a month ago.
I pieced the story together from the email newsletter. Adelaide McLaughton was found dead in her back yard on Chase Court around three o’clock. A neighbor noticed her lying on the ground and went to help, then called 911. Mrs. McLaughton, a widow, was working in her garden. I couldn’t fathom why anyone in her right mind would work in the yard at mid-day when the temperature was predicted to climb over 100
o
but that was the story. A second killing. Same circumstances. I was stunned.
Mike called to say he’d been held up investigating the death plus being called out on no less than three domestic violence calls—the heat must have been bringing out the worst in people.
“Mrs. McLaughton…it was the same guy that killed Florence Dodson, wasn’t it?”
I could hear his impatient sigh. “Kelly, we think she just had a heart attack. After all, it was 101
o
today, and she shouldn’t have been working in the garden in mid-afternoon. I mean, I don’t want to speak ill of the dead, but… Anyway, it’s only a homicide until the medical examiner proves otherwise, which he will.”
“I’m not so sure,” I said. Okay, if it wasn’t yet a serial killer, it was darn close.
“Kelly, give it up. I’ll see you later.”
****
The next day, from the neighborhood gossip e-mail, I learned that Mrs. McLaughton had three sons, two who lived in Fort Worth with their families and one unmarried and living in Mrs. McLaughton’s home with her, but no one was home.
I brooded about that old lady. The girls asked what was on my mind and, not wanting to frighten them, I said I was worried about a real estate deal that I didn’t know would go through. They sympathized and were quiet all evening, watching a DVD movie.
But while they watched, I sat and stewed. Two old women, at opposite ends of the neighborhood. Why would someone choose them? What linked them together? By the time the girls went to bed, I was bursting with questions and pacing the floor for Mike’s arrival.
He called at ten and sounded oh so weary! “Kelly, I can’t come by. I’m stuck here with the victim’s family and….”
“Mrs. McLaughton?”
“Oh, yeah, guess I forgot to tell you. It was homicide. Coroner says she suffered blunt force trauma to the head—hit with something blunt. Go on. Say ‘I told you so.’ It’s too close to the Dodson case for comfort. And something else, she’s the same lady that called a couple of weeks ago about an intruder in her yard. Yeah, I’m tired even thinking about it.”
“It’s all over the neighborhood, Mike, but the news says they’re withholding identification pending notification. How can they not find the sons?”
I heard the caution in his voice. “Whoa, Kelly! When I see you I’ll tell you. Right now we are talking to the lady’s gardener, but that wouldn’t tie him to Florence Dodson. But I can’t talk.” He paused a minute. “Did you talk to Claire?”
I almost asked “About what?” But I knew. About moving, and no, I hadn’t. “No. She told me Jim posted bond—or Angus Mitchell did—and Jim was held overnight to sober up. He’s out, and as far as I know she hasn’t heard from him.”
“That’s not what I meant. Kelly, you take care of the business that affects you—that would be Claire—and leave me to helping solve murders of little old ladies.”
“Mike, I….” I have no idea what I meant to say, but he said, “‘Night, Kelly.” Two nights in a row without seeing Mike, and I did miss him a lot.
“Mike, come by whenever you can. Wake me up.” But I heard a dial tone.
I hung up the phone in frustration and sank into one of the chairs. No, I didn’t talk to Claire. I didn’t have to. She talked to me, first thing in the morning.