Chapter Sixteen

“So what do you make of this?” Mina said. She was standing at the checkout counter at Sparkles showing Finn the work permit she’d snitched.

He examined it. “I . . .” His gaze traveled from the front of the store to the back, and he lowered his voice. “Where’d you get this?”

“From Angela Quintanilla’s house. Have you seen what a mess it is? I went to pay a condolence call and found the house roped off and this stuck to the front door.”

“And you helped yourself?”

Mina fiddled with the top button of her sweater and smiled. “It blew off the door, and I picked it up.”

“So that’s your story and you’re sticking to it? You know, one day they’re going to arrest you for—”

“For what? I was picking up litter. Pfff. Besides, they wouldn’t want to draw attention, would they? And there’s another house not two doors away from this one that’s already been demolished. Did you know that?”

“I heard, but—”

“So who’s responsible? I’d like to know that, and I’m sure I’m not the only one.”

“I don’t know anything more than you do.”

“But you talk to everyone. Surely—”

“Haven’t heard a thing.”

“So I think you should find out.”

“But—”

“You’re an attorney, aren’t you?”

“Was.”

The bell over the front door tinkled. Mina looked over. It was Sandra Ferrante’s daughter. She dropped a slip of paper as she entered the store. Stooped and picked it up.

When Mina turned back, Finn had slid the permit under the mat on the counter.

“Hi,” the girl said as she picked up a shopping basket from the stack nested by the register. She looked tired and frazzled.

“Hey,” Finn said. “Need help finding anything?”

The girl consulted her crumpled scrap of paper. “Roach bomb?”

“Over there, against the wall,” Finn said, pointing to the far side of the store.

“Lightbulbs?”

“They’re over there, too.”

Mina followed Finn’s gaze as he watched the girl walk off. When he turned back, Mina winked at him.

He chuckled. “You’re entirely too observant for your own good.”

“Have to be blind as a bat not to see,” she said. “So that permit. You’ll look into it?”

Finn took the permit out again and read it, front and back. “SV Construction Management. Soundview?”

“Do you know them, or are you guessing? Because guesswork I can do myself. You have a computer, don’t you? Isn’t that what they’re for?”

“Mrs. Yetner.” He shook his head.

“Do you need a retainer?” Mina found her change purse in her bag, opened it, and pulled out a neat roll of bills—about a hundred dollars. She thrust it at him. “Here.”

“You are relentless,” Finn said, taking the money from her. He opened the roll, peeled off a single, and tucked it into his shirt pocket. “There. That’s plenty,” he said, giving her back the rest.

“That’s ridiculous,” Mina said. But she put the money away before he could change his mind.

The girl brought her basket to the register, and Mina watched as Finn began ringing up the items. When he got to the third frozen chicken potpie, he said, “Gourmet dinner?”

“Easy dinner,” the girl said.

Finn bagged the groceries in two bags. Mina picked up one of them. “I can take this for you,” she said heading for the door.

“You really don’t have to,” the girl said, following her outside.

“I don’t mind,” Mina said, and she didn’t. The bag was light, and it was always more pleasant walking with a companion. Besides, the girl looked dead on her feet and Mina wanted to be sure she got back in one piece.

“See you later?” Finn called after them.

The girl gave an absentminded wave.

Mina and Sandra Ferrante’s daughter walked in companionable silence until they were a half block from home.

“Why did you take the bus?” Mina asked.

“My mother’s car won’t start.”

That explained it. “If it’s not one thing, it’s another.”

“You can say that again.”

They were in front of Mina’s house. “Thanks,” the girl said, taking the grocery bag.

“So how’s your mother doing?”

“Fine. Good, actually.”

Mina gave her a long look. The poor thing couldn’t even meet her gaze.

Chapter Seventeen

Evie realized that Mrs. Yetner was only trying to be kind, asking about her mother, but Evie was finding it overwhelming enough without having to deal with the concern of others. Peace, quiet, and some time alone were what she craved.

She closed some of the windows and plugged the refrigerator back in. Started a potpie in the oven and put the rest in the freezer. Pure comfort food was exactly what she needed, never mind that it was mostly cornstarch and salt.

She put away the rest of her purchases. In the bottom of one bag, along with her receipt, she found another copy of the Soundview Watershed Preservation brochure. The photographs of the marsh on the back cover could have been taken from her mother’s back porch. She set the brochure on the mantel.

Other than pretending that stems of feathery marsh grass were their magic wands, Evie and Ginger had always been oblivious to the marsh and its wildlife. Mostly Evie had been embarrassed by its farty smell.

Now she didn’t mind that smell so much. It was preferable by far, she thought as she took in the remaining mess, to sewage and rotting food. At least the smell in the house was better than when she’d first gotten there. Sleeping there wouldn’t be as miserable as she’d feared.

While she waited for the pie to heat up, Evie went methodically from room to room, looking on every surface, in every drawer and box and closet, grabbing any mail or official-looking papers that might help her assess her mother’s finances. She piled everything she found on the kitchen table.

It was only when the smell of baking chicken pie filled the kitchen that she remembered how often her mother had made them for dinner. How their freezer had been packed with Stouffer’s potpies and Swanson TV dinners and Van de Kamp’s fish sticks.

Evie pulled the pie from the oven, let it cool a bit, and then devoured it directly from the baking tin. After that, she began to sort the papers she’d accumulated. Piece by piece, she fell quickly into a rhythm, separating bills and statements into categories, setting aside the occasional personally addressed envelope, and discarding junk mail and advertising circulars. She’d done this kind of thing countless times when the Historical Society acquired paper archives, separating the wheat from the chaff.

When she had everything categorized and sorted by date, she stopped to assess. REMINDER. PAST DUE. OVERDUE. The words were in bold on envelope after envelope. Water, gas, electricity, heating oil bills: all were at least two months overdue.

And yet there were also envelopes with checks. Social Security. Fireman’s pension. In all, the uncashed checks added up to about fifteen thousand dollars, plenty to pay off unpaid bills.

Evie opened her mother’s latest bank statements. There was only five hundred in checking; a little over four thousand in savings. There’d been no activity in either account since mid-March. No deposits. No withdrawals. No nothing.

She was afraid to open the latest credit card bill. But when she did, she found a zero balance due. Zero! She opened the three earlier statements. Her mother hadn’t even used the credit card in March, when the overdue balance had been more than eight thousand dollars with finance charges accruing to the tune of hundreds of dollars a month. In April that balance had been paid off in full.

How had her mother paid the bill? Evie went back to the bank statements but found no checks corresponding to the payment. And how on earth was her mother managing to keep herself stocked with vodka and cigarettes, never mind cat food for strays, if she wasn’t withdrawing money or using her credit card?