Sammie was sitting at the small table by the window, leafing through a thin pile of papers and letters. “Nothing here, either. Mostly insurance forms, bills, official correspondence. Some junk mail she kept. There’re a few family pictures, including a group shot-looks like a reunion-but no personal letters. The best I could find was an address book. Not too many entries, but I’ll chase them all down.”
Emerging from the bottom of the one closet, Ron merely gave me a shake of the head.
“Okay,” I told them. “I’m going to find Annabelle Tuttle, the listed next of kin. I’ll see you all at the office.” I checked my watch. “Let’s shoot for a noon meeting. Supposedly, Dr. Riley’s coming over. If one of you could get a statement from him, that’d be great.”
As I entered the building’s lobby from the stairwell a few minutes later, a harassed-looking man, his hair tousled and his coat unbuttoned, came banging through the glass-paned double doors.
I took a guess. “Dr. Riley?”
He stopped dead in his tracks. “Yes.”
“I’m Lieutenant Gunther-Bratt PD-”
Before I could get any more out, he interrupted me by grabbing my arm, stepping close and asking in a hoarse whisper, “What the hell’s going on? I heard Adele Sawyer’s death was being called a homicide-that I screwed up the death certificate.”
I considered soothing him, pointing out that the postmortem results hadn’t come in yet. But then I decided to hell with it. I didn’t like the priority of his concerns. “You did.”
His face went slack and his cheeks reddened.
I relented a bit. “Look, nobody’s going after you. The mortician noticed some bruises around the neck. My forensics guy told me they probably surfaced after rigor mortis began setting in and the blood drained away from the neck area. She normally had a flushed complexion, right?”
“Yes-it was tied in with her breathing problems.”
“That’s what hid the bruises. The missed cause of death is no big deal-since we caught it-but you might want to be more careful next time.”
He stiffened slightly but took it without comment, which I appreciated. From his opening line, I’d figured him for more bluster. “The problem now,” I continued, “is to find out who killed her. Was she one of your regular patients?”
“I’ve been treating her for about five years.”
“A joyride?”
His pinched face cracked a thin smile. “I guess you’ve heard about her. Pretty unpleasant person.”
“How long had she been dead when you got here?”
He frowned. “She’d definitely begun to cool, but there were no signs of rigor. I’d guess two or three hours at most.”
“Anything unusual about her medical history?”
“Nothing a little physical self-respect wouldn’t have headed off. She smoked, ate poorly, never exercised, and was in a constant rage. Whoever killed her obviously had no patience-another six months and she would’ve spared him the effort.”
“Is that a medical estimate?” I asked.
The smile returned. “Probably more like wishful thinking, if that doesn’t put me on the suspect list. She should’ve been dead years ago, so I suppose she might’ve lasted a few more. The autopsy will give you the best answer to that one.”
Given all of Brattleboro’s neighborhoods, Spruce Street was purely middle ground. Shoved up hard against a hilly, wood-choked wilderness area, it contained a few solid, vaguely stately homes, scattered among a wider sampling of more bedraggled, tenacious, middle-class residences, pristine examples of which had been popular in family-hour TV shows in the fifties. Annabelle Tuttle lived in one of these.
I parked across the street from her address and looked at the building for a moment, studying the peeling paint, the odd shutter or two in need of repair, the furrow carved in the snow from porch to driveway, the width of one shovel. I guessed the occupant to be single, living alone, no longer young, and on a diminished income.
I got out, navigated the narrow path to the weather-beaten porch, and pushed the doorbell.
The woman who opened up a minute later was white-haired, slightly stooped, and looked permanently fatigued.
“Mrs. Tuttle? My name is Joe Gunther. I’m from the Brattleboro Police Department. I was wondering if I could have a word with you.”
She registered no surprise, but stood back to let me in, shivering slightly in the draft of cold air that accompanied me. “I suppose this is about Adele. They called me already.”
I stood in the overheated hallway, wondering if I should presume to remove my coat. My hostess made none of the usual gestures to indicate I was invited to stay. “That was last night?”
She let out a tiny snort of derision. “More like two o’clock this morning.”
“Right. We were wondering why you hadn’t come by the Skyview to pick up her things, or contact Guillaume’s to see about the arrangements.”
She was a short woman and had been gazing at the middle button of my coat so far, but at that, she looked up my frame and nailed me with a hard stare. “That’s a concern of yours?”
“It’s a source of curiosity. You’re the only one listed as next of kin.”
“Sisters,” she said, as if talking about the flu. “We weren’t close.”
“All that’s left of the family?”
The snort was repeated. “The family’s large enough. I was the only one who volunteered to be contacted. The nursing home had to have someone to call. Why are you so interested?”
For the sake of form, I took a shot at solicitude, although I doubted it was necessary. “Mrs. Tuttle, I’m afraid I may have some shocking news. Would you like to sit down?”
“No.” Her eyes on me didn’t waver; her face didn’t change expression.
“We don’t think your sister died of natural causes. She was murdered-strangled to death.”
I’d added the last bit for effect, but all it registered was a bitter half-smile. “One of her housemates, no doubt.” She sighed, and then added, “Maybe I will have that seat. Come.”
I followed her into the living room, gratefully removing my coat. We sat on opposing hard, straight-backed couches. She seemed as composed as ever-just a bit more tired. I thought perhaps the brevity that had so offended Sue Pasco on the phone may have been merely weariness and economy.
“My sister,” she began, “was an angry, disappointed woman. She married badly twice in a row, had three kids who won’t talk to her anymore, and got fired from every job she ever had because of her mouth. Every comment was taken as an insult, every look was an accusation. To say nobody loved her misses the point. Nobody even liked her, including me.”
I sat there in silence for a moment, wondering when I’d last heard such an eloquent and devastating tribute. “Apart from you, did she keep in touch with any other family members?”
“No. And she didn’t with me, either. The Skyview put my name on her application form-she didn’t. Who killed her?”
The bluntness of the question caught me by surprise. “We don’t know yet. I was hoping you might be able to help us with that.”
“I never visited her-never knew any of the people she was living with.”
“I was thinking more of outsiders-someone who might have come to see her.”
“I don’t know who that could have been. I doubt she had any friends, and I already told you about the family.”
“How about her possessions? Did she have any property or assets that might benefit anyone?”
Annabelle Tuttle shrugged and sighed, focusing on a distant chair. “No-everything she had was in that room. She had no money. I paid for a few things-a pair of slippers or some new underwear-but it never came to much. To be cruelly honest, she was always a burden, and it looks like she still is, even in death.”
I stole a glance at my watch, realizing the time for the staff meeting I’d asked for was drawing near. I stood up. “Are you the only family member who lives in the area?”