Jill Churchill: Grime and Punishment

“It's this modern permissive society," Thelma was going on. "When standards are allowed to slip, we're all in peril."

“I can't see how that figures, Thelma. We don't even know anything about this woman or why she was killed."

“Mark my words, it'll all come out eventually and you'll see I'm right. Ah, children, your mother has finally come to pick you up," she said as Mike and Katie came out of the second bedroom, which was fitted out as a TV room. Thelma had every video game in the world, part of her insidious campaign to make herself indispensable. She managed, too, by some mysterious process that Jane found highly suspicious, to get rental movies before they were even in the rental shops.

“What's goin' on, Mom?" Mike asked.

“Mother! I was supposed to go to Jenny's after school and Gram said you wouldn't let me," Katie complained.

Jane cast a black look at Thelma, who was smiling fondly on her grandchildren.

“I'll explain on the way home. Get your things," Jane said. "Thelma, I don't know how to thank you for your support."

“It's the least I can do, Jane. After all, they are my own flesh and blood."

“As she drove home ("No, Mike, my nerves are too frayed to ride with you in rush-hourtraffic."), she explained to them what had happened in the most innocuous way she could. Her aim was to make the murder sound like a pure freak of nature that would almost instantly be sorted out, with no danger to them whatsoever. But in her own mind she was deeply troubled. If somebody could commit murder in Shelley's house, they could do it in hers. The first thing she was going to do when she got home was check all the locks.

The kids, however, weren't upset. They were fascinated by the idea of a real live murder next door. To them, it was an adventure, impersonal and exciting, like something on television. Tomorrow they'd be the center of attention at school, famous for their proximity to something so out of the ordinary. They hadn't known the victim, so they had no sense of personal loss. Nor had they had the misfortune of actually viewing death, as Jane had. Best of all, they showed no signs of making any connection with their father. They'd grieved him properly at the time, and still missed him, but this didn't appear to be reactivating their distress, as it had with her.

They're so damned resilient, Jane thought. It must come from having no sense of their own mortality yet.

Shelley came to dinner, and in front of the kids neither she nor Jane discussed the afternoon's events. Todd turned up, filled to the brim with a double cheese Whopper and fries and content to listen to Mike and Katie's account without taking much interest. Eventually they all wandered off to their separate pursuits, and Jane and Shelley were left to sit over the remnants of the makeshift dinner.

“You'll stay here tonight?" Jane said. It was halfway between an invitation and an order.

“Thanks, I'm planning to. Mary Ellen Revere invited me to stay at her house and I lied and said I'd already agreed to stay here. I know I've got to get it over with, sleeping in that house, but not until Paul gets back tomorrow. He tried to get a flight tonight and couldn't. I called my sister and told her that, if this isn't solved by the time they're ready to come back, I want her to keep the kids a little longer. Jane, why do you suppose this happened?"

“I have no idea. I guess it could have been someone that woman knew."

“But why? And how would the killer have known she was at my house? As I understand it, she didn't even know where she'd be until she reported in to work early this morning. The Happy Helper man called a while ago. He said she's a 'floater,' a worker with no regular assignment but to fill in. Like a substitute teacher."

“Well, there's always the wandering maniac theory. That's what Thelma thinks — somebody whose lack of moral fiber pushed them over the brink."

“The next stage after growing hair on the palms of your hands? Murdering cleaning ladies? Forget wandering maniacs. You know as well as I do this is a neighborhood of devoted snoops. You can't even go for a walk without somebody alerting the police. If you aren't decked out like a full-fledged jogger, you're assumed to be a criminal. How would this maniachave cruised around the neighborhood without being noticed?"

“You know what you're saying, don't you? That it had to be someone familiar. Someone from the neighborhood.”

Shelley's eyes widened. "Not necessarily, Jane. It could have been someone who looked like they had business around here. A TV repair truck or a Sears van or a gas meter reader in a uniform."

“Shelley, what would be the point? There would be no reason to go to all the trouble of disguising himself just to kill her in your house instead of her own."

“There is that, of course. Well, then we have to consider that he didn't want to kill her. Suppose it was someone who came to rob the house."

“Was anything stolen?"

“No, nothing was touched, apparently. I haven't searched everything, of course, but it doesn't look like anything's been torn apart or dumped out, as if someone had been rummaging for valuables.”

Jane had to take her word on this. If you moved so much as an ashtray in Shelley's house, she noticed immediately.

“So why kill her and not take anything?”

“Maybe she caught him coming in?"

“While she was vacuuming the guest room?"

“Jane, you're just picking apart everything I suggest as a possibility," Shelley said with a hint of anger. "What do you think could have happened?"

“I'm sorry. I don't know. But, by damn, I'm going to find out. We're all in danger until we know who it was and why. If someone could come in your house, murder someone, and leave right under our noses, it could happen again."

“But why would it happen again? Why did it happen this time? I just keep asking myself the same questions over and over."

“All right. Let's get organized about this. I read a lot of mystery books and I know all about motives. I'll make a list and then we'll cross them off one by one. Whichever one's left has to be the right answer."

“Somehow, I don't think it's quite that easy," Shelley disagreed. You make it sound like a computer course."

“You'll see," Jane assured her, getting out the notepad and a stub of pencil. "Since it didn't look like robbery, let's assume for the moment that somebody meant to kill her. Now, what are the reasons for murder. Greed. That's usual."

“I doubt that a cleaning lady had a vast fortune for someone to inherit, otherwise she'd own the company. And she didn't seem to be wearing a strand of emeralds or anything that I noticed."

“True, but it might have been greed for something in your house."

“But I told you, nothing was taken."

“Still, it might have been that the murderer meant to take something and just didn't get it. Suppose he'd gone in and determined to kill anybody who was there and then rob the place, and just as he killed her, he heard you coming in?”

She was immediately sorry she'd suggested it.

Shelley hugged herself. "Could I have actually been in the house with the killer? No, Jane. That doesn't work. If he didn't mind killing her, he wouldn't have minded killing me. And how would he have gotten away? If he'd jumped from a second-story window, he'd have been bound to hurt himself, and the police checked all around the house for signs of things like that. If he didn't go out the window, he'd had to have come downstairs, and I could see the stairway from the time I came in the kitchen. I wasn't looking at it, but I would have certainly noticed anyone coming down."

“Okay, cross off greed. It was just a suggestion. Reasons for murder. Greed, fear—"