Well , I thought, deal with this ⦠I took the four one-hundred-dollar bills from my pocket and fanned them on the desk in front of Marion. She looked at the bills and then at me.
âNothing in writing, remember?â I said. âI never met you. So, I have no professional obligation to you.â
It was an expensive gesture, I know, but I wanted her to be worried about something, if not Thoreau, then me. Well, maybe too expensive. I snatched one of the bills off the desktop and stuffed it into my jacket pocket. âI had some unexpected expenses,â I announced.
I left the office.
âGood-bye, Holland,â C. C. called after me. âIâm sorry things didnât work out.â
NINE
M Y HOUSE IS a two-story Colonial built in 1926 by a well-to-do businessman who paid for its construction with silver dollars. In those days Roseville was all farm country. Now itâs one of the oldest suburbs in the Twin Cities, a bedroom community feeding both Minneapolis and St. Paul, populated by row after row of houses whose most prominent feature seems to be an attached garage. I donât like the suburbs, probably because Iâve never felt comfortable there, and I donât understand how other people can feel comfortable there. Thereâs no connection between the place and the residents, no sense of community. In the city you live on a street, you belong to a neighborhood. Schools, parks, the hamburger joint down the street, the bar up the block, the drugstore on the cornerâthey all become a part of you and you become a part of them, a fusion of identities. The suburbs? You can swap locations, mix and match the houses, change names and it wouldnât matter, no one would notice. In the Cities, you can be an Eastsider or a Highland Parker or a Nordeaster. But you can only live in Roseville.
I moved to Roseville at Lauraâs insistence. She had wanted a suburban neighborhood. Jennifer was still a gleam in our eyes back then. Even so, Laura wanted to live where she insisted the schools were better, the crime was less and the children were safer. So we bought the house, paying more for it than we could afford, even on two incomes. Now I own it outright, having used Lauraâs mortgage-insurance policy to pay it offâfunny, we took out the policy on me to protect her; adding a rider for her was an afterthought. Iâve considered selling the house several times since Laura and Jennifer were killed, only I canât bring myself to put up a F OR S ALE sign under the willow tree in the front yard where Jennifer played. Maybe itâs because the house and whatâs in it is all I have left of themâthat and some photographs Iâve already committed to memory.
I dropped the backpack on the kitchen table, opened it and retrieved the videotape, taking time first to read the note I found wedged in my front door. It was from Heather Schroten-boer. The note said she had come by about seven-thirty as planned and discovered I wasnât home. She guessed I was working and said she would swing by about ten-thirty. It was now 10:23.
I wanted to get to the videotape, but I also had to be ready for Heather. So I left the tape on the table and went upstairs to my bedroom. I unlocked the drawer built into the pedestal of my waterbed, selected a Beretta .380 from the guns I keep there and loaded it carefully. I slipped it into the back pocket of my jeans and went downstairs.
I grabbed a handful of chocolate-chip cookies and the videotape and went into what I used to call the family room when I still had a family. Ogilvy, my gray-and-white French lop-eared rabbit, was waiting for me. I opened his cage and he hopped out. I scratched his nose for a moment and then went to the TV and VCR, turning both on. I slipped the tape into the VCR, grabbed the remote and went to the couch. Ogilvy hopped onto my lap and I petted him some more. âWant to watch a movie?â I asked him. The
âNothing in writing, remember?â I said. âI never met you. So, I have no professional obligation to you.â
It was an expensive gesture, I know, but I wanted her to be worried about something, if not Thoreau, then me. Well, maybe too expensive. I snatched one of the bills off the desktop and stuffed it into my jacket pocket. âI had some unexpected expenses,â I announced.
I left the office.
âGood-bye, Holland,â C. C. called after me. âIâm sorry things didnât work out.â
NINE
M Y HOUSE IS a two-story Colonial built in 1926 by a well-to-do businessman who paid for its construction with silver dollars. In those days Roseville was all farm country. Now itâs one of the oldest suburbs in the Twin Cities, a bedroom community feeding both Minneapolis and St. Paul, populated by row after row of houses whose most prominent feature seems to be an attached garage. I donât like the suburbs, probably because Iâve never felt comfortable there, and I donât understand how other people can feel comfortable there. Thereâs no connection between the place and the residents, no sense of community. In the city you live on a street, you belong to a neighborhood. Schools, parks, the hamburger joint down the street, the bar up the block, the drugstore on the cornerâthey all become a part of you and you become a part of them, a fusion of identities. The suburbs? You can swap locations, mix and match the houses, change names and it wouldnât matter, no one would notice. In the Cities, you can be an Eastsider or a Highland Parker or a Nordeaster. But you can only live in Roseville.
I moved to Roseville at Lauraâs insistence. She had wanted a suburban neighborhood. Jennifer was still a gleam in our eyes back then. Even so, Laura wanted to live where she insisted the schools were better, the crime was less and the children were safer. So we bought the house, paying more for it than we could afford, even on two incomes. Now I own it outright, having used Lauraâs mortgage-insurance policy to pay it offâfunny, we took out the policy on me to protect her; adding a rider for her was an afterthought. Iâve considered selling the house several times since Laura and Jennifer were killed, only I canât bring myself to put up a F OR S ALE sign under the willow tree in the front yard where Jennifer played. Maybe itâs because the house and whatâs in it is all I have left of themâthat and some photographs Iâve already committed to memory.
I dropped the backpack on the kitchen table, opened it and retrieved the videotape, taking time first to read the note I found wedged in my front door. It was from Heather Schroten-boer. The note said she had come by about seven-thirty as planned and discovered I wasnât home. She guessed I was working and said she would swing by about ten-thirty. It was now 10:23.
I wanted to get to the videotape, but I also had to be ready for Heather. So I left the tape on the table and went upstairs to my bedroom. I unlocked the drawer built into the pedestal of my waterbed, selected a Beretta .380 from the guns I keep there and loaded it carefully. I slipped it into the back pocket of my jeans and went downstairs.
I grabbed a handful of chocolate-chip cookies and the videotape and went into what I used to call the family room when I still had a family. Ogilvy, my gray-and-white French lop-eared rabbit, was waiting for me. I opened his cage and he hopped out. I scratched his nose for a moment and then went to the TV and VCR, turning both on. I slipped the tape into the VCR, grabbed the remote and went to the couch. Ogilvy hopped onto my lap and I petted him some more. âWant to watch a movie?â I asked him. The
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