The Hunting Wind: An Alex McKnight Mystery by Steve Hamilton Page A

already!”
    “I’m sure they’d prefer beer!” Mrs. Meisner said.
    “We don’t have any beer!”
    “Please,” I said. “We don’t want to trouble you folks. We just wanted to ask you about Leverette Street.”
    “We used to live there!” Mr. Meisner said. “Here, sit down already! You’re making me nervous standing around! Muriel, turn off the television!”
    We sat down on the couch. Mr. Meisner sat in the chair next to Mrs. Meisner’s wheelchair.
    “Mr. and Mrs. Meisner,” I said. “You were living on Leverette Street in 1971, right?”
    “Yes,” Mr. Meisner said. His voice dropped down a couple notches in volume now that he was sitting down. “We bought that house in 1934, if you can believe it. Right after we got married.” He reached over and took his wife’s hand. “We raised four sons there. Here, you want to see pictures?”
    For the next few minutes, we went through all four of the sons, their wives, the seven grandchildren, and the eleven great-grandchildren.
    “That old house got to be too much for us,” Mr. Meisner said when we were done looking at the pictures. “We had to sell it and move here.”
    “You are so full of crap,” Mrs. Meisner said.
    “Muriel, please, we have company here.”
    “I hate this place,” she said. “Peach Tree Senior Community? There’s not a peach tree within a hundred miles of this place. And please, senior community? Why don’t they just call it a nursing home?”
    “It’s not a nursing home, Muriel. It’s ‘assisted living.’ Would you rather I be back there at the house, mowing the lawn? Shoveling the snow?”
    “You pay a kid to mow the lawn! And shovel the snow!”
    “The ice used to freeze in the gutters, remember? I’d have to get up there and chop it out in the springtime!”
    “Alex’s partner just fell off the roof doing that,” Randy said. “He broke both his ankles.”
    “Do you see?” Mr. Meisner said. “Do you see what happens? Do you want that to be me, falling off the roof and breaking both my ankles?”
    “Mr. Meisner,” I said, “Mrs. Meisner. Do you happen to remember a family that lived down the street from you? The Valeskas?”
    “Valeskas?” Mr. Meisner said. “Muriel, do you remember the Valeskas?”
    “They lived over the Kowalskis. They rented the upstairs, I mean.”
    “The Kowalskis,” Mrs. Meisner said. “We know the Kowalskis.”
    “Mickey Kowalski,” Mr. Meisner said. “And his wife, Martha. We still get Christmas cards from them.”
    “I think he’s sick, isn’t he?”
    “Who, Mickey Kowalski? He’s not sick.”
    “I think he’s sick.”
    “He’s not sick. Don’t listen to my wife.”
    “How about the Valeskas?” I said. “The people who rented the upstairs. Do you remember them?”
    “I don’t remember the Valeskas,” Mr. Meisner said. “Muriel, do you remember the Valeskas?”
    “Valeska, Valeska, Valeska,” she said. “No, doesn’t ring a bell.”
    “She was a spiritual reader,” Randy said. “A fortune-teller.”
    That hit them like a bolt of lightning. “The fortune-teller!” Mrs. Meisner said. “Oh my God, Fred! The fortune-teller!”
    “Yes! Yes!” Mr. Meisner said. “And that family. What was their name?”
    “It was Valeska,” I said. “You remember the family?”
    “Oh good heavens, yes,” Mrs. Meisner said. “My, what a time that was. With that family down the street. And that sign she put out on the sidewalk! You remember, with the big hand?”
    “Yes! The hand!” Mr. Meisner said. “Mickey rented the upstairs to those people. I think they were only there for nine months, maybe ten months. And then they were gone! Just like that! Mickey, he thought they were Gypsies or something.”
    “But they paid their rent,” Mrs. Meisner said. “I remember Martha telling me that. And they kept the place clean.”
    “Ah, but they were the strangest people,” Mr. Meisner said. “The husband—what was his first name?”
    Here it comes, I thought. This