Zigzag by Bill Pronzini Page B

away. She didn’t say where and I didn’t ask.”
    One more piece to fill out the pattern. “Leaving right away?”
    â€œI suppose so. She didn’t tell me that, either.” Another breathy sigh. “I’ll tell you this: I won’t miss her in the long run. She wasn’t the best employee I’ve ever had. Not dishonest, like some, but snotty and snappish to the customers sometimes. Late opening up, too, I had more than one complaint about that. But you take what help you can get these days. I suppose she owes somebody money?”
    â€œâ€¦ Money?”
    â€œWhy you want to see her. The business matter you spoke of.”
    I said, “She owes somebody something, that’s for sure,” and left the woman frowning and running a hand through her hair as if she was petting the black-pelt thing.

 
    14
    The rain had slackened into a misty drizzle when I reached the bridge that spans the river near Monte Rio. The wide sandy beach below it on either side was a popular swimming and picnicking spot during the summer months; not much of it was visible now, with the water level up from the recent rains. Once you crossed the bridge, the main road looped to the right into and through the village center, but that was not the way I went. I’d programmed Marie Seldon’s address into the GPS, and the disembodied voice I still found vaguely annoying directed me past the turning and onto Old Wood Road, a narrow strip of pitted asphalt that stretched east along the river.
    As soon as I made the turn I remembered that I’d been down this road once before, on an exploratory drive with Kerry and Emily one long-ago Sunday, and had forgotten its name. It ran for half a mile or so before dead-ending and was lined with a mixed bag of dwellings, most of them on high grassy banks crowded with pine and rock maple and wild grape that overlooked the river. Rustic cottages large and small, summer homes behind fences and screens of shrubbery, a small, closed resort that had once served food and hosted dances. The area’s old-time atmosphere had been palpable enough on a sunny summer day; winter desertion and the gloomy weather created the fanciful impression that I had passed through a time warp into the 1950s.
    Marie Seldon’s residence was not on the riverfront, but one of a short, staggered row of small cottages at the edge of a pine forest on the inland side. They were all identical in old age, size, and design—resort cottages, probably, that had been turned into rental units. The one that bore her number was partially coated with thick twists of ivy along one side. And it looked as though I’d gotten lucky: a car, an elderly yellow four-door Ford Focus hatchback with the hatch raised, was backed up close in front on an unpaved driveway. If the vehicle was hers, then she was still here.
    Right. I had confirmation five seconds after I pulled over onto the grassy verge. The front door opened and out she came, a somewhat chunky blonde in a black windbreaker, toting a large cardboard box.
    Her attention was on loading the carton into the back of the Ford; she didn’t notice me until I was a third of the way up along the edge of the muddy lane. When she did see me she froze, one hand up on the hatchback lid as if she’d been about to close it. The nearer I got to her, the surer she was that she’d never seen me before and the surer I was that she did not want anything to do with a stranger. Her stance was rigid, her broad mouth set tight, her stare both hostile and wary.
    â€œWho’re you? What do you want?”
    She flung the words at me when I reached the Ford’s nose, but I kept on going to where she stood before I answered. The car’s rear seats had been folded down, I saw, and the space behind the front seats was packed with suitcases, cartons, clothing on hangers.
    â€œMarie Seldon?”
    â€œSo what if I am?” She had a hard, abrasive