When the woman of the house returned a minute or so later, she was still dressed in her robe but had shed the damp towel. As she approached the doorway, she appeared to have had a sudden change of heart as far as I was concerned.
“I’m Shelley Adams, by the way, and you are?”
“J. P. Beaumont,” I replied. “I’m a private investigator.”
“Come in so I can shut the door,” she invited. “Sorry about snapping at you. I have to keep an eye on my husband every minute, and sometimes the pressure gets the best of me. The last I saw, he was sitting there in his room, quiet as can be and watching TV, so I thought it was safe for me to jump in the shower. I had no idea he had somehow located the spot where I kept the key to the dead bolt. He goes wandering, you see, and that’s why I have to keep the doors locked. The last time Roger went walking around barefoot in the snow, it’s a miracle he didn’t come away with frostbite.”
That went a long way to explaining the necessity of using restraints. “I had no idea your husband was ill,” I said. “What’s going on with him, Alzheimer’s?”
Shelley shook her head. “Not exactly,” she answered. “The doctors say it’s some form of early-onset dementia. No cure, of course. We just have to wait it out. As for your missing person? When I realized you were asking about Chris, that little creep from all those years ago, it rubbed me the wrong way. Roger can barely remember his own name these days. How could he possibly remember Chris?”
Dealing with a mentally challenged patient in need of constant supervision was a legitimate explanation for the bruising I’d seen on Roger Adams’s wrist. Suddenly I felt ashamed of the fact that my pocketed cell phone was still busy recording our conversation, but since there was no way to turn it off at that moment, I let it be.
Shelley had ushered me into a wood-paneled living room with a roaring fire burning in an enormous river-rock fireplace. The room was filled with comfortable pieces of well-used, overstuffed leather furniture.
Shelley settled into an easy chair situated in front of the fireplace and motioned me into the matching one next door. As she crossed her legs, the robe fell open slightly, revealing a pair of shapely legs that clearly matched the rest of her. Shelley Adams was a good-looking woman. Even with wet hair and no makeup, she was a natural beauty, with clear skin, good bones, and fine features. I knew from Penny Olmstead that Shelley was considerably younger than her husband, but at this point the difference in ages could have been thirty years rather than half that. Shelley was still youthful and vibrant. Roger was a frail, used-up shell of an old man.
“So what’s all this about Christopher Danielson?” Shelley asked.
“Did you know him?” I wondered.
“We never met in person,” she said, “but I certainly heard about him, and none of it was good. Jack, my first husband, and I were close friends with Roger and Eileen, Rog’s first wife. The four of us had lots of great times together, but our relationships were such that we shared some of the bad stuff, too. As far as Roger and Eileen were concerned, Chris Danielson was bad news.”
“Because he was a high-school dropout or because he and their daughter were expecting a child out of wedlock?” I asked.
“All of the above,” Shelley said with a nod. “Of course, a dozen years later when gender-reveal parties routinely precede both engagements and weddings, that whole premise seems almost quaint, but that was what her parents believed at the time—that their bright, promising daughter was squandering her future on some low-life loser. They wanted her to graduate from high school, go off to college, and do something useful with her life.”
Which is just what she’s done, I thought, and without an ounce of help from either of her parents.
Before I could ask another question, I heard a key turn in the front door and a man and woman let themselves into the house. The pair appeared to be in their thirties or forties and looked a bit sketchy and unkempt. Between them, however, they carried several grocery bags, and Shelley wasn’t the least bit alarmed that they had entered on their own.
“That’s my cousin Nadine and her husband, Duncan,” Shelley explained as the new arrivals disappeared down a hallway without any words of greeting. “They stop by from time to time to help out. This is a big place to manage on my own. Nadine does a lot of the cooking and most of the housework. Dunk handles the firewood supply and makes sure the vehicles are all in good working order. And as long as they’re around, whenever I need a break, I have someone on hand to look after Roger.”