“Socially or financially?” I asked.
“Both,” she said. “Jack had a reputation for being something of a tightwad.”
“Are you and Shelley still good friends?” I asked.
“Not as close as we used to be,” Betsy admitted.
“What happened?”
“Nothing really,” she said. “Once she married Roger, she started moving in a different social circle, and we drifted apart. I still see her around town occasionally, but we’re not that close. In fact, the last time I saw her, sometime last fall, she mentioned Roger was having health issues.”
“Did she give any specifics?” I asked.
Betsy frowned. “I believe she said something about Alzheimer’s, although Roger’s pretty young to be dealing with that.”
The word “Alzheimer’s” grabbed my attention. Shelley had told me Roger was suffering from some form of dementia. My understanding is that those two ailments are two distinctly different propositions.
“Naturally I didn’t ask for any more details.”
“Why not?”
“Religion,” Betsy replied. “That was a big part of why Shelley and I fell out. I’m a nurse—an RN. Sometime after Eileen died, Shelley and Roger walked away from regular medicine and turned to Christian Science instead. I took it personally. People are free to believe whatever they believe, and I should probably have just let it go. But what’s this all about, Mr. Beaumont? I’d hate to think Shelley is in some kind of trouble.”
The Christian Science lie again, with slightly different twist—Alzheimer’s instead of dementia—but I didn’t want to alarm Betsy for fear she might warn her former good friend that I was going around asking questions.
“Not at all,” I fibbed. “I was just wondering if you thought Shelley would have any problem if Danitza showed back up in her father’s life.”
Betsy shook her head. “I can’t imagine why she would.” At that point she paused long enough to check her watch. “Oops,” she said, “I have to go. I’m due at my next patient’s home in ten minutes.”
“Home?” I inquired. “I was under the impression that you worked at a hospice.”
“I do hospice care,” she corrected, “but I do it in my patients’ homes. We don’t have a brick-and-mortar hospice facility here in Homer.” She stood up and gathered her purse. “I hope this was a help.”
“It certainly was,” I told her. “Thank you.”
Once she was gone, I noticed that while I’d been talking to Betsy, Twink had entered the restaurant. I walked over and sat down at her table.
“Do any good?” she asked.
“Not really,” I said. The truth is, I was discouraged. Neither interview had been particularly fruitful, and I felt as though I was just spinning my wheels. And the fact that I was functioning on less than five hours of sleep didn’t help.
“Look,” I said. “How about if you take me back to the hotel and then give yourself some time off and maybe hang out with your friend. If I need you later today, I’ll call. Tonight I’ll treat you to dinner at AJ’s.”
“Sounds good to me,” Twink said. “After all, Sunday is supposed to be a day of rest. As for dinner? I’m ready. I finished up the rest of the leftovers from Simon & Seafort’s yesterday.”
We saddled up and headed back to the Driftwood. Twink seemed to be in a somewhat cheery mood, so I decided to take a risk. “Mind if I ask you something?”
“What’s that?”
“I’m curious. You told me earlier that our relationship had lasted longer than one of your marriages. Is that true or were you just pulling my leg?”
“God’s truth,” Twink replied. “The day after the wedding, I found out the son of a bitch was still married. I messed him up pretty good before I was done with him. Not enough to put him in the hospital, but close enough to make me feel better. After that, I had to hire a lawyer and go to court to get it annulled. Took me six months. Talk about insult to injury.”
“I’ll bet he never tried a stunt like that again.”
“You’d better believe it,” she declared. “He most certainly did not!”
Chapter 26
Back at the hotel, I slipped off my jacket and boots and lay down on the bed to rest both my eyes and my feet. It turns out I’m not accustomed to wearing boots, and I had a suspicion that once I got home to Bellingham, the ones I’d bought in Anchorage would disappear into the far corner of my walk-in closet, never to surface again. By the way, that’s one formula for maintaining marital harmony—separate bathrooms and separate walk-in closets.