A Stranger in the House Read online

  But the obvious intelligence in the detective’s eyes unnerves her, and she says, a little too quickly, “I’m sure you know this already from the other police officers investigating the accident, but I don’t remember anything about it.” She thinks how ridiculous that sounds. She flushes slightly.

  “We did hear that, yes,” the detective says.

  He appears relaxed, but alert. She feels like she can’t put anything past this man. She’s suddenly very nervous.

  “Actually, it isn’t the accident, per se, that we’re interested in.”

  At this, Karen feels all the blood drain from her face. She’s sure they can both see it, her sudden, damning pallor.

  “No?” she manages to say.

  “No. We’re investigating something else. Something that happened not far from where you had your accident, we think at around the same time.”

  Karen says nothing.

  “A man was murdered.”

  Murdered. She tries to keep her face neutral, but suspects she has failed miserably. “What could that possibly have to do with me?” she asks.

  “That’s what we’re trying to find out,” Detective Rasbach says.

  “I don’t remember anything about that night,” she protests. “I’m sorry, but you’re probably wasting your time.”

  “Nothing?” the detective asks. He obviously doesn’t believe her. She looks at the other detective beside him. He doesn’t believe her either.

  She shakes her head.

  “Maybe we can help you remember,” Rasbach says.

  She stares back at him, frightened. She’s glad Tom isn’t here. Then she wishes that he were.

  “We believe you were at the murder scene.”

  “What?” She feels faint.

  “We found a pair of rubber gloves at the scene,” the other detective tells her.

  She’s dizzy now, and her heart is pounding. She feels herself blinking rapidly.

  “Are you perhaps missing a pair of pink rubber gloves, the kind you might use for washing dishes?” Rasbach asks.

  She lifts her head, straightens her back. “No, I’m not,” she says convincingly. But she knows her gloves are missing, she was looking for them yesterday. She has no idea where they’ve gone. She’d asked Tom, but he hadn’t known either. She has the sudden courage of someone with a very strong survival instinct who is backed into a corner. “Why would you think they’re mine?” she asks coolly.

  “It’s quite simple, really,” the detective says. “The gloves were found near the murder scene, in a parking lot close by.”

  She says, “I still don’t see what that has to do with me. I never had any pink gloves.”

  The detective says, “The gloves were run over, in that parking lot, by a car. Tire track evidence—it’s almost like fingerprints. Your car has the same kind of tires as the ones that made the tracks in that parking lot. I think you ran over those gloves—in that parking lot. And then you fled—and had an accident in that car around the approximate time of the murder.” He pauses, leans forward slightly. “I think you’ve got a problem.”

  —

  As Tom pulls into the driveway, he wonders whose car that is, sitting in front of his house. A plain, newer sedan; nobody he knows. He gets out of his own car and looks at the one in the street uneasily. Who would be visiting his wife? He hates the suspicion that he feels. Apprehensive, Tom hurries up the steps.

  He opens the door quickly and immediately sees two men in suits sitting in his living room.

  “Tom!” Karen says, turning her head around, clearly startled. Her expression is confusing, a mix of relief and fear. He can’t tell if she’s happy, or horrified, to see him. Maybe a bit of both.

  “What’s going on?” Tom asks to the room at large.

  The two men remain silent, watching from their seats, as if waiting to see what his wife will tell him. Tom is anxious. He wonders if they’re insurance people, here about the accident. He doesn’t need any more bad news.

  “These two men are police detectives,” Karen tells him with a slightly warning look. “They’re here about . . . the other night,” she says.

  The two men stand up in unison. “I’m Detective Rasbach,” says the taller man, flashing his badge. “This is Detective Jennings.”

  “Do we have to do this now?” Tom says a little rudely, coming farther into the living room. He wants his old life back. “Can’t it wait? Our lawyer said he was going to put things off until she got her memory back.”

  “I’m afraid we’re not here about the car accident,” Detective Rasbach says.

  Tom feels a sudden weakness in his legs. His heart revs sharply. He needs to sit down. He sinks onto the sofa next to Karen. He realizes that he’s been waiting for something like this to happen. In his heart, he knew there was more to this story. He feels like he’s opened a wrong door somewhere and ended up in some other life, one that doesn’t make any sense, peopled by impostors.

  Tom looks guardedly at the two detectives. He glances nervously at Karen, but she isn’t looking at him.

  When no one speaks for a moment, Detective Rasbach says, “We were just telling your wife—we’re investigating a murder that occurred not far from where she had her accident.”

  A murder.

  Karen turns to him abruptly and says, “They want to know if we’re missing any rubber gloves, but I’ve already told them we aren’t.”

  Tom looks back at her, his heart lurching. He shakes his head. Time seems to slow down. “Rubber gloves? No, we’re not missing anything like that,” he says. He feels light-headed, and can taste the bile rising in his throat. He turns to the detective. “Why?” Tom knows he’s a terrible actor. The detective with the sharp eyes seems to see right through him. The detective knows he’s lying.

  “We found a pair of pink rubber dishwashing gloves near the murder scene.” Rasbach adds, “With a flowered pattern up near the elbows.”

  Tom hears this almost as if he’s hearing it from a distance. He feels very detached. He frowns. Everything seems to be happening in slow motion. “We never had any pink rubber gloves,” he says. He watches Karen turn away from him back to the detective. Jesus. He’s just lied to these detectives. What the hell is going on?

  “It doesn’t matter too much where the gloves came from, frankly, or whose they were,” the detective says. “What’s important is that the tire tracks on those gloves and near the scene of the murder match the tires of your wife’s car. Putting her near the murder scene shortly before she had her accident.” He turns to Karen and says, “You were driving very fast, apparently.” The detective leans forward and adds, “A little convenient, having amnesia.”

  “Don’t insult me, detective,” Karen says, and Tom stares at her in shock. He would never have believed she was capable of such sangfroid. It’s as if he’s looking at a stranger.

  “Don’t you want to know who was murdered?” Detective Rasbach asks. He’s toying with them. “Or do you know already?” he adds, staring at Karen.

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Karen says. “And neither does my husband. So why don’t you stop playing games and tell us?”

  Rasbach looks back at her, unruffled. “A man was shot three times—twice in the face and once in the chest, at close range—in a deserted restaurant on Hoffman Street. We know that your car was near the murder scene. We were rather hoping you could fill us in,” he says.

  Tom feels physically ill. He can’t believe they’re having this conversation, in his own living room. He was sitting in this very spot just a few days ago when the police came to tell him that there’d been an accident. Given the circumstances of that accident, he hadn’t believed the driver could be his wife. But it was. Now this. What is he to believe this time?

  “Who was he?” Karen asks. “The man who was murdered?”

  She�
��s very pale, Tom thinks, but her voice is steady. She’s remarkably composed. It’s almost as if he’s watching someone else, an actor, playing his wife.

  “We don’t know,” the detective admits. Then he reaches into an envelope and says, “Would you like to see a picture?” It’s not really a question.

  Tom still feels like everything is happening in slow motion. The detective places a photograph on the coffee table and rotates it so that he and Karen are looking at it right-side up. It’s the distorted face of a man with bullet holes in his forehead and cheek. The dead man’s eyes are open, expressing what looks like surprise. Tom instinctively recoils. The detective places a second photo beside the first. This one shows his bloated body with blood splattered all over the chest. The photos are revolting, disturbing. Tom can’t help it, he glances at his wife—she is so still she looks like she has stopped breathing—then he quickly looks away. He can’t bear to look at his own wife.

  “Is that jogging any memories for you?” the detective asks her a little flippantly. “Do you recognize him?”

  She stares at the photos, as if studying them, and slowly shakes her head. “No. Not at all.”

  The detective looks as though he doesn’t believe her. “How do you explain your car being near the scene?” he asks.

  “I don’t know.” A note of desperation has finally crept into Karen’s voice. “Maybe someone hijacked my car, and made me wait there, as a getaway driver,” she says. “And . . . maybe I managed to get away and that’s why I was driving so fast.”

  Detective Rasbach nods, as if he appreciates her creative efforts.

  Tom desperately thinks, It’s possible. Isn’t it?

  “What other evidence do you have?” Karen asks boldly.

  “Ahh,” Detective Rasbach says, “that I’m not prepared to say.” He gathers up the photographs, glances at his partner, and starts to rise. Karen and Tom stand up. Rasbach takes a business card out of his suit pocket and offers it to Karen. She takes it from him, looks at it, then places it on the glass coffee table.

  “Thank you for your time,” the detective says, and the two men leave, Karen shutting the door behind them. Tom, filled with dread, stands shell-shocked near the sofa. Karen comes back into the living room, and their eyes meet.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Rasbach reflects on the interview in the passenger seat of the car as Jennings drives them back to the station. Karen Krupp is hiding something. She was admirably self-possessed on the surface, but she was panicked underneath.

  He believes she was there, very close to the murder scene, presumably around the time of the murder—although that’s a pretty big presumption at this point, as their estimated time of death is necessarily broad. But he’s convinced the timing of the two events is the same. What was she doing there?

  The husband is a lousy liar, Rasbach thinks, remembering his demeanor during the interview. He’s certain the Krupps are missing a pair of pink rubber gloves.

  Someone must have seen Karen Krupp leaving the house that night. They need to know whether she was alone. Rasbach decides to return to Henry Park later that evening to talk to the neighbors. And they’ll need all the Krupps’ phone records, too. Maybe she got a call. They will look very thoroughly into Karen Krupp.

  He leans back in the passenger seat, rather pleased. The case has taken an interesting turn. He loves it when that happens.

  —

  Tom, horrified, stares accusingly at his wife. He has just lied to the police for her. The woman he loves. What has she done? His heart twists painfully.

  “Tom,” she says, and then stops, as if she can’t think of what to say next. As if she can’t possibly explain.

  He wonders if she really can’t explain, or if she’s faking it all. He believed her in the beginning, believed that she couldn’t remember. But now he doesn’t know. It certainly looks like she has something to hide. “What the hell’s going on, Karen?” Tom asks. His voice sounds cold, but inside he’s feeling desperate.

  “I don’t know,” she says fervently. Her eyes well up with tears.

  She’s so convincing. He wants to be convinced, but he can’t quite believe her.

  “I think you know more than you’re letting on,” he says. She stands motionless in front of him, straight-backed, as if daring him to say what he really thinks. But he can’t. He can’t accuse her of . . . of murder.

  My God, what has she done?

  “You lied to the detectives,” he says. “About the gloves.”

  “So did you,” she says sharply.

  This shocks him; it’s like a slap across the face. He hardly knows how to respond. Then he says, in a fury, “I did it to protect you! I didn’t know what else to do! I don’t know what the hell’s going on!”

  “Exactly!” she snaps back at him. She walks a few steps closer, never taking her eyes off his. They’re within arm’s reach of each other. “That’s my point,” she says, less confrontational now. “I don’t know what’s going on either. I lied about the gloves because I didn’t know what else to do—the same as you.”

  Tom stares back at her in dumb shock. Finally he says, “Whether you remember it or not, those are probably your gloves, and we both know it. At a murder scene. Why were you at a murder scene, Karen?” When she doesn’t answer, he continues, appalled at what’s happening. “They have evidence! That you were at the scene of a horrible crime!” He can’t believe that he’s saying this, to Karen, the woman he loves. He runs a frantic hand through his hair. “That detective obviously thinks you did it, he thinks you killed that man. Did you? Did you shoot him?”

  “I don’t know!” she cries, desperation in her voice. “That’s the best I can do right now, Tom. I’m sorry. I know it isn’t good enough. I don’t know what happened. You must believe me.”

  He glares back at her, not knowing what to think. He feels life as he knows it slipping away from him.

  She looks at him, her eyes steadily on his. “Do you really think I’m capable of killing someone? Do you really think I’m capable of murder?”

  No. He can’t imagine her killing anyone. The idea is . . . ridiculous. Monstrous. And yet—

  “He’s coming after you, Karen,” Tom says, stricken. “You saw what he was like, that detective. He’s going to dig and dig and he won’t quit until he gets to the bottom of this. It won’t even matter that you can’t remember. You won’t have to—the police will find out what happened, and they’ll tell us!” He’s almost shouting now. He’s trying to hurt her, because he’s scared, and he’s angry and he can’t trust her anymore.

  She’s even more ashen now than when the detectives were here. “If you don’t believe me, Tom . . .” She leaves it there, hanging in the air, waiting for him to protest, to say that he believes her. The silence drags on, but he doesn’t say it. “Why don’t you believe me?” she asks finally.

  “What a question,” he says roughly.

  “It’s a valid question,” she persists. She’s angry now, too. “What have I ever done that would let you believe that I could kill someone in cold blood?” She steps closer. Tom watches her but says nothing. “You know me! How can you think I’m even capable of something like murder? I don’t know what happened that night any more than you do.” Now her face is up close, just below his; he can smell the faint perfume of her skin.

  She presses. “What ever happened to innocent until proven guilty?” She’s breathing rapidly, her face close to his. “You don’t know what happened, so why can’t you believe that I’m innocent in all this? Tell me, is that any more far-fetched, any more insane, than that I shot someone and left him for dead?” Now she is almost shouting.

  Tom looks back at her, his heart tight. In all the time he’s known her, and loved her, he’s never had even the slightest reason to doubt her, about anything. It all comes down to that night. What really happened? Doesn’t he owe
her something for that complete trust?

  He shakes his head. In a lower voice, he says, “The police come in here, accusing you . . . you lie in front of them . . . I don’t know, Karen.” He pauses. “I love you. But I’m scared.”

  “I know,” she says. “I’m scared, too.”

  Neither of them speaks for a moment. Then Karen says, “Maybe it’s time to go back to Jack Calvin.”

  —

  That evening Karen sits quietly in the living room, a magazine lying ignored on her lap. Tomorrow night will be exactly one week since her accident. A week, and she still can’t remember anything.

  The afternoon had been terrifying. The police—that cold-blooded detective—had practically accused her of murder. And Tom—Tom seems to believe she might have done it.

  She’s afraid of the police, afraid of what they might find out. Afraid of what Dr. Fulton might tell them.

  She realizes that she’s clenching her teeth and tries to relax. Her jaw aches.

  The photographs—Karen can’t get the grisly images out of her mind. She thinks of Tom, upstairs in his office, closeted away with some work he brought home. Or is he just pretending, like her? Is he sitting at his desk staring at the wall, unable to get the images of the dead man out of his mind, too? Probably. He looked sick when he saw the photos. And then after, he wouldn’t even look at her.

  Now she glances out the front window and starts. She sees two men in suits at the door of a house across the street. Even in the near dark she recognizes the two detectives again. With a feeling of encroaching horror, Karen walks over to the window, staying close to the wall. When she gets to the window, she stands behind the curtain, looking out.

  They’re interviewing the neighbors. Of course.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Brigid looks out at the street. Darkness is falling. She spends a lot of time here, with her knitting, watching what goes on outside her window.