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It doesn’t seem to be anywhere.
“It was just here,” I say, scanning a desktop that contains nothing but a typewriter and a lamp.
“There wasn’t a page in the typewriter,” Detective Vick says, maybe trying to be helpful but coming off smug instead. “Are you sure you didn’t imagine it?”
“I’m sure.” I start opening desk drawers, searching for the page that bore Virginia’s name. It’s not in any of them. Nor is it on the floor. I look to Lenora and say, “You know it was here.”
Her left hand remains atop the typewriter keys, motionless and seemingly useless.
“Tell him I’m not lying, Lenora,” I say, my voice sliding perilously close to outright begging. “Please.”
Detective Vick stands, grabs me by the wrist, and drags me into the hallway, seething.
“Is this some kind of game to you, Kit? Because I didn’t believe a word of what you said about your mother, you’ve decided to toy with me?”
“I’m not toying with you,” I say. “Lenora does know how to type. We spent all of yesterday doing it. She’s been telling me what happened the night her family was murdered. I think she plans on either confessing or telling me who really did it.”
“That’s insane, Kit. The woman can barely sit up. Do you seriously expect me to believe that Lenora Hope is typing her goddamn life story?”
“But it’s the truth!”
“Sure,” Detective Vick says, dripping sarcasm. “Let’s go with that. But why now? After so many years, why has she decided to tell you, of all people, what happened that night?”
“I don’t know. But shehastold me things.” The words tumble out in a mad rush, so desperate am I to have Detective Vick believe me aboutsomething. “About the months leading up to the murders. About her family. And her sister. She said the ghost of her sister has been in her room.”
“You don’t believe that, do you?”
“No,” I say, because I don’t. Not really. Not yet, anyway. “But I do think something is wrong with this place. It’s... not right.”
Detective Vick takes a step back and stares at me, his anger dissolving into something else. It looks like pity.
“We’re done talking, Kit,” he says as he pulls a business card from his pocket and presses it into my hand. “Call me if you ever feel like telling the truth.”
He stalks off down the hall toward the Grand Stairs. I march back into Lenora’s room. Seeing her at the desk, now in full typewriting mode, makes me break one of the cardinal rules of a Gurlain Home Health Aides employee—no swearing at patients.
“What the fuck was that about?”
Lenora, exuding the patience of a saint, nods for me to join her. She then types two words.
im sorry
“You should be. You made me look like a complete liar in front of the detective.”
i had to
“Why?”
it must be a secret
“You knowing how to type needs to be a secret?” I say. “From whom?”
everyone
It would have been nice to know that before I invited Detective Vick up to her room. Now that I do know—and now that I’ve completely blown my chance of him ever believing me about anything—I feel compelled to ask the same questions I think he would have posed.
“Did Mary tell you she was leaving?”
Lenora taps once on the keyboard.