Chapter 4: What Eleanor Knew
The guests were asked to wait in the adjoining sitting room while the investigators worked.
Most of them went quietly.
A few lingered near the doorway, watching the officers photograph the documents on the table, until one of the staff gently guided them through.
Edward didn't move from where he was standing.
The gardener — his name was Daniel — stood near the far wall, still in his work clothes, unsure whether he was allowed to leave or required to stay.
He had said everything he needed to say.
He had shown them the recording.
He didn't know what his role was now.
Edward looked at him across the room.
"Come here," he said.
Daniel walked over slowly.
"Sit down," Edward said.
He pulled out a chair for himself at the same time.
They sat across from each other at the long reception table — the same table where the pitcher had been placed, where the glass had shattered, where the documents now lay in clear evidence bags.
"How old are you?" Edward asked.
"Twenty-four," Daniel said.
Edward nodded slowly.
"You've worked here — how long?"
"Eight months."
"Eight months." Edward looked at the table.
"And in eight months, you saw what I didn't see in three years."
Daniel didn't answer.
There wasn't a good answer to that.
Ruth was seated nearby, a cup of tea someone had brought her cooling in front of her untouched.
One of the investigators sat across from her with a notepad.
"Tell me about the record Eleanor kept," the investigator said.
"She started it about four months before she d*ed," Ruth said.
"She would write things down in the kitchen in the mornings, before anyone else was up.
Small things at first.
Dizziness.
Nausea.
A strange taste she couldn't explain."
"Did she speak to a doctor?"
"Three times.
They told her it was stress.
That she was anxious." Ruth's mouth pressed into a thin line.
"She wasn't an anxious woman.
I knew her for nine years.
She was the steadiest person I've ever met."
"Did she ever say directly that she believed someone was harming her?"
Ruth was quiet for a moment.
"She said to me once — about two weeks before she d*ed — she said, 'Ruth, if I don't wake up one morning, don't let them say it was my heart.'" Ruth looked at her hands.
"I didn't understand what she meant.
Not until after."
"And after she d*ed — why didn't you come forward then?"
"I tried," Ruth said.
Her voice didn't waver, but something behind it did.
"I went to the house three days after the funeral.
Diane was already there.
Already moving things.
I asked to speak with Mr.
Edward and she told me he wasn't receiving visitors.
She told me to leave the property or she would call the police."
She paused.
"I was seventy years old and standing on a gravel driveway with an envelope in my coat pocket.
I went home.
I kept the letter.
I told myself I was waiting for the right moment." She looked up.
"I waited too long.
I know that."
Edward had been listening from across the room.
He stood up and walked over.
"You didn't wait too long," he said quietly.
"You came tonight.
That's what matters."
Ruth looked at him.
Her eyes were steady but not entirely dry.
"She loved you very much," Ruth said.
"That letter — she spent a long time writing it.
She wanted to make sure you understood that she wasn't angry.
She was only frightened."
Edward didn't speak for a moment.
"What did she say in the letter?" the investigator asked.
"Can you summarize?"
Edward reached into his jacket pocket, where he had placed the folded sheet.
"She said she believed Diane had been in the house longer than I knew," he said.
"That the two of them had met before I introduced them.
That she had found a photograph."
He set the letter on the table.
"And she said she was sorry she hadn't told me sooner.
That she was afraid I wouldn't believe her."
The investigator wrote something in his notepad.
Daniel, still seated at the far end of the table, stared at the wall.
He thought about the small container.
The careful stirring.
The smile.
He thought about how long a person had to practice a smile like that before it looked real.
From somewhere deeper in the house came the sound of a door closing.
Then footsteps.
Then a voice — Diane's voice — sharp and controlled, speaking to someone on a phone she had apparently convinced an officer to let her use.
"Get me out of this tonight," she said.
"I don't care what it costs."
The investigator stood up immediately and walked toward the sound.
Edward looked at Ruth.
"She's been planning this for a long time, hasn't she," he said.
It wasn't a question.
May you like
"Yes," Ruth said simply.
"I believe she has."
