The Stranger in the Attic

by Agnes Makoczy

  “We should be getting closer,” Oscar said. “I see something in the distance. That way,” he said, pointing at something that Alfred couldn’t see.

  “I can’t see much of anything,” Alfred said. “My eyes are terrible. I can’t even see a horse at five feet.”

  Chapter 30. Paintings

  Meantime, Henrietta decided that she couldn’t keep looking at her precious paintings from the attic, piled up in a corner of the landing. How many times had she asked Alfie to bring them down? But Alfie had become soft and lazy. Every time, his answer had been, sure, later. How many days ago had that been? It was time to do something about them.

  Still troubled by her earlier encounter with the lodger, she climbed the stairs quietly, barefoot, stepping softly on the rungs so that the old wood wouldn’t creak.

  At the top of the stairs, she stopped to rest and listened, like a scared rabbit. An absolute silence came from behind the attic door and she wondered what George Baxter did when he wasn’t reading the Bible.

  Walking softly, so that the lodger wouldn’t hear her, she approached the paintings, casting many glances behind her. It would take her several trips to bring all those paintings down. But she didn’t care. All she knew was that she didn’t want them anywhere near George Baxter.

  She struggled in silence, trying not to pant aloud, carrying her beloved paintings two by two. When she was done, she sat down on her bed exhausted. The tenant had begun muttering to himself again. She couldn’t make out the words, but she could hear him. She had the feeling that he was reading from her Bible again.

  Well, he was one strange man, for sure, but she’d learn to live with him. She wanted to make sure that he was happy so that he would stay for a long time.

  She walked to her dresser and looked at herself in the mirror. He had called her Henrietta, and not Mrs. Jones. It disturbed her, especially when he came close to her and looked deeply into her eyes while saying her name.

  She looked in the mirror but became sad right away. The years with Alfred hadn’t been kind to her. It was an old woman who stared back forlornly at her. Her hands went up to her hair and she picked the voluminous locks into a messy bun. The updo favored the heart shape of her face and made her look years younger.

  She was about to let the hair fall back onto her shoulders, but she decided against it. She had some hairpins somewhere. Yes, why not wear her hair up, as she used to when she was younger?

  She fumbled with the pins and the hair for a few minutes until the outcome satisfied her. She turned one way and then the other, inspecting the results, now thinking that perhaps she shouldn’t dress so dumpy all the time. She went to her armoire and rummaged until she found something she hadn’t worn in a long time.

  Blushing a little, she wondered what George Baxter would think when he saw her hair up like that. She giggled and smiled at the silly old woman staring back at her. And then, as if she were years younger, she skipped down the stairs, dreaming of what she would cook her lodger for lunch.

  Chapter 31. The Hunting Lodge

  Alfred followed Oscar across an endless white wilderness, dragging his legs, struggling with the snow that at times reached his knees. He was crazy to be out here instead of at home, sipping on his morning coffee. Had he gone mad?

  He was exhausted, fighting for breath. When he finally decided that he could go no further, he looked up and sighted the scene of the crime. It wasn’t much to write home about. Barely two police cars, a forensics van, and a half dozen people who were stationed in front of what Oscar had called the Hunting Lodge. Nowhere near the display of activity he expected to be awaiting them.

  The Hunting Lodge too was a disappointment. It was no more than a ramshackle two-story rotting building that bore very little resemblance to what Alfred had expected to be a regal “Hunting Lodge”.

  Greenish with mold as the dying shrubbery around it and covered with an ivy that had somehow managed to survive the brutal winter, its roof was laden heavily with snow. It looked more like a high-school haunted house than a murder scene, a cliché of a scary place. But knowing that there must be a dead woman inside terrified Alfred who—after seeing the bloated and disfigured body of his dead mother—never wanted to see another dead body as long as he lived.

  He regretted coming with Oscar. He wanted no part of this. Remembering his dead mother had sucked the joy out of an early morning adventure that had already gone stale. He had no interest in seeing a decomposing body, although Oscar assured him that it wouldn’t actually be visibly decomposing yet because of the extreme cold of the last few days. He lamented the whole thing and wanted out. But what bothered Alfred to no end was his friend’s behavior.

  Why did Oscar know so much about such matters? He—himself— had worked at the police station for a while, and even though he had picked up some knowledge of procedure here and there, he knew nothing about violent crimes as such.

  The wind shrieked wildly at the back of the park, and as they approached the Hunting Lodge, keeping low, they struggled with the snowbanks and the dead branches of the shrubbery that surrounded the derelict building. It was a strangely silent scene. Men in hazmat-looking white suits coming and going, mingled with the policemen in blue uniforms. Despite the intensity of the occasion, the scene was oddly silent. No words carried toward them on the wind.

  It had begun to snow again. And it was getting colder. Alfred was pondering whether to turn around and go back home although he had no idea how he would find his way back. The white vast nothingness that surrounded him was oddly disorienting. But he figured that all he had to do was backtrack on their footsteps, hopefully before the falling snow obliterated their tracks.

  He turned around to look at Oscar who huddled behind the bush next to him, his whole body slanting forward with excitement. Their eyes met for an instant and he noticed that Oscar’s eyes were shiny, and a trickle of saliva had visibly begun to ice at the corner of his mouth.

  Alfred felt disgust. This wasn’t like him, this ogling at a murder scene. He leaned toward Oscar to whisper to him that he was leaving when he noticed that the front door of the lodge was propped wide open and a stretcher appeared out of the dark interior.

  He sensed more than saw his friend come to attention. Oscar grabbed his arm and told him to look.

  “They’re bringing her out, Alfred. We got here right on time.”

  “I don’t have the stomach for this, Oscar,” he told his friend. “I’m going to head back.”

  “All right but look. You can almost see her.”

  “That’s the thing. I don’t want to see her. I prefer my women alive.”

  “Oh, you’re in a rare form today, my friend,” Oscar said and chuckled.

  “See you later, buddy,” he said and got up to leave. But that second, Oscar gasped, and he turned back around. One of the men holding the stretcher had stumbled on something and rocked it. As the men tried to regain control of the gurney, the body shook and the sheet covering it shifted.

  “Look, Alfred, look,” Oscar said with trembling voice pulling Alfred back down. He pointed toward the lodge.

  Alfred looked, wanting but not wanting to see what was going on, and he was horrified despite himself. An arm had slipped out from under the sheet and hung dangling from side to side as they carried it, and a part of the head now showed. As they walked toward an unmarked black van, a cascade of magnificent red hair tumbled down to the side.

  “Oh my God, Alfred, do you see that splendid red hair?”

  Disgusted, unable to take it any longer, Alfred turned and left. But not before noticing how Oscar was shaking with excitement at the sight of the dead woman. What was wrong with his friend? And why had he never noticed what a sick bastard he was? Shivering with cold and dismay, he hurried home.

  Chapter 32. Henrietta Sings

  When he unlocked the front door, the first thing Alfred noticed was that his wife was singing.

  Now that’s odd, he told himself. It was a head-scratcher. He ha
dn’t heard his wife sing since they had first gotten married. The singing was coming from upstairs, from where their bedroom was, and kicking his boots off, he followed the sound.

  He opened the door to their room and saw with dismay that every inch of space was covered by piles of clothes and rags. Shoes, slippers, boots, scattered on the floor, coats, jackets, strewn on the sitting chairs.

  “What’s going on, Henrietta?”

  “Oh, nothing, honey. Just spring cleaning,” Henrietta said, cheerfully. “It was time to go through my stuff.”

  “You’ve never done anything like this before.”

  “That’s why it was time. I was sick and tired of these stuffed closets. There are clothes here that I haven’t worn in a decade. That I didn’t even remember having.”

  “I heard you sing. Are you all right?”

  “Of course, I’m all right, silly. It’s just that the sun was shining, and nothing hurts this morning, and I’m happy to be alive, so I thought that this was a good time to get rid of some of this old stuff.”

  “You’ll never manage to clean all this up in time for bedtime.”

  “It’s doesn’t matter, honey. You can sleep in Celia’s room while I’m done working on this.”

  Alfred stared and stared. Had she just called him “honey” twice? What had prompted all that? And what about the singing? Should he be worried? Well, maybe not, but he was going to keep an eye on her. Just in case.

  Chapter 33. Alone At Last

  That night, Henrietta lay on her bed, luxuriating in a silent privacy that she hadn’t enjoyed since she had been a young teenager. She had the large bed all to herself. Nobody lay next to her, snoring.

  It was a pleasure that ran through her body that was almost indescribable. She had space for her arms. She had space to turn around and stretch. She would be able to sleep for the first time without earplugs and enjoy the sounds of the night, the whoosh of the cars driving by, the odd police siren in the far distance, a dog or two barking.

  She had shut herself to these nightly pleasures for a very long time, ever since she had discovered earplugs.

  She turned around and opened her eyes in the dark. She thought she had heard wood creaking softly upstairs, and then quiet, careful footsteps coming down the stairs. She could have imagined it. But she thought she had even heard the front door being opened and then softly closed.

  She wondered if she should go and check. She was sure someone had slipped out of the house. Either Alfie or George Baxter. But she laughed at herself. For one thing, she was too comfy in bed to get out of from under the warm covers to investigate. It was her imagination. It had to be. Mr. Baxter was sleeping upstairs like a good lodger, and her husband sleeping at the end of the corridor, where Celia’s room was. She had heard his snores earlier when she had gone downstairs for a glass of milk.

  It’s my imagination, she told herself. Everyone is sleeping. Henrietta closed her eyes and drifted off. She thought dreamily about the new clothes and shoes she was going to buy herself with the money she had been setting aside.

  Later, much later, she woke from a pleasant dream to what she thought at first to be the sound of footsteps on the creaking stairs. Then, she remembered thinking that someone might have left the house earlier. But again, she told herself that it must be part of the dream. She had no feelings of fear or threat of danger.

  She turned the other way, pulled the comforter up to her shoulders, and kept on dreaming.

  Chapter 34. A Desire To Snoop

  Every morning George Baxter—the lodger—left the house promptly at 9:30 but never said where he went. Alfred and Henrietta had wondered many a time why their lodger insisted he was retired and didn’t work yet left every weekday morning at the same time.

  Not ungratefully, they also wondered why George Baxter—who seemed to be well off according to the expensive-looking brand-new clothes and shoes that he wore—had to live in a dusty attic instead of renting or buying his own place.

  As the days went by, Henrietta’s desire to know more about her lodger intensified. She spent altogether too much time thinking about him, wondering about his private life, and so, a seed of an idea wormed itself into her mind, one she couldn’t let go.

  The more she thought about it, the more sense it made. She was going to follow him one day and find out for herself what all he did and where he went. There was no harm in that. It was simple curiosity.

  She planned for days what she was going to wear, and how she was going to go about it. Then, she waited for the right time. And on this particular Monday morning, having geared up her courage, she got dressed and ready before breakfast and came down the steps holding her coat in one hand, her gloves and hat in the other.

  Sitting at the breakfast table, Alfred—who seemed to have moved permanently into Celia’s room without any further complaints—asked this new Henrietta what she was up to.

  “I hardly recognize you, you know?”

  “What are you talking about, Alfie? It’s the same old boring me you married like 30 years ago.”

  “No. I don’t think so. Something’s different about you, but I can’t put my finger on it. Where are you going this morning? And why are you so nicely dressed?”

  “Nicely dressed? This is such an old dress, Alfie. Don’t you remember it? You bought it for me for a birthday or something, like, oh I don’t know, like 20 years ago.”

  “No, I sure don’t remember. But you look quite pretty in it,” he said, and it surprised Henrietta to see a shadow of that old admiration in his eyes.

  “Well, thank you, honey,” she said, giving him a coy, flirty smile.

  “You’ve started calling me honey. And now you always look dolled up. Should I be worried?”

  Henrietta laughed. “No, silly. No reason to be worried.”

  “So where are you going this morning? I saw you bring down your coat and hat and gloves.”

  “Well, if you don’t mind, I’m going to go out with Nancy. We’ll go to the shops. It’s a sunny and pretty day today, and you’ll probably be visiting with your pal Oscar anyway, and I get bored, sitting here all by myself.”

  Henrietta caught herself saying too much. You must always remember to be succinct when you lie. The more you say, the more suspicious you will sound. Thankfully Alfie was a trusting soul. She could tell him anything and he would believe it. But what would he say if he found out that she was about to go tail the lodger to wherever he went?

  After breakfast, she gave Alfred a peck on the cheeks, grabbed her coat and stuff and started heading toward the door. The plan was to stay next to the magazine stand across the street until the lodger left the house, and from there on to follow. But before she could reach the doorknob, the doorbell rang, and Alfred shuffled hurriedly past her into the living room.

  “That must be Charlie,” he said. “I completely forgot to tell you that he was coming over.”

  “Today? Did it have to be today?” Henrietta groaned with frustration. She put her coat and things on the sofa and crossed her arms. At that moment, she heard George Baxter close his attic door upstairs and head down, step by step, on the creaking floor. What terrible timing. Her plan had just gone to the dogs.

  George Baxter stepped into the living room at the same moment Charlie Fox did through the front door. Introductions and handshakes followed, and within minutes Henrietta watched her lodger’s back despondently as he turned left on Ember Street, destination unknown.

  She was so angry that she could have screamed. She was even rude to Charlie who wasn’t to blame. She tried to take part in the conversation, but her heart wasn’t in it, so she headed to her room to mope. The opportunity had come and gone. So, she changed into her comfy home clothes and threw herself on the bed. She would rest for a while and then go downstairs to start preparing lunch.

  But on an impulse, she sat up. Since Alfred was busy anyway, she crept upstairs to the attic and put her hand on the doorknob. Would she dare enter the lodger’s rooms uninvited
? The temptation was gnawing at her. She knew that he was hiding something. She felt it in her bones. She wanted to snoop in his armoire and his chest of drawers to see what secrets he was hiding. She wanted to know what all he brought home in those shopping bags.

  Her heart beat violently in her chest. Looking behind her back to make sure that she wasn’t being observed—with a shaking hand—she turned the knob. Oh, but it was locked. Of course, it was. She slapped her forehead. She should have known, why would George Baxter leave his room unlocked? It was his private residence now, wasn’t it?

  Then again, what was so important in that dusty room that had to be kept behind locked doors? Why did he spend hour after hour pacing around the room, reading from her Bible? Her curiosity intensified. The answer had to be behind that locked door. And she knew that she wouldn’t be able to rest until she found out what it was.

  She paced up and down the attic landing, thinking, the obsession burning inside her. Then she remembered that she had a bagful of spare keys somewhere downstairs, and she was sure that at least once, she had owned a copy of the key to the attic door.

  She hurried downstairs and then back up, with her bag of spare keys. They weren’t labeled, so she would have to try them all.

  But she didn’t mind. She pulled the chair next to the keyhole, sat down, and began trying the keys one by one. She worked in a frenzy, with unsteady, shaking hands, knowing what a terrible thing she was doing. Moreover, she had to be on the alert in case Alfie or Charlie came looking for her, or—Heaven forbid—the lodger came home too soon. It was nerve-wracking. But there was no stopping her.

  When she found the correct one, she cried out with excitement.

  Alas, right at that moment, Alfie called out to her from the bottom of the stairs wondering where she was, and Henrietta—startled—dropped the bag of keys and almost had a heart attack. Looking at her watch, she realized that she had been upstairs way too long. But no matter. At least she had a way in now. Smiling with anticipation, she placed that key carefully in her apron pocket and threw the rest of them back in the bag.