Blood in the Water(14)

Jessica looked up when he came into the room and then sat down on the side of the bed.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I just thought I’d get some work done while I had a free morning. Didn’t you want to go out to the farmer’s market this afternoon? It’s the last of the sweet corn we’re going to get this year.”

“There’s a garden hose on our deck,” Walter said.

Jessica blinked. Jessica was something of an idiot. Walter had known that for years.

“Not our garden hose,” Walter said, in the voice he thought of as “patient.” “Our garden hose is where it’s always been. There’s a strange garden hose on our deck, just thrown there willy-nilly. Just lying there.”

Jessica blinked again. “Why?” she said finally.

Walter sighed. “I don’t know why, do I? I just found it there this morning. This minute, really. A garden hose, plain as day, when it’s obvious no garden hose belongs there. Somebody was on our deck last night. Either that, or somebody was on the course, and they threw the garden hose up from there.”

“But why would they?” Jessica said. “Why would anybody want to throw a garden hose onto our deck? And does it really matter, Walter? I can’t imagine a garden hose did us any harm.”

“That isn’t the point, is it? It’s not if the garden hose did us any harm, this time. It’s the fact that anybody can get into this place and do anything he wants. Or else he’s already here. This is supposed to be a secure place. It’s supposed to provide us all with peace of mind. That’s what we paid for. It’s not living up to its part of the bargain.”

Jessica twisted her hands in her lap. “I wish you wouldn’t do these things,” she said. “You just get everybody all angry, and it never changes things anyway. Except that they don’t like us anymore, and we don’t get invited to things.”

“I paid for my house to be secure, I want it to be secure,” Walter said. “You’re too easy on people, Jessie. You let them walk all over you.”

“Just once I’d like to move to a place and settle in,” Jessie said. “I’d like to be just like everybody else. I’d like to have friends.”

“People just won’t listen,” Walter said. “They like to live in their illusions. I tried to tell them we were in for trouble, and here we are.”

“A garden hose isn’t trouble,” Jessica said desperately.

“It’s just the beginning,” Walter said. “That Michael Platte is a criminal, plain and simple, and I’d be willing to bet everything I have that Martha Heydreich isn’t the housewife she pretends to be. Well, we already know that. She’s hiding something. She has to be. What good does it do to have security cameras and security locks and guards and all the rest of it when you’ve got the danger living right here in your own backyard? We’re not protected from them, Jessie. We’ve got nothing to protect us from them.”

“Martha Heydreich seems like a very nice woman,” Jessica said. “She’s a little extreme, you know, in the way she dresses, and her mannerisms, and that kind of thing, but she still seems like a very nice woman. And she has such beautiful hands.”

“She has small hands,” Walter said. “I never trust anyone with small hands. They don’t know how to work, that’s what that is. They don’t do honest work.”

Jessica ignored him. “As for Michael Platte,” she said.

“He was arrested for possession of cocaine,” Walter said. “If his father hadn’t been willing to pay through the nose to get him off, he’d be sitting in prison right now.”

Jessica sighed. “Yes, Walter, I know. But it was never a secret, was it? They weren’t trying to hide it. And what does it matter, anyway? He’s had a little trouble. He’s young. Maybe he’ll grow out of it—”

“Maybe he’s been wandering around this place all night throwing garden hoses on our deck. I’m telling you, Jessie. There’s a problem out there. There’s a very big problem. And pretending it isn’t there isn’t going to make it go away.”

“Yes,” Jessica said. “I understand.”

“They’re going to regret it,” Walter said. “They’re going to see this mess they’ve gotten themselves into, and they’re going to regret it. It’s going to be too late then. They’re going to be murdered in their beds, and that’s if they’re lucky.”

“Yes,” Jessica said again.