He took his coffee with him. The two women stayed in the kitchen. The house had four rooms on the first floor, entrance, kitchen, parlor, living room. The whole place was solidly built out of good timber. The renovations were excellent quality. All the windows were new storm units in stout wood frames. The weather was cold enough that the screens were out and stored. Each window had a key. The front door was original, old pine two inches thick and aged like steel. Big hinges and a city lock. There was a back hallway with a back door, similar vintage and thickness. Same lock.
Outside there were thick thorny foundation plantings he guessed were chosen for wind resistance, but were as good as anything for stopping people spending time trying to get in the windows. There was a steel cellar door with a big padlock latched through the handles. The garage was a decent barn, less well maintained than the house, but not about to fall down anytime soon. There was a new Jeep Cherokee inside, and a stack of cartons proving the renovations had been recent. Theie was a new washing machine, still boxed up and sealed. A workbench with power saws and drills stored neatly on a shelf above it.
He went back into the house and up the stairs. Same windows as elsewhere. Four bedrooms. Alison’s was clearly the back room on the left, facing west over empty country as far as the eye could see. It would be dark in the mornings,
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but the sunsets would be spectacular. There was a new master bathroom, stealing space from the next-door bedroom. It held a toilet, and a sink, and a shower. And a tub.
He went back down to the kitchen. Harper was standing by the window, looking out at the view. Alison Lamarr was sitting at the table.
“OK?” she said.
Readier nodded. “Looks good to me. You keep the doors locked?”
“I do now. Julia made such a fuss about it. I lock the windows, I lock the doors, I use the spyhole, I put 911 on the speed dial.”
“So you should be OK,” Reacher said. “This guy isn’t into breaking doors down, apparently. Don’t open up to anybody, nothing can go wrong.”
She nodded. “That’s how I figure it. You need to ask me some questions
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now?
“That’s why they sent me, I guess.”
He sat down opposite her. Focused on the gleaming machines on the other side of the room, desperately trying to think of something intelligent to say.
“How’s your father doing?” he asked.
“That’s what you want to know?”
He shrugged. “Julia mentioned he was sick.”
She nodded, surprised. “He’s been sick two years. Cancer. Now he’s dying. Almost gone, just hanging on day by day. He’s in the hospital in Spokane. I go there every afternoon.”
ut> n
I m very sorry.
“Julia should come out. But she’s awkward with him.”
“She doesn’t fly.”
Alison made a face. “She could get over that, just once in two years. But she’s all hung up on this stepfamily thing, as if it really matters. Far as I’m concerned, she’s my sister, pure and simple. And sisters take care of each other, right? She should know that. She’s going to be the only relative I’ve got. She’ll be my next of kin, for God’s sake.”
“Well, I’m sorry about all that, too.”
She made another face. “Right now, that’s not too important. What can I help you with?”
“You got any feeling for who this guy could be?”
She smiled. “That’s rather a basic question.”
“It’s rather a basic issue. You got any instinct?”
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“It’s some guy who thinks it’s OK to harass women. Or maybe not OK, exactly. Could be some guy who just thinks the fallout should be kept behind closed doors.”
“Is that an option?” Harper asked. She sat down, next to Reacher.
Alison glanced at her. “I don’t really know. I’m not sure there is any middle ground. Either you swallow it, or it goes public in a big way.”
“Did you look for the middle ground?”
She shook her head. “I’m the living proof. I just went ballistic. There was no middle ground there. At least, I couldn’t see any.”