“Yes.” Her eyes flashed when she looked at me, as if daring me to believe her. “Perhaps it was God’s will.” She threw out her arms. “Perhaps it was Mads who did it himself to leave us a little extra . . . he was in poor shape, as you know.”
“But you didn’t do a thing to hasten his departure?” My voice was weak, but still calm. My whole body felt as if taken with fever.
“No!” Another flash of her eyes. “And now he wants to dig the poor man up! Who treats his brother like that? Who will attack a defenseless widow—?”
“If you did nothing, you have nothing to fear,” I reminded her.
“Of course I didn’t”—she all but hissed the words—“but it’s the indignity of it! The suspicion!”
“Are you getting very much money out of it?” I asked, though I would rather have not. I wanted the conversation to be over more than anything else, and yet I had to ask.
“Yes.” Her gaze met mine, as briefly as the beat of a butterfly’s wings. “I do get a lot of money.”
“Then your troubles are far from over.” I added a smile to mask my fear.
I wanted to believe her. I would believe her.
What else was there to do but believe?
She was my flesh and blood, after all.
25.
Bella
Ithought the devil had forsaken me at last.
In front of me sat Mr. Jackson, the insurance man, with a bushy brown mustache and a silver pen in his hand. To his left sat his clerk, a man half my age. On his right-hand side was the insurance company’s investigator, a thin, tall, sandy-haired man, Mr. Samuels. We were waiting for a representative from our former insurance company, a Mr. Wicker, but he seemed to be running late.
“What is astonishing to me, Mrs. Sorensen, is that you thought there would be no questions asked after your husband’s death.” Mr. Jackson leaned forth in his chair; his hands slid across the glossy surface of his desk. I myself was seated on a high-backed chair in front of him. The plain wood already grated at my backside.
“Not so untimely, I think,” I said, clutching at a handkerchief. “My husband had a bad heart for years. It was only a matter of time—”
“Yet it happened on that one day out of the year that your two insurance policies overlapped . . .”
“I don’t know anything about that.” I lifted my teary gaze to meet his. “My husband took care of bills and suchlike. I know very little of such things.”
“Did you even know there was a policy?”
“Well, we discussed it after our first daughter was born, to secure the children. I believe he made a habit out of it after that, just in case.”
“Does it not surprise you that he died on that very day?” Mr. Samuels spoke.
“No—I didn’t know it was a special day before you told me so.”
“You didn’t know there was an overlap?”
“No . . . I only learned it when I went through Mads’s papers after he died, and even then I did not quite grasp—”
“Would you say your husband was depressed?” Mr. Samuels interrupted me. “Would he have any reason to end his life a little sooner than expected? He was sick, after all, and waited to die; perhaps he wanted to give you a boon . . . a little more than you would otherwise have?”
“Oh”—I shook my head and dabbed at my eyes with the handkerchief—“I really don’t think he would. He was a very religious man, Mr. Samuels. Very concerned with his soul.”
“Couldn’t it be that he worried about his family, of what would befall you after he was gone?”
“Dr. Miller swore it was his heart,” I answered, and added a few more tears. “I have no reason to believe that the good doctor was wrong, and Mads wouldn’t leave me alone to fend for the children. He was a good man, he would never do anything wrong . . .”
Mr. Jackson spoke again, while the clerk scribbled in a book. “You see why we have to investigate this, Mrs. Sorenson. There are irregularities here, suspicious circumstances—”
“And the brother wrote,” the clerk piped up, looking at Mr. Jackson, not at me.
“Yes, his brother wrote to us and advised us to take a closer look. That’s how we discovered the duplicate.”
“My husband’s brother is a difficult man. He never much cared for me, nor for my children.” I could not help that my lips twisted up with distaste. He had surely succeeded in making my life miserable.
“Why is that, Mrs. Sorenson?” Samuels asked. “Why did he not care for you?”
“Well, for a long time God didn’t provide us with any children, and Oscar grew resentful of me then.” I rubbed my aching jaw.
“Because you didn’t have children?”
“Yes . . . I thought it got a little better after Caroline was born, but then she died and he resented me again. I have three healthy girls now, but he hasn’t changed his mind. He maybe thinks I held back on purpose. That I denied his brother a child.” I made it all up as I went along, one lie clasping hands with the other. Had not the circumstances been so dire, I would have quite enjoyed it. As it was, however, much was at stake, not least my neck.
“His death will leave you a very wealthy woman,” Mr. Jackson said. “Have you given any thought to that?”
“No. I rather think I’m poorer for it, being left a widow. What good is money, then, if you have lost someone you held dear?” I sniffled a little and looked away.
“Are you yourself a religious woman, Mrs. Sorensen?”
“Yes, very much so.” I cleared my throat.
“So you wouldn’t lie about any of this?” Mr. Jackson asked.
“No . . . no, I would not dream of lying!” I lifted my hands as in shock.
“And you knew nothing about these policies?” His eyebrow lifted a little and the crook of his mouth too.
“No.” I dabbed at my eyes again. “Maybe it’s merely an act of God.”
When I finally left that office, I was rattled to the core. I had clearly underestimated Oscar as an opponent. This was not good. I walked on perilous ground, and I knew it. How long would it be before they found out about the fires? Everything could unravel.
My greed had made me stupid.
* * *
—
I did not like it at all, the scrutiny of the insurance companies, which kept pestering me and sending worrisome letters. Jennie cried in her bed at night because the children in school said her mother was a murderer. I could see the little rascals hiding in the garden sometimes; running off shrieking if they saw me. The aftermath of Mads’s death had quite ruined the new house for me; the wallpaper seemed gray, all the flowers withered, and the paint appeared stained. Everything was filthy. The crystal drops in the chandelier seemed dull with dust, the icebox reeked, and my pantry filled up again with more food than we could eat. The preserves in the cellar grew a thick crust of mold. The venom people threw at me festered and spread through everything. I found no peace, I found no sleep—this was no way to live.