There Was an Old Woman

Chapter Forty-nine


Evie was halfway back to her mother’s house when the light in front of Mrs. Yetner’s came on and the front door opened. There stood Mrs. Yetner leaning against a metal walker and squinting out. Her hair had come loose and, backlit, it looked like a spidery halo around her face.

“Mrs. Yetner?” Evie said, hurrying back. “I’m sorry to bother you. You weren’t in the hospital, and I saw the lights on, and I thought . . .” The metallic scent of overheated power tools wafted out at her. “I found your glasses and I wanted to return them to you.”

“I’m afraid to ask.” Mrs. Yetner backed up and pointed to the floor. “Are those my glasses?”

Evie came up the steps and through the door. She picked up the envelope she’d pushed through the mail slot and shook out Mrs. Yetner’s glasses. With the lenses cracked and the frame bent, they reminded her of a mangled bird skeleton. “They were,” she said. “I’m sorry. I knew you’d want them back right away, but I guess I should have waited until I could hand them to you.”

Mrs. Yetner took the broken glasses from her. When she tried to put them on, one of the lenses fell out in pieces. “Well, no use crying over spilled milk.” She set the broken glasses on the hall table. “Where on earth did you find them?”

Evie picked up the broken lens from the floor and set the pieces next to the frames. “In a potted plant by the hospital elevator. I came up to see how you were doing—”

“You did?” Mrs. Yetner put her hand to her heart.

“Of course I did.” Evie found herself choked up. They’d barely reconnected, and yet there was something about her relationship with this woman, a simple pleasure in shared company, that she’d never experienced with her own mother or grandmother.

“Imagine that,” Mrs. Yetner said. “There they were, in a potted plant by the hospital elevator. I wonder how they got there?” Evie followed her gaze halfway up the stairs to where Brian was standing looking down at them. “Whatever made you look there?”

Evie said, “I’d been helping the nurse look for them in your room. Then I was waiting for the elevator and there they were.” In retrospect, it was amazing that she’d noticed them.

“It’s a good thing my nephew has already ordered me another pair. Haven’t you, Brian?”

Evie looked up the stairs again. Brian was still there.

“Is that chicken soup I smell?” Mrs. Yetner said.

“It is.” As Evie showed Mina the take-out bag, she realized it had begun to leak. “Uh-oh.” She hurried into the kitchen and set it in the sink. Mina shuffled in after her with her walker. Brian came in after.

“I know you mean well,” Brian said to Evie, “but my aunt is exhausted.” His shirtsleeves were rolled up and his pant legs and boat shoes were covered with dust. “She’s been resting all day. She’s still recovering from her injuries. The accident. The operation.”

“The construction,” Mrs. Yetner added. “Which somehow I managed to sleep through. My nephew is building me a new bathroom upstairs. Handicap accessible.” Mrs. Yetner spit out those final words as if they had a bad taste. “Isn’t that lovely?”

“That’s wonderful. I saw the truck outside,” Evie said. She hoped no one was planning to “renovate” the downstairs. But Evie suspected that if Mrs. Yetner’s nephew inherited the house, the only way the period-perfect rooms could be preserved would be in photographs, and Evie would have to take them.

“Apparently I need grab bars.” Mrs. Yetner turned to Brian, her face softening. “I don’t mean to sound ungrateful. Really, Brian, it’s very thoughtful of you.” She turned back to Evie. “My nephew is making the changes so I can live here instead of going into a nursing home.” She sniffed the air and shuffled to the sink where Evie had left the soup.

“And you’ll have someone staying with you?” Evie asked.

Brian answered. “Dora will be here soon. She’s making supper and staying overnight.”

“My nurse, apparently,” Mrs. Yetner said. “Evie, dear, why don’t you get down some dishes and silverware and we can talk.”

“Talk?” Brian said. “About what?”

“Nothing that concerns you,” Mrs. Yetner said, winking at Evie.

Evie felt a little bad for Brian. “Would you like some, too?” she offered. “I’ve got soup, sweet plantains, black beans, and rice.” She opened one of the take-out boxes to show him the black beans, releasing the smell of garlic and cilantro. Evie’s mouth watered.

“No, thank you,” Brian said. “Maybe later.” He opened a closet, pulled out a vacuum cleaner, and clomped up the stairs with it.

Once he’d disappeared, Mrs. Yetner sat at the table. Evie pulled two bowls and salad plates from the cabinet. She found forks and soup spoons in a drawer.

“Now he’s vacuuming,” Mrs. Yetner said, under her breath. “When he was little, he’d never lift a finger to clean up after himself unless he got paid. In advance. We used to joke and call him the COD kid.” She gazed up at the ceiling, which was creaking.

Evie took a cautious look to make sure Brian wasn’t within earshot. “Has he given up on getting you to sign away the house?” she asked quietly.

Mrs. Yetner stared at her. “How do you know about that? Finn must have told you.”

“I overheard your nephew asking about it. Then I found the agreement papers under your couch where Ivory was hiding.”

“Hiding? But Ivory likes you.”

“Apparently Ivory doesn’t like Brian. He was here late last night trying to get her out from under the couch so he could take care of her.”

“Take care of her?” Mrs. Yetner cocked an eyebrow. “He said that?”

“Pretty much word for word. He didn’t know I’d be here.”

“Imagine that. And you say the papers were under the couch?”

Evie nodded. “After he left and I looked underneath for Ivory, I found them. You know what else was there? The little whistle that goes on the spout of your kettle.”

Mrs. Yetner beamed. “I knew it. I knew I couldn’t have lost that, too. And Brian was here for the cat? If you believe that”—Mrs. Yetner lowered her voice—“I’ve got a bridge to sell you. My silver safety net? Pfff.”

“Safety net?” Evie said.

“Another of my nephew’s cockamamie schemes.”

“Maybe it’s a coincidence, but that’s the same term my mother used when I asked her about some cash I found in her house. And I’m wondering if Brian got my mother to sign an agreement like the one he wanted you to sign.”

“Oh, dear. Your mother signed away her house?”

“I don’t know.” Evie set the take-out boxes on the table. “Monthly cash payments were part of the agreement your nephew left for you to sign. Maybe he offered my mother the same deal, only she didn’t have the good sense to turn him down.” She ladled soup into bowls and set them on the table along with plates and glasses of water.

Mrs. Yetner pursed her lips and gave her head a shake. “My Brian and your mother?” She considered that for a few moments. “No. Oh my, no. I’d be very surprised at that.” She sounded so sure of herself.

Evie said, “The outfit behind it might be the same one that tore down a house a few blocks up.”

Mrs. Yetner looked stricken. “I thought Finn was going to put a stop to that.”

“He wanted to, but they moved the equipment over there while he was having one of his neighborhood meetings.”

Mrs. Yetner groped on the table for a little plastic container with compartments for each day of the week and handed it to Evie. “Would you? I need to take one of these. What day is it? Tuesday, right? Please tell me it’s Tuesday.”

“You haven’t lost track.” Evie gave Mrs. Yetner the pill behind the little door marked TU.

Mrs. Yetner took the pill with a swallow of water and set down her glass. Then she lifted a spoonful of soup and blew on it. Took a sip. She closed her eyes. “This is as delicious as it smells. Where did you get it?”

Evie told her about the little bodega not far away. “They tucked a take-out menu into the bag. I’ll leave it on your counter for when you’ve got your eyes back.”

Mrs. Yetner laughed. Then she turned serious. “So how is your mother doing?”

Evie hadn’t wanted to get into all the gory details, but it all came tumbling out. The hepatic coma. The acetaminophen poisoning. The rotted gas tank, and how the man at the gas station suggested that it had been vandalized.

Mrs. Yetner lowered her spoon. “Evie, dear, did it occur to you that someone might have been trying to do your mother a favor? I know you love her. But neither you nor your sister has been around.” Mrs. Yetner reached across the table and patted the back of Evie’s hand. “Perhaps it was a friend, someone who felt there was no other way to keep her off the road?”

Evie hadn’t considered that, but it was certainly possible, and it made her wonder if Brian hadn’t deliberately hidden his aunt’s glasses to protect her as well. After all, they hadn’t been under the bed or on the bathroom sink. They’d been nearly buried in fake moss. Putting the most positive spin on it that Evie could, maybe he thought it was the only way to slow Mrs. Yetner down enough to allow her hip to heal.

“But who?” Evie said. “Does my mother still even have any friends? Frank Cutler’s the only one who’s come to the hospital to see her.”

“He was at the hospital?” Mrs. Yetner’s eyes turned bright. “When?”

“Yesterday. I ran into him in the café. I told him she was in intensive care. He didn’t know that they only allow family to visit.”

“I don’t think that man even knows how to be a friend, not unless there’s something in it for him.” The comment didn’t surprise Evie. Frank Cutler could have pushed Mrs. Yetner from in front of a speeding truck and she’d have found a reason why it was self-serving.

Later, over cups of tea and Nilla Wafers from Mrs. Yetner’s cupboard, Evie said, “That’s a wonderful old map you have upstairs on the bedroom wall.”

Mrs. Yetner smiled. “It was my father’s, of course.”

“This neighborhood used to be Snakapins Point, and it looks as if it was once part of Snakapins Park. Did you ever go there?”

“I was very little when we moved into the house,” Mrs. Yetner said, blowing into her tea. “By then the amusement park had closed. It’s been Higgs Point ever since I can remember.”

“Your father must have known Finn’s great-grandfather. He built the park, and your father developed all of this land that was once part of it.”

“Of course they knew each other.” Abruptly Mrs. Yetner set down her cup and pushed herself to her feet. “So, are you ready to hear about the day the plane crashed into the Empire State Building? Because I think I’d like to tell you about it.”