“Always,” she said.“She was a trauma nurse herself, but only worked for a few years after she and Henry married, though she kept her license up to date.They thought they’d be starting a family and she wanted to be home full-time.”She sighed and shook her head sadly.“But that never came to be.Charlotte couldn’t have children.They would have made wonderful parents.”
“Can you tell us about the morning you found Dr.Wainwright?”Dash asked.
“Horrible day,” she said.“I’ll never forget it as long as I live.My husband had already passed by the time I started working for the Wainwrights.It’s not easy finding a job when you have three kids and need the flexibility for their schedules.But the Wainwrights hired me and paid a generous wage.When Mrs.Wainwright was alive I’d arrive around nine in the morning to start the housecleaning, but after she passed and my kids were off at college, I would arrive at seven thirty every morning to start the coffee and make sure he had a light breakfast to eat.”She paused and looked off into the distance as she remembered.“He wasn’t taking good care of himself after she died, and I knew he needed me to be there to put the food in front of him so he’d eat.I was the same way after my Stan died.You just go through the motions you know.”
“Yes, I know,” I said, remember those days after Patrick had died.
“I remember we had terrible storms that October,” she said.“And it was raining when I showed up for work that morning.There was space for me to park under the breezeway between the main house and the pool house, so I parked there like usual and let myself in through the back door.”
“Was it locked or unlocked?”Dash asked.
“Unlocked, but that wasn’t unusual,” she said.“That’s the door patients would come through when Henry had home appointments.There was a mudroom and it split in two directions.To the right was the kitchen, and to the left was a room where he saw patients.It looked just like a doctor’s office.”
“Did he see a lot of patients at home?”
“Not really,” she answered.“It was usually older folks who didn’t want to risk getting sick sitting in a doctor’s office.”Her voice dropped to a whisper.“Or people who were ashamed of whatever it was they were coming to see him for and didn’t want to risk that receptionist at the clinic telling everyone in town what their ailment was.”
“That would be Noreen Goble?”Dash asked.
“Nosy Noreen is what everyone used to call her,” she said.“I wasn’t even from the island and I knew to steer clear of her.”
“What did you do once you came through the back door?”I asked.“Was anything out of place or looked like it had been disturbed?”
“There was a bit of mud on the floor mat and a few leaves and smudges that led into the kitchen, but like I said, the rain was relentless, so it was to be expected.But nothing else was out of place.”
“Did you normally come in on the weekends?”I asked.
“Saturday was my day off, and I’d come in for a half day on Sundays,” she said.“I’d prep food for his lunches throughout the week.So when I came in that Sunday morning I started the coffee like usual and then did the dishes in the sink he’d left from the night before.
“He usually came down by eight or so because he liked to be at the church early enough to greet, but he didn’t come down.”Her voice faltered and she looked down at her lap.“So I went upstairs and saw the light coming from his study.He sometimes worked late into the night and would fall asleep at his desk, but I think something inside of me knew it wasn’t right.I remember my heart pounding and how loud my footsteps sounded on the wood floor.I thought surely he would hear me coming and call out.He was always so friendly and sweet.He always made you feel like you were his favorite person in the room.But he didn’t call out.
“I hesitated outside the door.It was cracked just a little bit, enough for the light to come out, and when I knocked it swung open.That’s when I…that’s when I saw him.”She swallowed but her voice was steady.
“His desk faced the door, and he was sitting there in his big leather chair behind the desk, but he was slumped sideways like he was leaning over to get something.But the smell.That’s what hit me first before my eyes registered what I was seeing.Then I saw the blood.”
“You’re doing a good job,” Dash told her.“Can you paint a picture of his study for me?Through your eyes that morning.Don’t focus on his body.Just the study itself.”
“I knew that whole house like the back of my hand,” she said.“I tidied it up every day, and I knew where everything went.”
She closed her eyes and was quiet for a few seconds as she gathered her thoughts.“It was a man’s space,” she said.“Big, dark furniture and leather.His desk lamp was on and papers were spread out on the desk.His reading glasses were lying on top of the papers, and I could see him take them off and rub his eyes like I’d seen him do a thousand times before.”
She was silent for several moments, but we didn’t interrupt the silence.
“The curtains were drawn.That was habit too.He’d draw them at night when he worked, and I’d open them again the next morning when I came in to clean.There were bookshelves behind his desk.Everything from medical textbooks to the latest fiction bestseller.He loved to read.
“He liked to have a glass of whiskey at night while he was working and before bed,” she continued.“He’d only ever have a glass.He wasn’t a big drinker, but he said it settled his mind before sleep.The decanter was on his desk, and there were two glasses sitting out—one next to the papers Henry had been working on and another across from him.Henry’s glass was empty, but the other was full.”
“You’re sure?”Dash asked.“That the decanter and glasses were on the desk?”
“As sure as the sun shining in Arizona,” she said.
“The photos Milton took at the scene show the decanter and one of the whiskey glasses sitting on the bookshelf behind the desk.Henry’s empty glass was still in front of him.You’re sure the second glass had whiskey in it?”
“I just said so, didn’t I?”she asked.“But it wouldn’t surprise me in the slightest if Milton decided to make things easier on himself.The decanter and the glasses usually sat on a gold tray on the bookshelf, and anyone who’d been in Henry’s office would know it was a staple there.Even a moron like Milton would know that two glasses on the desk meant someone else had been in that office with him the night he supposedly shot himself.But Milton always looked for the path of least resistance.”
“What did you do after you found him?”Dash asked.
“I went back to the kitchen and called the emergency line.Then I called Josephine.I think I was in shock.I don’t remember moving until Milton walked in the back door with a couple of deputies.They were in the study a good while, and Josephine and I just sat at the kitchen table holding hands until the coroner came and he was taken away.”
