Chapter 21: Linden Road

The house on Linden Road had belonged to my father, and then to my mother.

For sixteen years a man had lived in it who thought it was his.

We pulled up at eight on Sunday morning.

Ellen sat in the front seat in her navy dress with the deed folded in her purse.

Hoyt drove, and a hotel security guard rode in the back with his arms crossed.

"The front door is chained," Hoyt said, looking at his phone. "I can see it on the hall camera."

He swiped to another view.

"Harlan's in the kitchen with a suitcase. Blair's upstairs."

"Of course you can see it," I said.

"Your mother was thorough."

"I was a good student," Ellen said. "I learned from a man who watched everything."

She meant Harlan.

She got out of the car and stood on the lawn with her hands folded.

She looked up at the white house with its black shutters, and I saw her chin lift.

"Margo," she said. "Back door."

We went around the side.

My mother still had her key.

It turned in the lock on the first try, and the door swung open on the laundry room.

The house smelled of Harlan's cologne and burnt coffee.

I walked through it in my boots, with my mother on one side and Hoyt on the other.

The mudroom, the pantry, the kitchen.

Harlan stood at the island with a leather bag and a stack of papers he had been about to shove into it.

He looked up and saw the three of us standing in his doorway.

For one second there was nothing on his face at all.

"Ellen," he said. "This is trespassing."

"It's my house," my mother said. "I have the deed, and I have the board's letter."

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