Cynthia introduced her as Mrs. Edith Jones, drawing a slight smile but no offered hand.
"Please, just call me Edith." She bit her lip and began to fumble with a small purse. "I was wondering...I gave you a credit card. I'd rather pay in cash." She rummaged around and withdrew a large batch of crumpled bills, spilling several. Before stooping to retrieve them, she handed three one hundred dollar notes to Cynthia. "I don't remember how much you said it costs here. If you need more, tell me. Just give me back the credit card slip."
Cynthia took the money. "The credit card is already recorded but I'll reverse the charge if you'd rather pay in cash."
Edith Shipton looked concerned. "You've already put the charge through?"
"Yes," Cynthia answered. "Is that a problem?"
"I'm not sure," she replied, looking as if she were about to cry.
Fred O'Connor bounced into the room before the woman could comment further. He extended his hand, introducing himself and swinging into a cheery speech about the visual pleasures of wintertime in Ouray. Fred was so close to her she couldn't refuse his outstretched hand. She took it, but pulled back as if she'd touched a hot stove.
"I'm sorry," she interrupted, turned, and fled from the room, leaving Fred in mid-sentence.
"What did I say?" he asked, dumbfounded.
"It's not you," Cynthia told him. She turned to Dean, with a see-what-I-told-you look. "That woman has a definite problem." Her husband couldn't help but agree.
Dean finished dismantling the tree, cleaning up the remaining detritus of the holidays and packing away the delicate figures of a manger scene. He scraped the snow scene from the parlor window and changed the lock on the front door, an insurance company precaution mandated annually because so many keys were not returned. More of the red tape of running a lodging establishment. The phone rang twice while he worked, both times answered by Fred who sounded as if he was booking another guest. The second caller was a lady friend of Fred's by the sound of the muffled conversation. Nothing unusual about that. There was no further sign of either Edith Shipton or the boy.
Cynthia called the men into the kitchen for sandwiches. Fred was still gabbing on the phone so Dean shared with his wife the last of the turkey salad, extended mileage from the Christmas turkey of ten days earlier.
"Did you notice Mrs. Shipton's son had a different last name?" Cynthia asked as she cut her sandwich with her customary delicacy.
"Yes," Dean answered. "But we don't even know for sure Donnie is her boy."