The door slammed with a dull thud. I heard his old pickup truck start up and roll down the snowy street. The sound of the engine gradually faded into the distance.
I sat at the kitchen table, wrapping my hands around a cup of cold tea. It became quiet, empty, and somehow anxious in my soul, though I did not know why.
The old woman’s words surfaced in my memory again, clear and persistent. Do not touch the snow.
I shook my head, trying to chase these thoughts away. Foolishness, old folk’s superstition. But something held me back from dressing warmly and going out to shovel the yard as Vernon had ordered.
Fatigue crashed down all at once, like a sack of sand on my shoulders. The day had been long and exhausting. My legs buzzed, my back ached from housework, and the blizzard was raging so hard that everything would just be covered again by morning anyway.
What was the point of suffering now? Decided. I would not go out into this bitter freeze to drag a shovel around. I would deal with it in the morning if it was really necessary. Vernon was already far away. He would not see, would not know. And if anything, I would blame the blizzard, say it was pointless to clean in such weather.
I went upstairs to the bedroom, changed into an old warm nightgown and a soft robe, and lay down on the bed with a tattered book I had started reading a week ago. But I could not read.
The letters swam before my eyes, my thoughts tangled, returning again and again to the strange meeting in the store. Who was that mysterious old woman? Why did she say exactly that about the snow, about the yard? And why did she look so persistently, so seriously, so piercingly into my eyes, as if warning of something terrible and inevitable?
Outside the window, the wind continued to howl. The house creaked under strong gusts. I got up, walked to the bedroom window, and looked out.
The yard was drowning in pitch darkness. Only the weak yellowish light of the single lamp by the gate snatched swirling thick snowflakes from the gloom. The path had completely disappeared under a thick white blanket. The gate, the porch, the rose bushes—everything was buried beyond recognition.
A strange, anxious feeling seized me, tightening my chest, as if something absolutely had to happen this night. Something important, fateful, something that could not be brushed aside. I returned to the bed and lay down, pulling the warm blanket up to my chin.
I did not want to sleep at all, despite the fatigue. I lay there, listening to the howling of the winter wind outside the window, and simply could not get rid of the growing anxiety squeezing my heart. The old clock on the nightstand ticked monotonously, showing eleven at night.
Vernon was probably already far away from here, speeding along the snowy night highway, listening to the radio, drinking strong coffee from a thermos, thinking about his own things. What did he even think about lately, I wondered.
We had barely spoken in recent months, years. He would come home, silently sleep off the road, eat something without looking, pack up again, and leave. We lived like complete strangers under one roof, connected only by a marriage license.
When exactly had this happened? I sorted through the memories of the last years of our life together. Maybe it all started after we realized we could not have children. But that was so long ago, at the very beginning of our marriage, more than thirty years back. Back then, Vernon seemed to comfort me, said the right words—that we would live well, just the two of us, that happiness was not just in children.
Or maybe it was my serious illness three years ago, the surgery, the long, painful recovery. Vernon had become especially distant then, cold, as if I had become a burden to him. Or simply tired of me, of our monotonous life, of this old house, of my aging face, of everything.
I closed my eyes, trying to chase away the heavy, pressing thoughts. Tomorrow would be a new day. Maybe all of this just seemed this way because of exhaustion and loneliness, the winter blues. That is all.
I needed to pull myself together, do something useful. When Vernon returned in a week, I would cook something special, something delicious. We would sit down and talk normally, heart to heart. We had not really talked in a long time.
Sleep came in snatches, restless and anxious. I would fall into a fitful doze, then wake up sharply from especially strong gusts of wind, from the creaking of window frames. I dreamed of that old woman from the store, her piercing, all-seeing eyes, her dry, gripping fingers on my sleeve. Do not touch the snow, she repeated in the dream again and again, like a spell.
I woke up early, while it was still completely dark. I looked with sleepy eyes at the clock; it was the beginning of six in the morning. Outside the window, it was just starting to lighten a tiny bit.
The blizzard had finally stopped completely. The silence was somehow special, dense, ringing. I got up, threw a warm knitted robe over my shoulders, went down to the kitchen, and mechanically put the kettle on the stove. I lit the burner, walked to the window, and froze, not believing my eyes.
The yard was entirely covered in untouched, smooth snow, absolutely white. But from the gate to the house, to the windows of the first floor, led clear, very deep footprints.
Men’s footprints. From heavy, large boots. Definitely not Vernon’s. I knew his shoes, his size, his walk perfectly well. These were completely strange tracks.
Someone had come to our house at night, walked around the yard, and come close to the windows, while I remained completely alone. I stood by the window, clutching the windowsill with whitened fingers. My heart pounded so hard and fast that it seemed it was about to jump out of my chest.
I could not tear my gaze away from the tracks, trying to understand, to comprehend what was happening. Deep, clear prints of heavy boots led from the very gate straight to the house, methodically circling it on two sides, stopping at every window of the ground floor, as if someone were carefully studying the house.
Someone had walked around my house at night while I slept, completely alone, defenseless.
My hands trembled slightly. I stepped back from the window, pressing my palm to my mouth to hold back a frightened sob fighting to get out. Breathing became difficult. I needed to calm down, pull myself together, think clearly.
Maybe it was neighbors for some reason? No, that was impossible. The neighbors on the left, the elderly Petersons, both of them were over seventy. Such deep, heavy tracks were definitely not theirs.
The lot on the right had been empty for a year. The owners had moved to the city long ago. The house was closed up, and across the street lived only Mrs. Higgins. But why would an elderly woman walk around a stranger’s yard in a blizzard at night?
I forced myself to walk closer to the glass, peering at the tracks more carefully. They did not go chaotically, not disorderly, but very purposefully, thoughtfully. From the gate straight to the living room windows, then neatly along the wall to the kitchen windows, further to the back of the house where the pantry and the basement entrance were.
As if someone were methodically walking the perimeter of the house, carefully looking into every window, studying something, watching, checking. A cold chill ran down my spine. Goosebumps covered my skin.
Burglars preparing, looking for what to steal? But they took nothing. They did not even try to break in. The gate was closed on a simple latch. The lock was intact and unharmed.
The tracks led only from the gate into the yard and back. That meant the person somehow opened it, walked through calmly, circled the house, then just as calmly closed the gate and left without rushing.
The kettle on the stove whistled piercingly, and I shuddered with my whole body at the sudden sharp sound. I turned off the gas with a trembling hand, but did not even think about brewing tea. I had to do something urgently, make a decision, call the police.
But what exactly to say? That at night someone strange walked around the yard but stole absolutely nothing, broke nothing, smashed nothing?
I remembered our community officer, Gareth Purnell. I had known him for many years, ever since he came to work in this precinct as a very young man. Now he was over fifty, but he still worked diligently. He was known as a conscientious, responsive man you could turn to. I could definitely call him.
I quickly went up to the bedroom, dressed hurriedly, pulling on whatever came to hand: warm sweatpants, a thick wool sweater, and swapped my slippers for warm winter boots. I took out my cell phone and found the officer’s number in my old contacts. My fingers were still trembling nastily as I dialed the number.
“Officer Purnell, this is Alara Vance from Chestnut Street, House 17. Please excuse me for calling so early, but I have a very strange situation here.”
“Good morning, Mrs. Vance,” the officer’s familiar, calm, slightly raspy voice came through. “What happened?”
“Last night someone came to my house. They walked around the yard, left tracks in the… I got really scared.”
“I see. Did anything go missing? Did they break the door? Are the windows intact?”
“No, everything seems whole and in place, but the tracks… they lead right up to the windows from all sides, as if someone was purposely peeking inside or looking for something specific.”
Gareth Purnell was silent for a few seconds on the other end of the line, thinking.
“All right, I will come over right now. Twenty, thirty minutes max. Do not go out of the house for now. Do not trample the tracks under any circumstances, and check all windows and doors thoroughly. Make sure everything is securely locked.”
“Thank you so much,” I exhaled with relief. “I will wait for you.”
I put the phone on the table and immediately began checking the house. I looked around with new, wary attention. The house now seemed foreign, hostile, unsafe. Every familiar creak of the floorboards, every rustle outside the window made me flinch nervously and look around.
I methodically walked through all the rooms on the first floor, carefully checking the windows. All were tightly closed with latches. Nowhere were there even the slightest signs of an attempted break-in.
The front door was locked with two turns of the key and the chain, exactly as I had left it for the night before bed. It seemed everything was in perfect order, but for some reason, this did not calm me down at all. On the contrary, it worried me even more.
I walked again, as if drawn by a magnet, to the kitchen window, peering at the tracks again. Now, in the brighter morning light, they were visible even more clearly, even more frighteningly. Very large, very deep. The distance between steps was quite wide. Definitely a man.
Tall, heavy, large build. He walked leisurely, completely confidently, calmly. He knew exactly what he was doing and why he came.
Twenty minutes dragged on excruciatingly, unbearably long, like hours. I sat in the kitchen clutching a cup of completely cold tea in my trembling hands and literally could not take my tense gaze off the window. What if this unknown person returns right now? What if he is watching somewhere nearby, waiting for the right moment when I step out or get distracted?
Finally, bright headlights hit the window. I jumped up from the chair and looked out; it was the recognizable cruiser of the officer. Gareth Purnell got out of the car. He was a tall, heavy-set African-American man, a little over fifty, in a uniform winter jacket and a warm hat.
I literally ran to the door, threw it open before he could ring the bell. “Officer Purnell, thank you so much for coming so quickly.” I stepped aside, letting him into the house.
“Oh, think nothing of it, Mrs. Vance. It is my job.” He deliberately shook the stuck snow off his heavy boots, walking after me into the kitchen. His experienced gaze immediately caught the window, the view of the yard. “Show me exactly where the tracks are.”
We went out together onto the cold porch. The frosty, prickly air painfully burned my flushed face and lungs. Officer Purnell slowly, thoroughly descended the creaking wooden steps, carefully examining the snowy yard.
He walked right up to the tracks, carefully squatted down, examining each print for a long time.
“Boots, size twelve, maybe even thirteen,” he muttered thoughtfully to himself, clearly estimating. “Deep-tread sole, looks like work boots or combat boots, coming from the gate.”
He slowly traced the entire chain of tracks with an attentive gaze from beginning to end: straight to the living-room windows, then methodically along the entire wall of the house to the back, then back the same way to the gate.
“Very strange. Who could it even be?” I hugged myself tightly, wrapping up in the old jacket I had hastily thrown over my shoulders, shivering not only from the cold.
“That is indeed a very good and important question.” Gareth heavily rose from his squat, brushing snow off his knees. “Tell me, Mrs. Vance, do you have any serious conflicts with neighbors? Maybe someone took offense at something? Holds a grudge?”
“No, what do you mean? We speak absolutely normally with all the neighbors. We live quietly, peacefully. We do not bother anyone. We do not quarrel with anyone.”
“And your husband, when exactly did he leave for his trip?”
“Yesterday evening, around seven o’clock. He left for a long haul, at least for a week, maybe even longer.”