Page 225 of Taken Away

Burke waited.

“He told her he was ashamed to ask.”

Silence settled between them.

Finally, Patsy looked back at him.

“Do you know what hurt Mabel most?”

“The money?”

“No.”

She slowly shook her head.

“It was that after thirty years, he didn’t trust her enough to ask.”

Burke’s pen moved more slowly now.

Patsy’s voice softened.

“She told me, ‘Walter, if you’d walked through that office door and asked me for seventy-five thousand dollars, I’d have written the check before you finished explaining why.’”

Burke looked up from his notebook.

“But he didn’t.”

“No.”

Patsy nodded.

"After that, she never trusted Walter quite the same way again."

Burke sat back.

“Did she tell you that?”

“She did.”

Patsy looked down at her hands.

“And do you know what she cried about, Sheriff?”

Burke said nothing.

Patsy’s eyes lifted to his.

“She said, ‘If Walter doesn’t believe he can come to me, then somewhere along the way I’ve failed him.’”

Burke stilled.

That was not what he had expected.

“She blamed herself?”

“That was Mabel.”

Patsy gave a small, sad smile.